Moulton residents continue campaign against new homes plan (From Northwich Guardian)

Moulton residents continue campaign against new homes plan

3:00pm Tuesday 5th March 2013 in News By Gina Bebbington

CAMPAIGNING residents have been spurred on after winning an early victory in their battle against plans for 148 new houses in their village.

Moulton residents have mounted an extensive campaign in their spare time against the plans for land, off Beehive Lane and Barnside Way.

Almost 1,000 comments have been submitted to planning authority Cheshire West and Chester Council (CWAC) and a committee of villagers has monitored each consultation response by an official body.

This scrutiny has even resulted in a u-turn from CWAC’s tree team, which originally said that ‘in principal the outline plan shows little impact on trees’ then two weeks later its report states: “Further to our previous comments we have just been reading through the access statement for the application and it seems we have overlooked a significant impact on trees.”

The team is concerned about the affect on protected trees in Beehive Lane and can no longer support that part of the application.

David Brown, from campaign group Moulton Matters, said: “We’ve been lobbying quite hard in the past few weeks on various items.

“We think that the way the council planning department looks at things is slightly flawed and we are trying to challenge things in a positive way.”

Residents have also raised complaints about reports by the fire safety officer, greenspace team and biodiversity team.

Clr Elton Watson, ward councillor for Moulton, said: “I think you’re doing a great job getting in touch with the case officer and pointing out some of these things.

“I’m gobsmacked by the amount of comments.

“It’s not a massive application like an incinerator or town centre review, it’s considered a small to medium sized planning application.

“For that size we would normally expect 40 or 50 comments so well done.”

A decision on the plans is expected in April.