Ordinarily, we should be jumping up and down with delight at the prospect of a company taking on more composting. Not so with the new application by Hills at Mopes Lane.
To remind you, the first application more than a year ago was refused by Wiltshire Council because of inadequate consideration of HGV traffic, smell and a few other things. Hills has returned with a new application in which, despite a 70-page Transport Statement (which has to be read very carefully to see what it is really saying) and a plan for the inevitable smell, both of which are unconvincing, it has introduced one of the more momentous proposals to hit Purton in many a year.
When the composting facility was first approved back in 2007 it obviously needed access to the temporary bridge which goes from the Mopes Lane side of the railway line to the open countryside towards Pavenhill. It was always the case, of course, that the temporary bridge over the railway was just that ~ temporary. In fact it has to be removed by 2024 when the landfill closes.
Buried in the documents of this new application, and only mentioned in passing and with no evaluation, is the possibility of making the bridge permanent. Although the effect of this has not been evaluated it must mean that the traffic to Mopes Lane will barely diminish ~ ever. More likely it will increase over time.
If this application is allowed this would be a disaster for Purton. Why? because it would lead to the continuing usage of the open countryside towards Pavenhill for industrial purposes. History tells us that this would lead to further applications for industrial development (as we have seen during the last 20+ years). There is a neighbourhood planning process ongoing which is looking at land use (housing and business use) in the parish and it is very disappointing that this company did not discuss their proposals which will have profound effects on Purton and the parish lands. Very disappointing.
There are other disquieting features of the application primarily with smell. Even the predictions carried out by the Hills consultants indicate that the smell envelope is not far off the farm at the end of Upper Pavenhill, assuming the winds are predicted correctly. The predictions are based on winds measured at Lyneham, hardly close by. Yet in the year since the first application and this one, the consultants could actually have collected a year’s worth of data on-site and have predicted the envelope more accurately. I wonder why not?
On top of all that, there are no extra jobs; so no value to the local economy.
This is a bad application and needs to be dismissed. If you want to ensure that there is no further development in the countryside between Upper and Lower Pavenhill, would be concerned by smells potentially reaching parts of the village, and concerned by the ever-increasing HGV traffic that carves up the verges between Mopes Lane and Cricklade then please send a quick email citing Retention of existing composting facility, access and increase in throughput, Parkgate Farm, Purton (15/00401/WCM to: Lucy.Harding@wiltshire.gov.uk. The closing date is Thursday next week (19 February 2015).