Up to 270 new houses and a complex of offices could be built in Northampton town centre after the West Northamptonshire Development Corporation (WNDC) agreed to buy a section of land by compulsory purchase reports the Chronicle & Echo. The land includes the site of the former St Mark’s Church and the listed Maltings building opposite the town’s railway station, which developers knocked down without permission several years ago. Whilst the demolition of the Maltings angered many in town at the time, now that it is gone and this being a brownfield site I am more than happy to see it being developed in preference to a nice green field.
Talking of building on green fields, a group of almost 400 farmers who have been trying to get the cattle Market in Lilliput Road, Brackmills reopened, have given up their fight after WNDC planners backed a scheme to build two warehouses on the land. The market closed in 2002 following the national foot-and-mouth outbreak. It has been estimated the development will cost £25 million and create 560 new jobs in the town, but as we have seen in the past, predicted job numbers generally fail to materialise. The land concerned is between the current Brackmills industrial estate heading towards the village of Great Houghton. One piece of good news is that the WNDC planning committee meeting is likely to be the last held by the unelected quango before being wound up by the Government.
Good subject to get started on Rob, The British National Party should be pushing to the front of the debate the need for water, when agreeing to any development, the cost should be matched pound for pound on new builds, with the cost of building reservoirs to cope with the extra demand,
this would be a step in the right direction. Also it would encourage growth in more water rich areas of the country. and release the stress in the south east of england.
Cromwellian
Are you serious!!! The BNP owe £875,000, have bankrupted many small businesses, employ perverts, drug dealers and porn freaks in senior positions and you reckon they will be effective in campaigning about WATER!!! I do despair at times.