Shottfield Close: List of Objections

1. Inappropriate Location, Scale, and Green Belt Impact

• The proposal is for 84 homes - a disproportionate urban-scale development - irreversibly altering the rural character at the edge of Sandridge Village which lacks sufficient services and infrastructure. The design fails to respect Sandridge’s village character, and the poor interface with existing homes threatens privacy and visual intrusion, especially on Shottfield Close. Claimed benefits are minor, site-contained, and insufficient to offset adverse impacts. 

• Affordable housing is inappropriately segregated and not inclusive.

• The site is open arable Green Belt land with a strong visual connection to Heartwood Forest and the wider rural area, preventing outward development and protecting open countryside. Claims that this land is “Grey Belt” are misleading, being based on selective, subjective interpretation of guidance, and must be rejected.

2. Access and Highway Safety

2.1 Outdated Transport Data & Inaccurate Trip Forecasting

• The Transport Assessment relies on 2011 Census data and pre-pandemic assumptions about travel behaviour, which fail to reflect the sharp increase in home delivery and service vehicle traffic in addition to 194 parking spaces proposed.

2.2 Narrow, Inadequate Access Infrastructure

• Shottfield Close is a narrow, quiet cul-de-sac, unsuitable as the sole access route for a development of this scale.

• The surrounding country lanes such as Woodcock Hill and House Lane are narrow single-track with passing places, no pavements in places, and poor visibility, are unsuitable for high traffic volumes and a danger to pedestrians cyclists and equestrians.

• Minor improvements (e.g. junction changes, inset bays, shared surfaces) will not help, and  major improvements (e.g. road widening or new thoroughfares) are not proposed and in any case would be impossible to implement.

3. Environmental Sensitivity, Flood Risk, and Biodiversity Concerns

• The site lies over a principal aquifer with high groundwater vulnerability; proposals to mitigate flooding are underdeveloped with no clear runoff treatment or long-term maintenance plans.

• Sewer flooding incidents have been recorded locally, but no foul drainage strategy or evidence is submitted to address this. Thames Water has confirmed that local sewage treatment works cannot currently accommodate this development.

• The field supports breeding skylarks and has badgers and bats nearby. The proposal's harm to the Green Belt location cannot be justified by claimed ecological gains which are not supported by a binding mechanism for delivering, monitoring, funding, and maintaining Biodiversity Net Gain for 30 years.

Conclusion

• The outline application fails to address fundamental concerns about infrastructure capacity, outdated and incomplete data, and the protection of local character.

• The proposal does not account for the significant impact on existing infrastructure, including highways, sewage treatment, and local services.

• Key transport assessments rely on outdated 2011 Census data and fail to capture increased traffic volumes due to modern factors like home deliveries, making trip forecasts unreliable.

• There is no comprehensive ecological assessment to fully understand the impact on local wildlife habitats, undermining the environmental sensitivity of the site.

• The design inadequately responds to the rural edge context, risking privacy and visual intrusion for existing residents, while the lack of detailed landscaping and green buffers cannot mitigate harm to biodiversity and landscape character.

• Crucially, the development would erode the natural settlement boundary adjoining Heartwood Forest and Hertfordshire Way, damaging the open character that defines Sandridge. Without thorough and up-to-date information, alongside robust infrastructure planning and design that respects local context, the outline application is fundamentally unsound and conflicts with key planning policies.