5 hours ago
6
It is disappointing to see the huge urban sprawl at Gilston, north of Harlow, described as rejecting “car‑centric models” (A new town for the 21st century?, 9 February).
Big, ultra-low-density developments like this, far from rail-transit networks, are inevitably car-dependent, despite claims by their promoters. It takes more than building the primary schools necessitated by such schemes to get people out of their cars, especially as walks to school are extended by the very low densities secured by huge consumption of productive farmland.
Nor should the developers be given credit for “mixed tenure” housing. They managed to get East Herts council’s aspirations for 40% “affordable” housing reduced to 23%, using cynical “viability” provisions in planning guidance that enable developers to demand high rates of return and so reduce their obligations to provide affordable housing. And don’t forget that much “affordable” is simply slightly-less-unaffordable – and can include little or no social-rent housing.
The “garden town philosophy” has created a few “cookie-cutter estates”, but much has fallen foul of part of developers’ “blueprint for the future”: their unwillingness to provide much of the big infrastructure that is needed. In the end, like Gilston and several of the “new towns” the government is mulling, all they really create is car-dependent sprawl.
Jon Reeds
Smart Growth UK
News of yet another “garden village” arriving sometime between now and the next ice age prompts me to write before I’m formally admitted to a hospice for those still waiting on national infrastructure. We are assured these schemes need only 20 years of planning and another 25 to build. At this rate, the ribbon‑cutting will be attended by my great‑grandchildren – a theoretical cohort, as I don’t have any – assuming they can get through the traffic caused by the still‑unfinished access roads.
While the housing crisis is happening in real time, we persist with timelines that make medieval cathedral builders look hasty. Meanwhile, empty buildings across the country quietly decay despite already having roads, pipes and occasionally roofs. Refurbishing them would deliver homes within a single human lifetime, but instead we embark on multi‑decade odysseys of inquiries and consultations.
If the final “village” ever opens, I trust the hospice staff will wheel me out to witness this triumph over time, money and common sense.
Richard Eltringham
Leicester
