Call for Greater Community Involvement
Development of Golden Mile needs wide public consultation
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A call for greater public consultation about the future of the Great West Road from Chiswick Roundabout to Gillette Corner has been made by a local residents' group, as Hounslow Council prepares to start a public consultation on a detailed plan for the 'Golden Mile'. A "Site Capacity Study" was published in March 2015 outlining the vision.
The West Chiswick and Gunnersbury Society (WCGS) on behalf of the G15+ consortium of local resident group that includes Brentford Community Council has called on local residents to become more aware of large schemes being proposed for their areas, saying that 'developers are here today and gone tomorrow unlike the established resident communities who have to live with the consequences'.
WCGS has been holding talks with the Council’s planning policy team and has mde several proposals, emphasising the need for wide consultation and publicity. It has also recommended that public meetings be held in both Brentford and Chiswick to explain the purpose and process of the partial review and how residents can get involved.
A number of high-rise schemes are planned which will have a huge local impact, particularly the Lionel Road Stadium and its enabling residential development. A 32-storey building at Chiswick roundabout and other developments at Capital Interchange Way and the B and Q site are also on the horizon. In Chiswick, local groups continue to campaign against the Lend Lease development at Empire House and Essex place. Meanwhile Brentford is still wondering about its high street.
Hounslow Council is about to launch the initial consultation on the Great West Corridor plan review which it says will provide a "vision for change within the area (Osterley, Brentford and Chiswick) over the next fifteen years. This first consultation will be for key stakeholders with a full public consultation expected in summer 2016. Further information is available in a Great West Corridor Plan position statement.
"We don’t want a Wild West corridor — a lawless area where, in the absence of policy, cowboy developers take the planning reins into their own hands, riding roughshod over the above issues and others such as air quality —and building like the sky’s the limit," said WCGS chairman Marie Rabouhans.
The Golden Mile area earmarked for development
Marie said it was very important that residents get involved in local planning issues, and pointed out that during the Public Examination of the draft Local Plan. The Hounslow Local Plan was formally adopted last September. The Inspector's Report contains a section on the Great West Corridorwhich concludes that “this Partial Review is necessary to settle locally controversial issues such as the provision of adequate transport and other infrastructure, suitable locations for taller buildings, and the area's suitability or otherwise for large scale residential development.”
December 9, 2015
