CAMPAIGNERS battling the Redditch Eastern Gateway development have hit out after Bromsgrove planners took a step nearer to approving the northern section of the project.
The site – comprising 37 per cent of the total area – will comprise a storage and distribution centre covering 34,041sqm with a service yard with 106 loading bays for heavy goods vehicles (HGVs) and parking for 125 more.
On Monday evening, October 7, Bromsgrove councillors voteed unanimously to delegate final decision to its Head of Planning and Regeneration.
The plans had previously been approved by Stratford planning committee earlier this month.
However Winyates Green resident and member of the Eastern Gateway Steering Group, Len Quartly, said both Bromsgrove and Stratford planning committees had failed to adhere to their own terms of procedure.
“The procedure established and minuted by by Stratford planners, who set up the Steering Group in the first place, was that it should consider matters before they went to committee, and this has not happened,” said Mr Quartly.
“Our only involvement has been with the HGV routing plan and I think what has happened now is quite disgraceful.”
The approved plan, for a mystery client, also includes 469 car park spaces, space for 60 bicycles plus bus and smoking shelters.
The Steering Group was designed to be made up of local residents and councillors from Winyates Green, Mappleborough Green, Studley and Warwickshire and Worcestershire County Councils.
However under the chairmanship of Worcestershire’s Coun Ken Pollock it rarely met, leaving local representatives frustrated at their lack of input into the development.
The Redditch Eastern Gateway is a massive 80 acre industrial / distribution scheme straddling the A4023 Coventry Highway in Redditch and backing on to the A435.
Attention now turns to the southern part of the development which lies in Stratford district.
