Round 1 Engagement Summary - Glasshouse Lane (June 2023).pdf

Glasshouse Lane

Round 1 engagement summary

Engagement in numbers

• Mailshot sent to 448 local residents and 32 stakeholders, including ward councillors, portfolio holders and community builder

• 762 visitors to Commonplace website between 7 November (notifications issued) and 5 December (end of round 1 engagement)

• 595 visitors during consultation period, 21 November to 5 December

• Highest number of daily visitors on 22 November (130 unique visits) when public exhibition took place at Newcourt Community Centre

• Second peak of website visitors on Thursday 1 December (52 unique visitors) when second engagement event was held at The 100 Club

• Over 75 people attended the engagement events: 5 people attended the stakeholder session and 41 attended the public session at Newcourt Community Centre on 22 November; 33 people attended the event at 100 Club on 1 December

• 87 respondents provided a total of 231 comments via Commonplace

Glasshouse Lane

Areas of Support

• Acknowledgement that there is a general need for housing, with an emphasis on affordable

Main issues from all feedback received (survey and verbal)

• Don’t build on green space – preserve wildlife and existing trees (especially Walnut Tree); it’s not a brownfield site

• Negative impact on infrastructure/community – area already under pressure from development, difficulty getting GP appointments, too much traffic, unreliable bus service

• Traffic and parking – frustration at proposal of ‘car free’ development, busy roads, parking already an issue

• Building heights – ¾ storeys is too high, concerns re overlooking, design not in keeping with the area

• Bad experiences with previous developers not fulfilling responsibilities e.g. road surfacing

• Flooding/sewage issues

Demographic reach of Commonplace

63 of the respondents provided demographic information.

Relationship to site (63 respondents)

Glasshouse Lane

Responses by Age group (63 respondents)

Postcode analysis

60 individuals provided postcodes, all but one of whom gave an Exeter postcode. Distribution of respondents in relation to the site shown below.

Glasshouse Lane Round 1 engagement summary

Commonplace Survey data

The Glasshouse Lane site

From your local knowledge of the site, are you aware of any other constraints, issues or opportunities that should be considered? (23 respondents)

Key themes:

• Infrastructure can’t cope e.g. GP Surgery, school – 10 comments

• Traffic/busy roads/insufficient parking – 9

• Loss of green space/wrong place for development – 8

• Unreliable bus services – 6

• Flooding/sewage – 5

• Anti-social behaviour not an issue - 4

• Loss of Wildlife/Walnut Tree - 3

Overview of the proposals

How do you feel about our proposal to develop the site? (64 respondents)

Why do you feel this way? (63 respondents)

Glasshouse Lane

Other comments (add something):

• Lack of parking / not happy that it is car free - 16

• Negative impact on community - 9

• Increased demand on local infrastructure – 7

• Loss of / impact on wildlife - 7

• Size - 4 & 3 story blocks are too high/out of keeping with area - 6

• Over development of area – 2

• Pollution – 2

Design Options

Which of the two options do you prefer? (23 respondents)

What do you think about the proposed size, shape and layout of buildings? (45 respondents)

What do you like about the proposals? (24 respondents)

Glasshouse Lane

Round 1 engagement summary

Concerns about the proposals? (42 respondents)

Virtually all comments made reiterated the issues raised previously re traffic and parking, unreliable public transport, inability of local infrastructure to cope with additional pressure, over development of the area and loss of wildlife

New comments:

• Availability of more appropriate housing for existing residents who would like to downsize

• This development was not declared in the Exeter Futures Plan that visited Topsham a few weeks ago. Why not? Exeter Local Plan explicitly states that new homes will be built on brownfield sites to protect our surrounding countryside and green spaces. The proposal is completely at odds with what is stated in the Exeter Local Plan.

• What are the plans for the ‘community hub’?

• Will there be some community space allocated, for storage?

• Existing council buildings surrounding the proposed construction area are extremely degraded and should be attended first if improving the neighborhood is the aim

• Criticism re holding event at Newcourt Community Centre

About our design approach

Do you agree with this design approach? (33 respondents)

Our commitment to enhancing biodiversity and ecology

How do you feel about these proposed actions to enhance biodiversity? (24 respondents)

Do you have any other suggestions for enhancing biodiversity on this site and the surrounding green spaces? (35 respondents)

• Do all of the things on list, just don’t build the houses (17)

• Save established/add more trees (6)

• Community/herb garden (5)

• Don't believe this statement is genuine (3)

• Wildlife pond (2)

• Set up a community group with Devon Wildlife Trust (1)

Other general suggestions:

• Crossing between the shops and the site needs to be improved for pedestrians and general connectivity of the green space. Traffic is bad in the mornings, and people are concerned it will be even worse when construction works are taking place as well. Could a new pedestrian crossing be constructed pre-main start on site?

• Perhaps one of the flats could be a community hub/meeting rooms?

• Lakeside Play Area has not been upgraded as promised years ago.

Other items requiring follow up:

• Some local interest in downsizing to one of the new homes

• The site can be wet and some people voiced issues re local sewage capacity, with some residents concerned about regular smells

• There needs to be a better rendering (photographic, not illustrative) of the design at the next engagement event.

Glasshouse Lane

Feedback re engagement process

General belief that engagement was just paying lip service, especially as first event held at Newcourt Community Centre some distance from the development site and people couldn’t see what they were typing on Commonplace. Also, due to issues with Royal Mail deliveries, some people didn’t receive their event notification until after the event.

Response:

• Second event held at 100 Club in second week of engagement (1 December 2022), closer to site

• Second event notified by mail but also via social media, Commonplace news update, and email to stakeholders (including ward councillors) with request to share via their networks

• Issue re text boxes on Commonplace fixed as soon as we realised – switched from short text box to long text box so that people could see everything they typed

• This was the first round of engagement, with a second round planned for Spring 2023 when more detailed proposals will be shown and a response to first round feedback provided. People will also have further opportunity to comment when planning application submitted.