Page 16 - Ashbourne 08-02-2021

Could we get Councillors to plead for an application?
If the stakeholders could be positively engaged, and a strategy derived linking delivery of the Neighbourhood Plan aspirations and the Local Plan support for a bypass, hopefully with a “better than compliance” approach, then this may pave the way for a speculative planning application. This would always be a risky course of action, as the policy framework nationally and locally is not designed to encourage such approaches – instead, it is focused almost exclusively on housing delivery. However, the tactics would be to seek to get as many stakeholders on side as possible, because they can recognise the benefits for the town.
The aim would be to get to a tipping point from which Councillors were actively seeking an application because they could see the combined benefits of the bypass, and the delivery of the NP proposals and beyond.