The purpose of this stage is to seek the views of the community and stakeholders on the preferred options sites for development.

Throughout the Council’s consultation and engagement on the Local Development Framework, details of potential development site locations and possible allocations have been requested. The Council is publishing its Preferred Options report for the Site Specific Proposals DPD on 3 July 2008, which will be subject to a six week statutory consultation period. This report indicates which sites are preferred to others from the sites the Council is currently aware of. Consultation on the Preferred Options report will allow comments to be made on the preferred sites and will represent another opportunity for further sites to be put forward to the Council for inclusion in the version of the Site Specific Proposals DPD to be submitted to the Secretary of State.  This stage of consultation is therefore:

•  Preferred Options Consultation: 3 July - 14 August 2008.

All comments should reach the Council by 5:00pm on 14 August 2008. To view and comment on the documents please use `Related Links' > LDF Online Consultation.

To comply with the requirements of the EU Directive on Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) and the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004, the document at various stages will be subject to a Sustainability Appraisal which will be carried out by Waterman Environmental. The aim of this appraisal is to assess the proposed allocations and consider their relative positive or negative environmental, social or economic effects. A scoping report was carried out at an early stage for the Core Strategy, Development Policies and Site Specific Proposals DPDs. The Council has since carried out an Initial Sustainability Appraisal of the site proposals. This has assisted the Council in selecting the preferred options. The results of these appraisals can be accessed under 'Downloads'.

A sustainability appraisal of the Preferred Options has been undertaken and, like the Preferred Options Report, the Sustainability Appraisal Report is the subject of the consultation.  There are three other documents supporting the Preferred Options Report.  They are the Options Assessment Tables Technical Paper which summarises the assessment of the options, the Appropriate Assessment Screening Report which considers the Preferred Options impact on certain types of very important habitats, and the Initial Statement of Pre-Submission Consultation which is a statement of consultation on the Site Specific Proposals DPD to date.  All these documents as well as a Comment Form and Site Information Form (to propose a new site) can be accessed under ‘Downloads’.  Additionally, the Preferred Options Report and Reference Maps can be explored at the LDF Portal - see `Related Links'.

Do you have a site development proposal which is not featured in this report?

As part of this consultation stage, we are inviting new proposals for additional or alternative developments.  If you have a new development proposal that you wish to be considered please complete the Site Information Form which may be downloaded from the Council's website or completed online at the LDF Consultation Portal.  Copies of the site information forms will be made available for public inspection and cannot be treated as confidential.