Last year, Devon County Council ran a consultation on proposals for a new £7.2 million primary school for Thorne Farm, Ottery St Mary, with land next to the school site earmarked for 150 homes to help fund the cost. The plan is to relocate Tipton School to this site – due to flooding concerns at its current site.
Last October, we pointed to the fact that not only would the site be just 1000m downhill and downwind of dust, PM2.5, PM10 from any mineral workings at Straitgate Farm, and directly downstream from additional runoff caused by mineral workings – but that the Thorne Farm site was in a Mineral Consultation Area, one of many that Devon County Council had plastered across the county.
At the time of Devon County Council’s consultation last year, the question of situating a primary school and 150 new homes next to a multi-million tonne resource of sand and gravel – which had been safeguarded by the Council but would effectively be sterilised by the development – had perhaps surprisingly not been addressed.
Outline planning application 20/1504/MOUT for the school and houses was lodged with East Devon District Council last week. James McInnes, Devon County Council's cabinet member for schools, said:
We've listened very carefully to local residents and have made a number of changes as a result of their input. A lot has happened with covid-19 since we held the public consultation and I believe that this multi-million pound injection into the local economy couldn't come at a better time.
If we are to build ourselves out of recession then what better way to do it than by providing the most modern educational facilities for our children, who have been among the worst affected by the pandemic.
Changes include a roundabout on the B3174 Exeter Road. But what on the subject of those sterilised minerals? To answer that point, Devon County Council commissioned a Mineral Resource Assessment which was delivered last month.
Evidence pointed to post-medieval sand extraction from the site. However, the MRA recognised:
The MRA also recognised that a significant increase in HGVs on the B3174 would be inappropriate given that "the B3174 provides the principal access to Ottery St Mary":
This surely begs the question:
If HGVs working minerals at the Thorne Farm site "is unlikely to be appropriate" for the B3174, how on earth can up to 200 HGVs a day from a quarry at Straitgate – just 1000m to the west of the proposed new school – be appropriate for the same stretch of road, particularly given the level of accidents on this stretch – some documented here – and when the impact of 150 cows crossing 4 times daily has still not been assessed?
For anyone in any doubt, this was the impact that 5 cows had on the B3174 Exeter Road recently:
Clearly the adverse impacts detailed in the MRA commissioned by Devon County Council – HGVs, noise, exhaust fumes, dust, visual impact – are not the sort of thing to put near any home, including those around Straitgate.
The MRA concluded, unsurprisingly, by saying that the millions of tonnes of sand and gravel near the site could not realistically be worked and were therefore "not of strategic importance":
The "significant constraints" highlighted could equally apply to the resource at Straitgate.
The Planning Statement for the new school and associated homes can be found here. Does the application raise any other points of relevance?
Exeter Airport had concerns about this development, just as they had with Aggregate Industries' proposal for a quarry at nearby Straitgate Farm. They were concerned that the operation of the nearby navigational beacon might be impacted, meaning "metallic substances will not be permitted within the construction of the roof elements", and neither will roof-top solar panels be allowed.
Traffic counts in September 2019 for the B3174 Exeter Road "the main highway access into Ottery St Mary from A30" were recorded as 6948 for a workday average, which again confirmed that figures previously put forward by Aggregate Industries were fiction.
On the issue of flooding for the proposal:
The design of the SUDS systems will prevent any increase in the downstream flood risk due to the development proposals. 9.11
The question is whether the SuDS have allowed for a 100 acre sand and gravel quarry upstream. One assumes not.
A Community Consultation Summary Report has been produced. As one respondent said:
Tipton school should be in Tipton, not on the other side of Ottery right next to a quarry.
