Consultation Portal

Overview

The Wiltshire Core Strategy Consultation Document builds on the 'Wiltshire 2026 - Planning for Wiltshire's Future' consultation, which was undertaken in 2009/ 2010, and previous consultation exercises undertaken by the former district councils of Kennet, North Wiltshire, Salisbury and West Wiltshire. Since then, the government has introduced the Localism Bill, which proposes changes to the planning system, including the introduction of neighbourhood plans and the abolition of Regional Spatial Strategies, which identified levels of housing and job growth for areas such as Wiltshire.

As such, this consultation exercise provides the opportunity for you to have your say on new proposals for the level and location of new employment land to provide for job growth and new homes across Wiltshire. In addition, the consultation document sets out draft policies to ensure the sustainable delivery of new development within Wiltshire. These aim to maximise the benefits of development for local communities whilst at the same time conserving and enhancing Wiltshire's high quality environment.

The Core Strategy will be based on robust evidence about the challenges facing Wiltshire and the best and most realistic ways of meeting those challenges. This evidence has been gathered from a wide variety of sources, including commissioned studies. The views and aspirations of local communities are an important part of this evidence, and these views have been collected through both ongoing dialogue and structured consultation exercises, such as the Wiltshire 2026 consultation. This current consultation provides a further opportunity for the local community and other stakeholders to help shape the Wiltshire Core Strategy. Evidence base documents to support the emerging Wiltshire Core Strategy are available to view on the Wiltshire Council website at www.wiltshire.gov.uk/planningpolicyevidencebase.

A series of draft topic papers have been produced, which collate the evidence in a comprehensive manner. These will continue to be developed following the consultation, taking into account the response and will be finalised to support the publication of the draft Core Strategy. The draft topic papers include consideration of reasonable alternatives to the proposals presented in the consultation document, and give clear justification as to why these alternatives have not been pursued. The draft Topic Papers are available to view on the Wiltshire Council website at www.wiltshire.gov.uk/wcsconsult2011.

The Wiltshire Core Strategy aims to deliver sustainable development. A Sustainability Appraisal is being undertaken throughout the preparation of the Core Strategy. In simple terms, the Sustainability Appraisal entails evaluating all potential options against a range of sustainability criteria, and scoring them in relation to how sustainable they are. A Habitat Regulations Assessment has also been undertaken as European legislation requires the integrity of internationally important wildlife sites to be protected. Both have helped shape this consultation document. The Sustainability Appraisal and the Habitat Regulations Assessment are available to view on the Wiltshire Council website atwww.wiltshire.gov.uk/wcsconsult2011.

Consultation

Public exhibitions, staffed by council officers, are being held in each community area. Information about dates and venues is available to view on the Wiltshire Council website at www.wiltshire.gov.uk/ldfconsult.

The consultation period runs from 9am on Monday 13 June to 5pm on Monday 8 August, 2011.

How to use this document

Chapter 2 of this consultation document begins by describing the key characteristics of Wiltshire in a ‘spatial portrait’ of the area, and identifying six key strategic challenges which planning policy can assist in addressing.

Chapter 3 sets out a spatial vision for Wiltshire, and 10 'strategic objectives'. Together these provide a clear direction for the Wiltshire Core Strategy.

Chapter 4 describes the ‘spatial strategy’ and the three overarching core polices.

Chapter 5 identifies the local challenges and issues within community area strategies (outside of south Wiltshire). Finally:

Chapter 6 sets out the Wiltshire wide core polices which are required to complement the core polices in preceding chapters and contribute to effective development management.

 

How to comment on this document

The purpose of this public consultation exercise is to seek the views of Wiltshire's local communities and organisations on draft policies and proposals to inform the preparation of the draft Wiltshire Core Strategy. We would like to hear what as many people as possible have to say in response to our specific questions, which can be found within the consultation document.

You can add your comments at specific points within this online version of the Wiltshire Core Strategy Consultation Document. You can do this wherever you see an 'Add Comments' tab, which is usually located next to a chapter or section heading, or by a specific question within the text.

To add comments, you need to be logged into your Objective account and click on the 'Add comments' tab next to the question or the section heading. If you do not have an Objective account already, just click on the 'Login/ Register' option on the bar along the top of the screen to begin the simple registration process.

Alternatively, you can download and complete the response form under supporting documents and return it by email or post using the contact details below.

Please be aware that all responses will be publicly available and cannot be treated as confidential.

Next steps

Following the consultation, Wiltshire Council will continue to develop the Wiltshire Core Strategy, taking into account all the consultation responses received. A submission draft Core Strategy for submission to the Secretary of State will be prepared later this year and published for a final formal stage of public consultation. This document will include a comprehensive list of all existing policies that it is proposed the Wiltshire Core Strategy is to replace and those which will be retained.

Errata

Chapter 5.1 Chippenham Community Area Strategy

Please note that there is an area missing from Map 5.3 Chippenham Proposed Sites Option 1. Option 1 includes the proposed employment land to the north east of Chippenham, as shown within Map 5.4 Chippenham Proposed Sites Option 2 and Table 5.2. A corrected version of Map 5.3 is available to download under supporting documents below.