End of the saga?
Yesterday Somerset County Council granted planning permission for the new school in Somerton.
Although ultimately it is SCC’s decision to make, the fact is that South Somerset District Council’s planning officer recommended refusal.
So SCC withdrew the application beofre SSDC had time to formally consider it.
In the SCC Regulation Committee yesterday the objections of SSDC were brushed aside. The report to the Committee dismissed them as misunderstandings.
SCC formally ratified the planning consent and now the actual process of building the school can begin.
And Somerton will get the new school it so desperately needs.
A clever dodge. It appears that SCC is giving planning consent to itself! However since SCC has reduced its workforce to manage new school builds, all this work is now outsourced, so that it becomes the developer BAM who is putting in the planning application rather than the County! Clever way to override the local planning authority.
County Council clearly haven’t looked at the road infrastructure very carefully, as more and more building is taking place to the West of the town and the roads are left without any improvements! These are not misunderstandings. A 120 degree blind bend in the road close to the entrance and exit points of the new school, pedestrian access from the South and West of the town along routes without pavements, local residential roads to provide workplace parking… What is there to misunderstand?