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| Seals resting by the River Stour. Nick Smith |
2013 has been a busy year so
far for consultations by Canterbury City Council, in addition to the Draft
Local Plan we have submitted a response to the Draft Environment Strategy.
The consultation document can be found here consultation.pdf
Our response to it follows here:
Theme 1: Valuing our built and natural heritage
Priority 1.1: Valuing our built heritage:
Action 3: Protect and preserve Westgate Towers
Measures: Strategy of traffic management to protect
Towers.
We would add:
“The strategy will involve first seeking to implement a range of
sustainable transport initiatives to provide a variety of alternative ways for
people to travel in and around the city other than in their cars; and
thereafter to seek the closure of the Towers to vehicular traffic.”
Coppicing Insert:
We are very pleased to see
the insert about coppicing. There is a huge lack of understanding with regards
this traditional practice of woodland management that also improves
biodiversity. It is excellent to the Council promoting it.
Priority 1.2: Valuing the Natural Environment:
What we are aiming to
achieve:
We
would add ‘Improving biodiversity’ and also ‘Encouraging more environmentally
sustainable ways of living.’
We would replace ‘Increased
use and appreciation of nature’ with ‘Increased understanding of and respect
for nature.’
Action 7:
We would add to 3rd
column: ‘Increase biodiversity, through re-introducing and attracting more
native flora and fauna into the park’.
Action 8:
As above.
Action 9:
Excellent. Could we clarify
whether that means all council sites, i.e. office sites as well as parks and
gardens?
Action 11:
Excellent
Action 12:
Excellent.
We would add that the
council will encourage the same of Canterbury Community in Bloom. I am happy to
assist with this as I am now on the committee. (Jo Kidd)
We
would also like to see further increase in the amount of wild flower strips in
areas that are presently regularly mown and encourage community wildflower
sowing.
Action 14:
Excellent. We would add
something in here about working in partnership with local schools, universities
and civil society groups (e.g. Abbot’s Mill Project is working on a programme
of outdoor learning and sustainable living in partnership with Christ Church
University and Simon Langton
Girls School
Theme 2 – Living ‘well’ within our environmental
limits:
Priority 2.1: Waste and Recycling
We strongly agree with the
new waste collection scheme, the intention to achieve the highest recycling
rate in Kent
Priority 2.2: Reducing our environmental footprint:
We support all of these
aims.
We would add that:
·
We need an
education/awareness programme on reducing consumption and packaging – i.e.
reduce and reuse before recycle.
·
We
should be working towards Canterbury District as a plastic-bag free zone by
2016 and lobby supermarkets and other retailers to reduce the amount of
packaging they use and accept from suppliers.
·
There should be more incentives and support for
green/environmentally sustainable/low carbon businesses, including those
proposing the use of renewable energy.
·
The City Council should be encouraging (possibly through
financial incentives) developers who own business parks and large
industrial/retail buildings to install solar PV arrays on the roofs of their
units. This could reduce the need for prime agricultural land being taken up
with renewable energy schemes. Canterbury City Partnership and Canterbury 4
Business could provide more information to developers and current site owners
about the economic return on investment into renewables.
·
The City Council should be encouraging (via an
awareness-raising and support programme) schools and owners of any large
building to install solar PV arrays. These could be as community energy
schemes.
Priority 2.3: Tackling Pollution/ Priority 2.4:
Changing Behaviour:
We strongly agree that:
“…one of the main pollution problems in the Canterbury District is air
pollution related to traffic congestion.”
We feel that actions
proposed in 2.3 and 2.4 lack specificity. If the reason for this is because
such actions will be specified in the forthcoming Transport Strategy then this
needs to be stated. In the absence of this we feel that, in addition to the
actions proposed in 2.3 (28 and 29)
and 2.4 (36, 37, 38) the following
sustainable transport measures to increase the modal use of sustainable means transport
and reduce that of cars should be implemented as a matter of urgency and a
timetable for their implementation included in the Environment Strategy:
Walking
a) Pedestrian priority measures that ensure that
pedestrians be given priority for crossing all roads with the minimum of delay.
b) Vehicle speeds in residential streets, throughout the
city and near all schools and children’s play limited to 20mph.
Bus
a) Bus priority measures
along the main routes into the City, including the removal of some on-street parking where such
parking prevents the construction of bus lanes. In such cases, residents should
be given ample notice and alternative parking arrangements provided if unavailable.
b) Real-time bus information
at every major bus stop by 2016.
c) Residents of all new
developments to receive free bus travel for a year.
d) The provision of ‘fast’
bus links into the city, at least every 10 minutes, including services to/from
Chartham and Thanington Without.
e) Bus priority measures and bus lanes through
Wincheap and through the industrial estate.
f) The creation of off-street parking through
multi-level parking on the industrial estate to enable the removal of on-street
parking on Wincheap, to enable the above.
Cycling
a) A segregated cycle route on New Dover Road New Dover Road
b) A cycle route from Sturry to link to the
existing ‘Riverside’ route to provide a direct, off road cycle route directly
into the centre of Canterbury
c) Cycle lanes to link any new development in
Hersden to the cycle lanes proposed above for Sturry.
d) A cycle lane on the A28
(at times a shared bus/cycle lane) all the way up from the Sturry direction to
the Military/Tourtel Road
e) A cycle lane on the Whitstable Road
f) Direct, easy cycle and
pedestrian access from Thanington Without to the Great Stour Way
g) Cycle priority measures
to enable cyclists from the south part of Wincheap to easily and safely cross
the A28 and then be able to access the Horses and Goats underpass route into
the city centre.
h) Investigation of the use of Broad Oak Road
New Development
·
All new major
new development to be situated near existing transport hubs and on major public
transport corridors.
·
Housing density to
be as high as possible on all new development.
·
Residents of new
developments to receive free bus travel for a year.
·
Parking on new
developments to be available at the edge of such developments, for an annual
fee, which is then put into a fund for sustainable transport measures.
·
Car-clubs to be
established on any new major development and throughout the existing central
and inner city.
·
Robust support for car-sharing
measures/kentjourneyshare to be promoted at any new major development.
·
The number of
car parking spaces per unit to be limited to less than one per household on any
major new development.
·
Each new major
development to have a Travel Centre on-site.
·
All new
development to provide traffic free segregated cycle routes and ‘home zones’
with residential streets that are safe for cycling through low vehicle speeds
of a maximum of 20mph.
·
Walking and
cycling greenways, pedestrian-friendly street-design, and ‘filtered
permeability’ to be ‘built-in’ features of any new major development.
·
Vigorous promotion
of car-sharing and car clubs in Thanington Without/Chartham and for commuters
from Ashford.
·
Sustainable
transport measures to be ‘built into’ any proposed new developments. All
development to be designed to be public transport centred and be easiest to
access by sustainable means of transport rather than being easiest to access by
car.
·
Sustainable
transport measures provide better pound for pound value than road schemes[1].
Developer’s contributions to be sought for such schemes only.
·
For measures to
improve air quality and cut air pollution to be most effective sustainable
transport measures to be introduced instead
of, rather than alongside, new
infrastructure to facilitate car travel.
We
urge the council to adopt fully the recommendations of Lynn Sloman’s (Transport for Quality of Life) A Sustainable Transport Blueprint
for Canterbury
Priority 2.4: Changing Behaviour:
Action 34:
We
would add that we need to implement a scheme where householders can get free
energy audits of their homes; this could help the local economy through
additional jobs in supplying and fitting energy saving measures.
Action 39:
We would add a specific
action regarding dropping/disposal of cigarette butts, which seems to be a huge
problem across the city. These contain chemicals that are toxic to wildlife and
can easily be ingested or leached into the water course. They also take
hundreds of years to degrade.
Priority 3.1: Infrastructure:
Action 41:
We are concerned that a Park
and Ride site in the north west
a) It would lead to a modal shift from sustainable
transport to car travel from Faversham, Whitstable and surrounding areas,
undermining, and possibly causing the loss of, some of public transport
services that many rely on.
b) It would increase greenhouse gas emissions
c) It would increase vehicular traffic and worsen air
quality in Harbledown.
We therefore disagree with
this policy.
Priority 3.2: Environmental Leadership:
We support all of these
aims.
We would also like to see
specific reference to aims to increase the number of council sites that
generate renewable electricity.
Appendix 7:
We note that Serco contract
vehicles represent the majority of greenhouse gas emissions in the district. We
would be interested to know whether this is purely down to number or whether it
is also down to behaviour/lack of awareness. For example, we have noted that,
whilst buses now turn off their engines whilst stationary at the St. Dunstan’s
level crossing, Serco vehicles drivers never do. We are sure that this very
high percentage of the total greenhouse gas emissions could be reduced with a
better environmental education awareness programme with staff.
General comments/additional measures that we would
like to see included:
We feel that all of the measures
and aims in the ‘What we are aiming to achieve’ columns need to be SMARTer,
i.e. include outputs as well as outcomes (i.e. actual numbers, dates and
percentages) so that it will be clearer as to whether or not they have been
met.
We would also like to see specific designations of land for
smaller scale cooperative farming use, for example for community allotments and
cooperative small-holdings, particularly those using organic, stock-free
farming and permaculture methods.
We would like to see stronger restrictions on horse ownership.
Horses occupy large areas of prime agricultural land that would be better used
for improving our food security. The keeping of horses generates a lot of
greenhouse gases. Many horses are kept in fields that are too small and their
health and well-being is compromised. This problem is exacerbated during a
recession when many people struggle financially with the care of their horses.
Afford the strongest level of
protection to all areas of natural vegetation surrounding Canterbury
Green corridors need to be designated that can form natural
linkages between presently fragmented areas of natural vegetation.
Have
a targeted urban tree-planting programme (including planting along roadsides in
the City) and green up areas of the towns/cities (e.g. living walls, green
roofs and permeable membranes on car parks) as part of the strategy to improve
air quality, reduce greenhouse emissions and reduce noise pollution.
Encourage and promote
more green business and renewable energy schemes in and into the City/District,
including, undertaking a feasibility study into the potential of wind
generation on high points around the City.
Insist that all new
builds comply with Level 5 or 6 standards of the Code for Sustainable Homes
(i.e. are carbon neutral, include a rainwater harvesting or recycling system for grey-water and energy
and water-saving technologies).
Look favourably (in
terms of planning, finance, business rates/council tax, for example) upon
residents and businesses who seek to enhance their premises and surroundings in
terms of sustainability and biodiversity.
Set targets for reducing
the amount of concrete used in all new builds.
Identify several public
buildings on which ‘green roofs’ could be planted.
Identify ways of
increasing areas of coppice woodland and better managing existing areas of
coppice woodland (including the Blean but also smaller pockets of woodland) to
enable us to increase our use of wood-fuel as opposed to fossil fuels.
We feel that this strategy
should include the council’s position on fracking. Canterbury District Green
Party (along with thousands of residents) is extremely concerned about the
threat of companies being given permission to drill for oil and gas. Evidence is mounting
that shale and coal bed methane gas extraction methods are extremely damaging.
They deplete and pollute ground water supplies, increase greenhouse gas levels,
cause earth tremors and destroy natural habitats.
We would strongly (and
publically) support the City Council in declaring Canterbury
List of the Harmed:
For more information on
fracking and why so many people are concerned:
Further,
we believe that:
·
Canterbury City Council should only contract with providers who have a
clear and robust ethical and environmental policy and who are not included on
boycott list for practices that harm the environment.
·
The City Council should give priority to providers who are social and
environmental enterprises and can demonstrate a clear commitment to the
environment.
·
Canterbury
·
All major universities and the further education colleges should
improve their links to the rest of the City and, particular, extend their
sustainability targets beyond the institutions themselves – i.e. take more
consideration of long-term sustainability of the City and of the City’s
capacity to absorb more students. There should be quotas on overall student
numbers set by the Canterbury Environment Group with additional
stakeholders/partners, including the Canterbury Society as a representative of
residents.
·
The remit and power of the Canterbury Partnership Environment Group
should be extended so that it has a greater influence on strategic decisions
throughout the city.
[1] Dr Lynn
Sloman, A Sustainable Transport Blueprint for Canterbury , ( Executive Summary), Jan 2013
