Bedford Borough Council need to build 12,500 more homes by 2040 and they are preparing a new Local Plan Review to 2040. As part of this process they issued a “Call for Sites” and several landowners in Honeydon, Begwary and Wyboston area put forward a large site which they called Dennybrook Garden Village. They have worked with Taylor Wimpey to prepare a vision document which shows a town of up to 10,800 homes spanning all the way from the edge of Colmworth in the west to Wyboston in the east and from the Bushmead Road in the north to Chawston in the south. The rural hamlet of Honeydon is shown effectively surrounded by a housing estate.

Bedford Borough Council have now issued their draft consultation on the Local Plan 2040 and they propose that residents of the Borough choose from 4 options. 3 of these options include a new settlement at Wyboston (later referred to as Dennybrook). Two of the three offer a choice between a settlement at Wyboston or a settlement at Little Barford just south of the power station (also in Bedford Borough); the third proposes a settlement in both locations. The settlements proposed in the draft local plan describe 2,500 homes at Wyboston and / or 3,500 homes at Little Barford.

However, transport models linked to the Local Plan describe scenarios of up to 10,150 homes by 2050 which is only a little lower than the number in the vision document prepared by Taylor Wimpey. This would be more than double the current size of Cambourne. Loves Farm in St Neots only has 1,400 homes.

The development would be on a completely greenfield site despite plenty of brownfield options being offered to Bedford Borough Council in their call for sites. Government policy specifically advises that brownfield sites be used before greenfield land. The land on which the proposed new town would be built is a quiet rural area surrounded by high quality farmland, livestock and wildlife. There are rare species such as Bath Asparagus, and orchids in the designated roadside nature reserves and prolific wildlife such as badgers, deer and the rare Small Eggar Moth.

The selection of the “northern route” for East West Rail and the government’s Oxford Cambridge arc appear to be being used as the justification for this and other huge developments in the area such as that proposed by Central Bedfordshire Council at Tempsford.

Staploe Parish Council consulted residents about the elements of life in our parish that they valued and wanted to protect in a recent Neighbourhood Plan questionnaire and the most popular responses were the peace, quiet, countryside views and rural setting. There was no support for extensive development in the parish and the need for homes from residents was tiny. Therefore, we are campaigning against this development. We are concerned about the implications for our rural way of life, traffic on our narrow lanes and flooding in St. Neots as the area is all upstream of the watercourses of St Neots. Residents will use the facilities in St Neots without the Council Tax or infrastructure money going to Huntingdonshire.

Please donate so that we can seek professional advice to challenge this new town.

The development would be on a completely greenfield site despite plenty of brownfield options being offered to Bedford Borough Council in their call for sites. The land on which the proposed new town would be built is a quiet rural area surrounded by farmland, livestock and wildlife. There are rare species such as Bath Asparagus, and orchids in the designated roadside nature reserves and prolific wildlife such as badgers, deer and the rare Small Eggar Moth.

The selection of the controversial “northern route” for East West Rail and the government’s Oxford Cambridge arc appear to be used as the justification for this and other huge developments in the area such as that proposed by Central Bedfordshire Council at Tempsford.

We are concerned about the catastrophic implications for Honeydon and the impact of huge volumes of traffic in Staploe, Duloe, Wyboston, Colmworth and St. Neots and flooding in St. Neots as the area is all upstream of their watercourses. Local services such as schools, doctors and hospitals in St Neots and Huntingdon are already overstretched and likely to be further impacted with little benefit to St Neots as Council Tax and infrastructure funds will go to Bedford Borough. St Neots station car park is usually packed with commuters to London and this development is likely to exacerbate this as not all residents will want to travel east west on the new railway as the Borough Council seem to assume. We believe that the use of greenfield sites such as Dennybrook in preference to brownfield sites such as Twinwoods (at Thurleigh) is against government policy.