Sir – Those rightly concerned about the potential traffic impacts of the 190 dwellings proposed at Wolvercote Mill should note the applicant’s transport proposals include ‘car club facilities’.
A general reduction in the ownership and use of the private car should already be an objective for the whole of the village (enabling policies might appear in the Wolvercote and other emerging neighbourhood plans) and not just from the 190 new households.
It is a truism that new development has become one of the drivers of change (eg new buildings are not sufficiently energy efficient but are much more so than they have been in the past) and a car club, started with financial contributions from a development that would otherwise be refused due to severe residual traffic impacts, could be designed to benefit all local residents.
This and other new developments should be required to provide appropriate parking spaces, the initial cars and free or subsidised membership for the first year (or more) to households both moving onto the site and in the surrounding area.
Parking provision on the site and, in time, the surrounding area, could or should be reduced leaving more room for play and planting.
These measures should be a prerequisite for new developments to benefit from the presumption in favour of sustainable development in national planning policy.
Daniel Scharf, Drayton
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