Locals from the south side of Harrogate are gearing up to fight to save a unique meadow walk from proposed development that will fulfil just one percent of the area’s estimated initial requirement of 4,000 new homes.
Residents, dog owners, ramblers and their children have been busy informing the thousands of walkers who use the footpath from Throstle Nest Drive to Stone Rings Lane of the details of the Council’s proposals to build 47 homes on meadows and farmland that was classified by the planners as a ‘special landscape area’ three decades ago following the rejection of similar proposals.
Local resident, David Broadley said:
We don’t want Harrogate to lose an invaluable rural amenity that is within a short walk of a large number of residents, and is used by the community every single day for the sake of just a tiny fraction of the required housing.
The proposals, tabled by the Council, without the agreement of the landowner, would see the meadows allocated as residential land and developed to into just one percent of the homes required, and with no proper consideration to traffic, school places or local employment opportunities.
Residents have already been busy distributing thousands of leaflets to homes on the south side of Harrogate and are urging walkers and residents of south Harrogate to ensure the protection of the land that was last under threat around 30 years ago.
Local children have even made signs to raise the awareness of the hundreds of walkers who use the path daily to the threat, and to encourage them to email or write to the Council to register their objection to the proposals.
Picture shows Millie Jordan Snape aged 10 of Western Primary School with one of the signs she and other neighbours designed to encourage walkers to help save the meadowland walk near Stone Rings Lane and Throstle Nest Drive.
