Withdrawal of Stevenage common enclosure plans
Stevenage Borough Council has heeded our advice and has withdrawn its application to fence off part of Norton Green Common. The common is on the south-west side of Stevenage in Hertfordshire, immediately to the west of the A1(M). The council had applied to the Secretary of State for Environment for consent to erect a fence…
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Land at Breaky Bottom open to the public
After a long battle by Action for Access and the Open Spaces Society, walkers can now use some of the Access Land (1) at Breaky Bottom, near Lewes. A new stile has been erected. The grid reference is TQ404054 (2). Our local correspondent Chris Smith says “The new access land is a great place to…
Read MoreWind turbines rejected on Rooley Moor, Rochdale
Rochdale Borough Council has refused planning permission to Coronation Power Ltd for 12 wind turbines and other infrastructure on Rooley Moor. The council rejected the application on a number of grounds. It considered that the development would be inappropriate in the green belt and it would have a detrimental impact on the wild and tranquil…
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The Big Pathwatch
This summer, with funding from the Ramblers Holidays Charitable Trust, the Ramblers are launching a survey of all the public paths in England and Wales as shown on Ordnance Survey maps. The Big Pathwatch will launch on Monday 13 July and the Ramblers will be providing a handy new, free app for your phone so…
Read MoreWe fight enclosure of Stevenage common
We have objected to a plan by Stevenage Borough Council to fence off part of Norton Green Common on the south-west side of Stevenage in Hertfordshire, immediately to the west of the A1(M). The council has applied to the Planning Inspectorate for consent to erect works on common land under section 38 of the Commons…
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Talking commons in Canada
The biennial conference of the International Association for the Study of the Commons (IASC) was held this year in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. Kate Ashbrook attended, generously funded by the Elinor Ostrom Award of which the society was a winner in 2013. Here is her summary of her visit. I travelled with John Powell from the Countryside and…
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Fighting on
‘Opinion’ by our general secretary, Kate Ashbrook, was published in the summer 2015 issue of Open Space. When David Cameron announced on 8 May that he was forming a government, he boasted of his achievements over the last five years and what he would do in the next five. Not surprisingly there was no mention…
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Booker housing plans rejected
We are delighted that planning inspector Christa Masters has rejected plans to build two houses next to Booker Common and a public bridleway in Buckinghamshire. Mr P Wells appealed against Wycombe District Council’s refusal of his application for two detached dwellings next to the former Live and Let Live pub. The developers appeared to ignore…
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Yateley Common fencing-plan withdrawn
Hampshire County Council and the Hampshire and Isle of Wight Wildlife Trust have withdrawn their controversial plan to erect fencing on Yateley Common. They had applied to the Planning Inspectorate for consent, under section 38 of the Commons Act 2006, to erect 24 kilometres of fencing on the common to enable it to be grazed.…
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Major victory for green spaces of Wales
The Welsh Government has decided not to ape England’s village-greens law. In December 2013 we learnt that the Welsh Government was proposing, in its Planning (Wales) Bill, to copy the provisions of England’s egregious Growth and Infrastructure Act 2013 for greens. In other words, it proposed that applications for greens should be outlawed when land had been identified for planning,…
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