Church Fields Victory!

Cllr Wyn Kidger leads the rally at Church Fields

Readers will remember that we have been battling with Developers to save a greenfield site at Church Fields in East Ardsley. We have campaigned hard with our MARC (Morley against reckless construction) colleagues and with the community in East Ardsley to put the strong case against housing development on this highly valued green field.

On Thursday we held a rally at the site prior to the Plans Panel site visit organised by my good colleague and Church Fields Campaign Co-ordinator Cllr Wyn Kidger. Over 50 people attended and it was great to see the community joining with us, waving banners and giving a clear message to Councillors on the Plans Panel about how important this Greenfield site is.

My colleague Cllr Tom Leadley sits on the Panel looking into this application. The Panel received a position statement report to consider which covers the areas of concern - such as traffic congestion and the impact on local services such as schools and health centres. I am delighted to say that the Plans Panel made a recommendation that the application should be refused. This refusal is likely to be confirmed in June unless the Developer voluntarily withdraws the application - therefore withdrawing the threat of development.

The issues from our point of view are clear. Local schools are full and have no space to accommodate the children generated form this development. Bradford Road is regularly congested and a further 600 cars contributing to this congestion would only make matters worse. The local health centre is already busy with servicing the health needs of people living in the area and a further 1000 plus patients feeding into it would make for longer waiting times to see a GP.

These arguments seems to have been accepted by the Labour dominated Plans Panel. How curious is it that the same arguments - which were relevant at Bruntcliffe Road, Daisy Hill and Owlers Farm - were rejected with Labour capitulating to developers on each and every occasion.

Some would say that Church Fields is in a Labour Ward and therefore gets special treatment. Others say Labour are so worried about losing the Ardsley and Robin Hood seat in the local elections in May that they needed to give the embattled Labour Councillors for the area a victory. Whatever the reason it is always gratifying to see a sinner converted to a better path. It will be interesting to see if this is a permanent or temporary conversion!

We are grateful to local residents for their support and Wyn Kidger has put her body and soul into this campaign working closely with the community in East Ardsley. They all deserve a great amount of credit for not buckling under the power of the large Developers wanting to concrete over this valuable site.

We will not be complacent. It appears we may have won this battle and retained this greenfield site. However we all know Labours propensity to u turn and capitulate to Developers when pressed as they did with Daisy Hill. We will battle on. There is no surrender when it comes to protecting the Greater Morley area from overdevelopment!