From: Jeremy Edwards <edwardsjde@gmail.com>
Date: 17 March 2025 at 16:21:44 GMT
To: Jeremy Edwards <edwardsjde@gmail.com>
Cc: Liz Slater <liz_slater@hotmail.com>, Nick Bacon <Nick@bellevuefarm.co.uk>, Terry Byrne <tnbyrne80@gmail.com>, peter sigler <siglerpj48@gmail.com>, Lee Davidson <ribalee@gmail.com>
Subject: URGENT: Please support the Society: Council meeting to decide on Close Car Park/Marsh Close planning application PL/2023/09615
Dear Member,
Many of you attended the excellent presentation by Dr Kate Felus about the landscape of the Close.
As you will know from previous communications and meetings, this landscape is under threat from a planning application to make permanent the temporary car parking facilities in the Close Car Park as well as carrying out works in Marsh Close which will enable further inappropriate large-scale events and car parking to continue there.
The trustees of the Society accept the principle of a car park in its current location. However, they are seeking a design that is sensitive to the setting and environmentally sound. They are opposed to the use of Marsh Close for car-parking or for large-scale events.
Planning Requirements
The Salisbury Cathedral Close Preservation Society is concerned that neither the application, nor the evaluations carried out by planning and conservation officers, give sufficient weight to planning policy given the extreme sensitivity of the site. Accordingly, the trustees of the Society commissioned a professional planning consultancy, Whaleback, to provide advice, which is attached.
Whaleback’s advice suggests that the application as lodged fails to meet planning policy requirements: in particular, it fails to take account of the specific context of the car park in terms of its sensitive setting and the impact of the application on that setting. Moreover, it fails to show the requisite high-quality and contextually relevant design. Nor does it meet requirements for managing surface water and controlling pollution given the car park’s proximity to the channel leading to the River Avon, which is an SSI. It is open to committee members to refuse the application if they consider it does not meet planning policy requirements. If they were to approve the application, they would need to impose significant, robust and enforceable conditions.
Southern Area Planning Committee Meeting
Councillors will meet to decide the application at the Southern Area Planning Committee at 3pm on Thursday, 20thMarch in the Marlborough Room at The Red Lion Hotel, 4 Milford Street, Salisbury, SP1 2A. Trustees plan to attend and make representations about our concerns. In order to demonstrate the breadth of support for the Society’s position, we urge you to write to the councillors listed below (who are expected to attend) and, if possible, to attend. (Further details of the Committee arrangements can be found at: https://cms.wiltshire.gov.uk/ieListDocuments.aspx?CId=148&MId=15629&Ver=4 )
Next Steps
It is clear that the proposals in their current form are defective. Successive amendments have been of a largely trivial nature and failed to address the key issues raised. The trustees would like to see the application turned down and a fresh application submitted which recognises and responds in design terms to the location ie within the setting of a Grade 1-listed building and a conservation area and close to sensitive watercourses. This would need to:
· Include provisions for the disposal of surface water including pollution prevention measures to protect the River Avon SSI in particular as required by the Environment Agency
· Improve the appearance of the car park and nearby residents’ parking through professional landscape design, including the introduction of trees and other planting consistent with existing planting; replacement of the impermeable surface and paint markings with a more appropriate and permeable surface and setts (required as a condition of earlier consents).
· Introduce hedges, matching those to the South of Marsh Close, to screen the car park from the Harnham Gate and from people and vehicles travelling between the Harnham Gate and West Walk.
· Seriously reconsider the need for/location of the proposed bicycle storage given its distance from the Cathedral and location over the root protection area (RPA) of magnificent plane trees in the South Canonry garden. Alongside this, removes car parking spaces from the RPAs of trees along the South and West boundaries of the car park.
· Reconsider the proposed location of the electrical charging points in order to reduce their visual impact.
· Respond to Historic England’s comments about the “degradation” of the setting by requiring a costed, long-term plan for the maintenance of the car park and Marsh Close (as a minimum).
· Eliminate all parking in Marsh Close.
· Eliminate provision for a water supply/standpipe in Marsh Close on the presumption this was designed to support the large-scale events.
· Preserve the “semi-rural character” of Marsh Close by limiting consents for the use of Marsh Close to modest, day-time events in keeping with its character.
· Return to the commitment to develop a traffic plan designed to reduce traffic flow in the Close
Yours faithfully,
Jeremy Edwards
Chair, Salisbury Cathedral Close Preservation Society