Flooding concerns over 350-home scheme

Concerns over flooding are among more than 60 objections made to a plan for 350 new homes to the west of Hereford.

The Environment Agency has formally objected to the scheme, which would occupy 25 hectares of farmland between the Yazor brook, Roman Road and Three Elms Road, and on which consultation closes tomorrow.

Its planning specialist Graeme Irwin said that the original wider plan for 1,200 homes west of the city proposed 1.8 hectares of flood storage, which would “provide an element of reduction in flood risk downstream of the site” – that is, within the city centre.

“There is no mention of this agreement and whether some of the additional storage will take place in this [site],” he wrote.

A flood risk assessment (FRA) submitted with the application “would appear to lack any fluvial [river] flooding information and is far less detailed than the FRA produced for the wider Three Elms site,” Mr Irwin added.

“No modelling is included, no assessment of the latest climate change allowances in relation to the site and FFL’s [finished floor levels], and it appears to ignore previous agreements to provide flood risk betterment by creating additional flood storage.”

The application says that water from the site will be discharged to the Yazor brook “via a series of swales and basins within the proposed areas of greenspace”.

“There will be no increase in flood risk as a result of the development, either within the site or outside its boundary,” it maintains.

Meanwhile, Herefordshire Council’s housing development officer Colette Cutter said that the council “would expect 123 units as affordable housing” out of the 350.

A quarter of these should be so-called First Homes, discounted at 30 per cent off the open market value, 71 per cent should be for “social rent”, with the remaining 4 per cent for “intermediate home ownership” under which buyers would part-own their property.

“We also require a block of one-bedroom units for a vulnerable cohort, with one of those units to be used as staff accommodation/office,” she said.

“In addition we would ask for four one-bedroom units either in a block or dispersed throughout the site for another vulnerable cohort.”

She urged that the mix housing formats both the open-market and affordable housing be agreed before the detailed application for the site be allowed to proceed.

Individuals’ concerns have largely focused on the scheme’s likely impact on local roads, schools, hospitals and other services, and also on wildlife.

“People understand the need for development, but everyone I know is against this,” nearby resident Helen Davis said.