Plans are being drawn for a 200-home estate and a sports hub with a dozen football pitches right next to where 550 houses are already due to be built in Plymouth.
South West-based Clifton Emery Design has submitted a pre-application document for the development of a greenfield site at Boringdon Park, in Plympton.
The proposed development would include a sports hub facility with adult and junior 11- and five-a-side pitches, a cycle track and a new woodland, plus 200 dwellings, including 60 affordable homes.
The site, within the Plym Valley, is next to where Homes England has already been given permission to build 550 homes, shops, a cafe, and a “community hub”, with a nursery, on the 30-hectare site of the former China Clay Dryer Works at what will be called Coypool Park.
That site only has one main access into it, although there is another for emergency vehicles and cyclists, and some councillors have already raised questions about the impact on traffic.
The Boringdon development, if approved, is predicted to add further to traffic levels in the area and a report from consultant engineers Campbell Reith, submitted to council planners, said the proposed development would be expected to “add increased demand along the Plymouth Road corridor” which is “already under high demand”.
It recommended that the highway authority consider the potential for “an additional vehicular link to the existing road network”. And it said the “only realistic option” would be for a new single-lane carriageway to connect directly east to Plymbridge Road, north of the Boringdon golf club, with localised widening and additional passing places for smaller vehicles going to and from the Sports Hub.
The overall plan for the site is to create a “green sustainable neighbourhood that maximises the opportunities to live with and alongside nature” being next to ancient woodland such as Plymbridge Woods.
The 200-home neighbourhood of 6.2 hectares would be “integrated” into the Coypool Park development with residents able to use its shops, cafe, and “community hub” with a nursery.
The new homes would feature low-carbon, low-density, detached “woodland homes” looking out onto the surrounding countryside. A smaller, denser core of homes would be on mews lanes and with shared courtyard spaces. with a “strong green corridor connecting” to the Boringdon Sports Hub.
This would have 23.8 hectares of sports land with two 11-a-side football fields, six five-a-side pitches, and four mini-pitches for children’s mini-soccer, adult and junior mountain bike trails, and 24.2 hectares of woodland and public open space.
The Pre-Application Vision Document said: “The vision is to create an attractive and sustainable extension to the eastern edge of Plymouth that draws inspiration from the local landscape.
“The proposed new neighbourhood showcases the latest in sustainable transport initiatives and best practice in terms of water attenuation and opportunities to maximise biodiversity.
“The site has the opportunity to deliver much needed housing in a sustainable location that relates well to the proposed sports hub providing residents with a healthy and active lifestyle.”
It said the proposed development will take advantage of existing cycling infrastructure and said: “Nestled next to an existing ancient woodland, this scheme aspires to create plentiful opportunities to explore the great outdoors, grow your own food and experience a high level of health and wellbeing by linking in with a large sports facility able to accommodate a wide range of activities.”
