CPRE Bristol

A new CPRE (Campaign to Protect Rural England) group is being set up in Bristol. This is good news. CPRE is a grassroots organisation, led by volunteers, but it has a powerful national voice – planners and politicians listen to them. I hope that this group will become a strong voice in Bristol to campaign for a greener city surrounded by a thriving countryside, using CPRE’s resources and planning expertise to set out a positive vision for change.

As part of this move CPRE are holding a public meeting at 7.30pm on Tuesday 3^rd April at the Horfield Quaker Meeting House (300 Gloucester Road, Bristol BS7 8PD). All are welcome – entry is via the main entrance to the left of the building.

The new National Planning Policy Framework was published yesterday. It looks as though CPRE’s relentless lobbying and pressure on the Government has paid off to some extent, with additional safeguards for the environment now present, but it still removes a huge body of regulations that guided planning. Meanwhile, the Localism Act gives new powers to communities to plan development in their area.

CPRE  see both a threat and an opportunity – if the government is not going to control planning, then we should step in and reclaim control of our own neighbourhoods, and support others to do the same.

Its hoped that the Bristol group will take a special interest in Localism and local food – CPRE want to explore how communities can use neighbourhood planning to develop local food infrastructure and build links with local farming communities. But also want to keep an eye on the bigger picture, a vision of Bristol as a clean, green city circled by farmland, woods and water.

If you think you might like to join the new group or if you are interested in these issues and you want to hear more, please do go along on Tuesday. This is an open public meeting, so please pass this message on to others who might be interested.

Contact Joe Evans, Director, CPRE Avonside

07854 741130 for further information.

Eco-Eddy??

Cllr Richard Eddy says he sympathises with '...the desire to protect our precious countryside from major development ' (here **). Why then does he favour constructing the South Bristol Link Road through it, stressing that he is a 'long-standing supporter of getting it finished' (see here)? Obviously protecting the countryside is not that high on his agenda - and mostly features in his world when seeking public political advantage with greenspeak!

Or is this more of Bristol Tory Cllr Eddy's special kind of 'logic'...the kind that allows him to say that the link road will 'ease congestion'(see here), despite all the weight of research evidence and experience for decades that shows building roads encourages car use which quickly fills them up to the point of congestion.

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**(Great letter on countryside protection from James Burden and Des Baker on the same page by the way - go to the link they give for more http://www.cpre.org.uk/ )