Goddard Avenue and the City Plan consultation process

John Fareham and John Abbott urge local residents on Goddard Avenue to play their full part in any future consultation exercise carried out by the City Council on the new City Plan. At a recent meeting of Planning Committee, members of different political persuasions were aghast to notice that the officers were still proposing to consult on maps showing both the privately owned and publicly owned parts of the land behind Goddard Avenue as available for housing purposes. All of the Committee rejected this proposal out of hand and asked that the maps be corrected accordingly, but what this seems to us to suggest is that unless local residents who feel strongly that this land should remain open say so loudly and clearly when the time comes, the same officer mindset that moved the area team from Newland Avenue to Park Avenue in order to make money on selling the former building might easily be applied, with unpleasant and inappropriate environmental consequences. We therefore urge residents to look out for any consultation forms they may be sent by the Council and to make the fullest use of them in expressing their views on this matter.