Derry City and Strabane District Council has confirmed that they plan to have a draft Plan Strategy for the District published for public consultation by then end of 2019.
The Plan Strategy will set out to the Council’s objectives in the relation to the use and development of land across the whole council area for a 15 year period. It will set out a growth strategy for the district which may include allocations of housing and employment land. To inform the growth strategy, the Plan will consider the characteristics of all of the settlements in the district and classify each settlement in accordance with a settlement hierarchy.
Derry City and Strabane Council gave an initial indication of its preferred option for the development of its district back in May 2017 when it published a “Preferred Options Paper”.
The preference for growth across the District was to have a degree of focus on Derry as the city but also but also on Strabane to a lesser extent, while at the same time providing opportunities in the remaining settlements as well as in the countryside.
It was also proposed to re-classify the current Local Town of Sion Mills as a village, and that some villages around the Strabane and Castlederg areas could be re-classified as small settlements.
The Council’s “Preferred Options Paper” provided the basis for consulting with the public and stakeholders on a series of options for dealing with key issues in the Plan area including: retailing and town centre development; tourism; minerals; open space and recreation; and the natural environment.
Whether the Council’s preferred options, such as those described above, are confirmed in the Plan will in part depend upon how members of the public and other third parties responded to them back in 2017.
What people said…
General issues raised included that consideration should be given to developing a bespoke vision which draws upon the Council’s Community Plan and which is more locally distinct and land-orientated.
In terms of economic development, there was support for the establishment and expansion of rural businesses and that planning policies need to be suitably tailored to support small-scale enterprises.
Wind energy development attracted a number of comments from different perspectives. On the one hand there were views that onshore wind energy development is a cost effective and deliverable technology and that it can meet climate change obligations. On the other hand there was the view that the District has not been protected from ‘wind farm blight’.
Have your say…
Representations made by the public and other third parties will be taken into account in the forthcoming Plan Strategy. Once the Plan Strategy is published it too will be subject to an 8 week period for the submission of representations, which will be followed by a further 8 week period for the submission of counter representations.
