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Bravo our council

BRAVO to Trowbridge Town Council for introducing an element of common sense to the consideration of The Elm Park Farm planning application. They seem to be the only authority concerned about traffic. Wiltshire Council, which actually has responsibility for traffic management, seems to have given up.

The traffic consultant supporting the Elm Grove Farm application is predicting for 2026, a morning peak queue in Bradley Road of 400 cars stretching back from County Way back into Frome Road and Newtown. This will not be caused just by the Elm Grove Farm development, but will be due to all the developments that Wiltshire planners are intending to allow by that date.

Wiltshire Council have already had a consultant review the traffic situation in Trowbridge with the planned developments. This showed that a large number of junctions would have problems. The Council planners seem to expect that the travel situation will be OK because a large number of us will take up walking, cycling or using buses. They are even planning for additional houses.

I believe they are living in a dream world. When cars are parked handily in front of houses and cycles are kept in a shed in the back garden, there is no competition. A free umbrella and some travel vouchers, as the Elm Park Farm developers propose, is going to be of minimal effect. Trowbridge needs a traffic plan, urgently.

I have no political affiliation, I would just like some common sense applied.

David Feather, Broadley Park, North Bradley

Let’s all keep calm

MAY I as a resident point out to Councillor Edward Kirk that one of his obligations as an elected member of Trowbridge Town Council is to set a budget which reflects the policies, needs and liabilities of the Council by the date prescribed in law. To attempt to set the permanent officials off on a wild goose chase regarding contributions from other Town or Parish Councils will only make the existing job of budget preparation even harder.

It is simply not true that Trowbridge residents pay a disproportionate amount of Council Tax when they are only paying for the facilities which their own Town Council has agreed to fund by decisions which Cllr Kirk is party to under the terms of collective responsibility. The one thing which is common to Parish and Town Councils is that they are all different in the sense that every one of them makes its own decisions about how many or how few services it wishes to provide and taxes accordingly. You cannot compare chalk with cheese.

No other Town or Parish Council was part of the decision making process in respect of the Trowbridge TC portfolio of services so any attempt to pressure them into contributing to the cost of services outside their area would be counterproductive especially when they are not part of the management of those services. Time I think for cool heads and wise counsels to prevail at what for any local authority is a challenging time of the year.

C.N.A Williams, Clipsham Rise, Trowbridge

Food chain threat

NORTHACRE Renewable Energy are planning to build an advanced thermal treatment facility for non-recyclable waste, in Westbury. This may look like a reasonable idea? But hold on, think a little deeper could this become a threat to our future food chain?

This area has a worldwide reputation for providing good wholesome foodstuffs. In our Post Brexit Britain the reality is, our financial future will depend on us trading the good name, of great British products to the rest of the world.

Our UK Government is actively encouraging our fantastic British farming & agricultural industry to lead us into a bright new productive era. I am no planner or scientist, but my alarm bells are going off. The Anchor butter production site is right next door to the proposed non-recyclable waste centre. The new waste plant gasification process sounds like heat is involved.

Unfortunately, the non-recyclable waste will have a high plastic content. We all have an individual responsibility to reduce our use of disposable plastic, but that’s another topic. So, the gasification process will involve heat. Some plastics and other materials, will emit deadly Dioxins, lethal persistent organic pollutants (POPs) Its worst component, 2,3,7,8 tetra chlorodibenzo-p-dioxin (TCDD), Commonly known as agent orange a toxic compound that causes cancer and neurological damage. A huge threat to vegetation, human and animal health, the environment as a whole.

It is highly likely there will be incidents of further contamination of our delicate environment. How confident can we be that poisons, will not enter our surrounding food chain. We are all trusting our planners, to calculate how much of a risk this is. How damaging could this be to the local economy.

We have a hard won, proud & growing heritage of producing quality food products. How then, if we think a little further ahead, will we encourage other producers, to Invest in setting up, new food production facilities in our prestigious area? This will be our future, our children’s future, & our children’s children future.

Mr MJ Linham, Hilperton, Trowbridge

Homes at risk

THE green planning application notice for 270 homes didn’t stay long attached to the footbridge railing in Drynham Lane but it made me think and pass my thoughts on to others.

I don’t know if anybody connected with the proposal has been to look at the area lately but I suggest they do.

All through the summer there were channels opened to study and assess the viability of the ground, being at that time, heavy clay packed hard and dry.

How different now, the ground is in some places almost ankle deep in water and totally saturated. Elsewhere evidence is showing itself as far back as Wiltshire Drive, what with the rain we’ve had this year. Hardly surprising with Wiltshire Drive acting like a dam, an elevated rail embankment preventing water movement, the busy A363 and White Horse Business Park adding to the problems.

What of the River Biss? Struggling through long forgotton culverts, ditches, ducts and drains to keep its water moving against a rising tide of drink cans, bottles and light flytipping.

If this development goes ahead in any form at all, it will need looking at seriously with respect to the river, make a feature of it, allow it to flow again!

I spent a couple of evenings listening to a nightingale down in that area last year, phoning my sister in Yorkshire so she could listen in, I wonder if he will return this year.

David Fry, Elcombe Close, Trowbridge