Local Plan Green Space Protection must be upheld - Robert Brown

12.00.00am GMT Fri 14th Jan 2005

Proposals by South Lanarkshire Council to grant planning permission for the development of 98 houses on former football fields at Kirkconnel Drive, Spittal, have been slammed by Glasgow Liberal Democrat MSP Robert Brown. Mr. Brown, a long standing campaigner for the protection of green spaces, had objected to the planning application and made a last minute plea to the Council's planning Committee to retain some open space or recreational ground at the site.

Robert Brown said

"The Cambuslang/ Rutherglen Local Plan approved as recently as October 2002 clearly states that the site has a dual zoning, identifying it as being suitable for residential and open space. The Open Space aspect is being totally ignored. The Local Plan Public Enquiry in 2001 concluded that, if residential development went ahead, it should be "with associated open space/recreational provision"

"The argument that the sale of the Council's section of the site will help finance improvements in the Rutherglen area is fair enough but it does not justify the loss of all the land to housing. In my view it is not adequate to claim that this provision is met by development of recreational facilities at Spittal Primary School and elsewhere. The overall effect is the loss of recreational land, albeit used informally, and a breach of a provision arrived at by the local plan enquiry only 3 years ago."

"In Scotland we have a serious problem with people not getting enough exercise. The development of the facilities at Spittal Primary is greatly welcomed but the Council should have required the setting aside of part of the Kirkconnel Drive ground for recreation or green space as well. What is the point of having expensive Enquiries after community consultation if key parts of the outcome are to be scrapped because it does not suit the Council? There is a bit of an obsession with letting developers build anywhere without regard to the need for "green lungs" for walking and for other recreational use."

"It is time that Councils paid more attention to the need for keeping open space and recreational provision in built up areas of towns and cities. This seems to me to be another example of excessive loss of green space"

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