FEARS have been raised Malvern could come to a standstill if a major 800-home development gets approved before vital improvements are made to the town’s infrastructure.
Town councillors expressed their concerns over the Newland application – one of Malvern’s biggest in years – at a meeting held on Thursday (December 10).
Developers Gleeson Developments and Welbeck Strategic Land submitted the mega plans to Malvern Hills District Council last month.
The huge application site is bounded by Lower Howsell Road, the railway line and Worcester Road.
As well as hundreds of homes, the development earmarks space for businesses, a care home, shops, community hall, police post and 18 hectares of green land, including space for a cemetery, playing fields and allotments.
But councillors at the meeting said the development was unsustainable with it featuring just one access point onto and exiting the site off the A449 Townsend Way/Worcester Road roundabout which would undergo improvement works if the plans were to go ahead.
But worried councillors felt no major development should be started until ‘adequate’ infrastructure in Malvern was put in place, saying it was vital for the town’s future to dualtrack Carrington Road Bridge.
A draft town council response to the plans reads: “A development of 800 homes to the North East of Malvern (along with other proposed development in Malvern) will put further pressure on already congested transport links into Worcester and from the A449 to the Powick roundabout and then over Carrington Bridge.
“There should not be any significant development in North East Malvern until the access from the A449 to the M5 is improved.”
At the meeting Coun Roger Yates said: “This will mock up Malvern. I don’t care if it is outlined plans or detailed plans, this development should not be allowed to happen, that is my view. It is too big.”
Coun Clive Smith said: “The line in the sand is no single dwelling should be built until the Carrington Bridge is dualled, otherwise we are going to get strung on.”
One member of the public, who attended the meeting, added: “When this development goes ahead Malvern will come to a stop.”
In response, Scott Chamberlin, managing director at Gleeson, said new residents would bring approximately £5.5million each year of spend into the local economy.
“This infrastructure-led proposal includes the early delivery of a significant £1.5million improvement scheme to the existing Townsend Way/Worcester roundabout, which has been designed following extensive detailed technical work and highway modelling over a number of years,” he said.
“In addition, other highways improvements are proposed, as well as investment into the public transport network.”
