Deputy John Gollop suggested that applying a ‘national park’ designation to part of the south-east of St Sampson’s, starting at Belle Greve Bay, would help to balance plans for extensive additional residential developments in the northern parishes.
The need to preserve the environment and allow areas of biodiversity had already been raised by other speakers at the public hearing, as discussion turned to the Vale and St Sampson’s.
‘That’s quite some throwaway comment,’ said planning inspector Keith Holland, in response to Deputy Gollop.
Simone Whyte, the States’ principal forward planning officer, said the idea was ‘probably a bit beyond the current policies and approaches’ in the Island Development Plan.
Traffic dominated discussion at yesterday morning’s session on proposed changes to the plan.
Residents and parish officials were among those who raised concerns about the number of new homes proposed for the northern parishes.
Ms Whyte pledged that traffic impact assessments would be carried out for all the sites in the area that were being considered for development.
Several representations received by the planning inspector suggested specific sites with potential for affordable housing.
But one man was hoping that his land could be removed from consideration after it had been suggested as one of the ‘windfall’ sites which might be suitable.
Jason Brache pointed out that his land, at Le Juqueurs Road, Vale, was effectively land-locked by its neighbours.
The Guernsey Housing Association had thought the site could be suitable for 11 homes, but an approach to the neighbours had revealed they were all reluctant to allow a right of way across their land.
Ms Whyte said the Development & Planning Authority could not force anybody to develop their land and was likely to consider removing it for consideration if there were strong feelings that it should be excluded from the plan, and doing so would not make a major difference to housing provision.
Speeches on behalf of several landowners suggested that their sites should be considered for affordable housing.
Many of these came from development consultant James Le Gallez, who was representing clients including Oatlands and Guernsey Clematis.
It was suggested that the overflow car park at Oatlands and the clematis site opposite the Guernsey business park in Route Militaire might be suitable.
But this was opposed by both St Sampson’s douzaine representative Karl Guille and former constable Leonie Le Tissier. They spoke several times to warn about the impact of traffic of such developments.
Another Route Militaire property owner with an interest was Jeffrey Belshaw, who owns the site next to the clematis vinery.
His application to be considered for housing had been turned down due to concerns over access, but Mr Le Gallez said that the clematis site owner would allow access to Mr Belshaw’s site if it was given the go-ahead for housing.