Consultation on new Bury Local Plan starts

Residents and businesses are being urged to have their say when consultation on Bury’s new Local Plan starts on 7 August.

The consultation Issues Paper identifies a range of issues, including the need to address the housing and employment requirements of the borough for years to come and the need for new infrastructure.

The Local Plan will also develop policies to safeguard land for leisure and recreation and protect other sites from development. It will also consider how the planning system can improve health and wellbeing and promote renewable and low carbon energy generation to improve air quality.

The Issues Paper forms part of the Local Plan, which is being drawn up within the context of both national planning policies and policies developed at the Greater Manchester level, including a rewritten Greater Manchester Spatial Framework. Together they will form the key planning documents that will shape sustainable growth and control development for the next decade and beyond.

Councillor Eamonn O’Brien, cabinet member for housing and finance, said: “The Local Plan will set out a long-term framework to guide and control growth in the borough. It is important to note that it will only deal with local issues relating to Bury. This is different from the Greater Manchester Spatial Framework, which deals with more strategic issues across the conurbation. Fundamentally, we need to deliver sustainable growth – including our priority to increase the supply of affordable housing - and concentrate efforts on brownfield sites to meet local needs and help regenerate the urban area.”

The deadline for comments is 2 October, but residents will have further opportunities to have their say on the details of the new Local Plan as it progresses next year.

Details of the Local Plan Issues Paper, including how you can make comments, can be found at http://www.bury.gov.uk/localplan

ENDS

Press release issued: 2 August 2017.