Local plan scoping consultation

I’m writing as a long‑standing resident who cares deeply about Ashley and the countryside around it. I’m not a planning expert, but I know this area well, the fields, the lanes, the wildlife, the quiet rural character that makes Ashley what it is. After reading the details of the 291‑hectare submission, I feel compelled to object because the scale and location of what’s being proposed would completely overwhelm our village.

Ashley is tiny, around 60 houses, adding in 1000 more would be a huge increase and strain for the village. We don’t have the services or infrastructure to support anything like this. There’s no school, no medical centre, no shops, and barely any public transport. The train station is small, with limited parking and only an hourly service, it does not constitute a well-connected station at all. And with the new Cheadle station coming, it’s already been said in Parliament that Ashley’s service may be cut to one train every two hours. That alone makes this an unrealistic place for thousands of new homes.

The roads here are narrow and difficult even now. The railway bridges, the single‑lane pinch points, the tight bends, they simply aren’t built for heavy traffic. Adding thousands more cars would make them unsafe and congested, especially around the A538 and M56 routes.

I’m also very worried about the environmental impact. These fields are productive farmland, proven to be classed as the Best and Most Versatile land and once they’re built on, they’re gone forever. The area is part of the Green Belt that keeps Manchester and Cheshire separate. It’s not just a line on a map; it’s a real, physical gap that stops the sprawl from Hale and Altrincham merging into Mobberley and Knutsford. If this land is built over, that gap disappears. Suggestion that this land is grey belt is just made up, its green belt and there is no proof that its greybelt.

The countryside here is rich in wildlife. Cotterill Clough Nature Reserve, the Bollin Valley, the ancient woodlands, the hedgerows they all form a connected habitat. I regularly see red‑listed birds like grey partridge and tree sparrow. A development of this size would break up those habitats and put huge pressure on the nature reserve.

There are heritage concerns too. There are 19 Listed structures in the area they rely on their rural setting for their character. Covering the landscape with housing, roads and lighting would permanently change that.

On top of all this, the land sits under Manchester Airport’s flight paths, with noise and bird‑strike risks that make high‑density housing questionable. And the drainage and services here are already fragile, heavy rain causes surface water problems, and adding thousands of roofs and roads would only make that worse.

When you put all these things together, the Green Belt, the lack of infrastructure, the transport issues, the environmental and heritage impacts, the flood risk, the airport constraints it’s clear that Ashley is simply not the right place for a development of this scale.

I’m asking the Council to classify the 291.03‑hectare submission as unsuitable and not promote it to be built on. Ashley is a rural village, and this proposal would fundamentally change it forever.