I hope yours will be one of the open minds attending the open meeting in the Village Hall on Wednesday 5th December. The Knebworth Options Report, commissioned by the Parish Council – with the support of the Knebworth Village Trust and the Knebworth House Education & Preservation Trust – is to be presented at the meeting for debate, at this vital time for our community.
The Local Development Framework represents a crossroads for Knebworth Village – one that this generation will not face again. The LDF is establishing planning policy until the 2020s. Greenbelt boundaries – which are to be extended and reduced (more of the former, the Prime Minister assures us) – will not be reassessed again until the 2030s.
Stevenage is getting bigger – it’s already got our secondary school children; now it wants our doctors, our post office, our library, our builders’ merchant (see www.knebworthgreen.net)… We can baton down the hatches, and sit tight. Or we can meet the challenge – and promote an evolving community, strong enough to maintain its own services and sufficiently endowed to hold safeguards beyond local authority budgets.
Or we can move to the West Country. My problem is, I can’t. So I will be there on 5th trying to make sense of it all.
Martha joins with me in wishing you a very Happy Christmas,
Henry Lytton Cobbold
www.knebworthhouse.com