Saturday, Sep 11, 2010
More like why save
Save Wye: Save Wye
This is the ultimate NIMBY website - delve into the mind of the NIMBY if you dare?
Posted by the number cruncher @ 12:19 AM (1022 views) Add Comment
26 Comments
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1. This comment has been removed as it was found to be in breach of our Blog Policies.
2. peter rocker said...
I'd much rather have the fields. They could be better developed for wildlife.
New builds always have stunningly ugly or boring architectures, for a start. That's a problem.
But the real problem we have is overpopulation, hence the need to build mini Milton-Keynes everywhere. David Attenborough has the right idea...
'David Attenborough to be patron of Optimum Population Trust '
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article6087833.ece
3. Crunchy said...
2. peter 'rockefeller' said...But the real problem we have is overpopulation.
Nonesense, the eugenics (murderers) brainwashing agenda continues,even after the need for carbon taxation it has been totally
discredited. BP really should be setting a better example, instead of poisoning the waters, skies and food chain. Tut, tut.
Learn more about the people behind this sick movement. 'Enron' should get you started.
4. mark wadsworth said...
Maybe we should just nuke Wye?
More NIMBY lies in the above comment: "But the real problem we have is overpopulation"
The UK is not 'overpopulated' and even if it were, that is no excuse for singling out young people and making them homeless.
As to the OPT, why don't the members all just kill themselves? That would be a good start.
5. cyril said...
I guess these sort of campaigns bring out the best and worst in people. Even the quality of debate on HPC has descended to new depths!
6. Pig said...
I'd much rather ensure people have decent homes. They would give people AND the planet a better future.
NIMBY selfishness is always stunningly ugly and tedious because it would rather preserve the slow death of the past rather than take a risk with the creation of a sustainable future.
We may in the future have a problem with overpopulation. But we can't properly plan for the future if we neglect sustaining the present. And not just 'sustain' - if there is one thing David Attenboroughs programmes taught us, the future of our planet should be about community, creativity and risk, otherwise simply known as 'life'.
7. shipbuilder said...
Ask anyone if they want a development of identical Barratt boxes, packed in with two foot between them, next door, and everyone's a NIMBY. Developers could do a lot more in this respect - if we're talking about a potential 'market' situation, then developers are failing hugely to appeal to their customers.
8. Numbers Crunched said...
I cannot believe this article, it really goes to show that whoever posted it has absolutely no idea what they are talking about and just decided to have a dig on the back of some misguided ideology. I suspect the same ideology that lets them think they have the right to pass judgment on any part of the country that they don't understand, have not taken the time to comprehend and I suspect that has nothing to do with them.
Wye is a beautiful small retirement village outside Ashford in Kent; it was for years the home of a successful and popular agricultural college which was shut down by Imperial College after they failed to turn this small village into a large science park and housing estate.
I grew up near Wye and have fond memories of this small Kent Village nestled at the bottom of the North Downs in an area of outstanding natural beauty. This is why I feel I have to write such a heavy response to the vindictive drivel posted by someone who it seems would like to see all of our greenbelt tarmacked and turned into a residential housing estate.
Anyone reading this should have no doubt that the plans involving Wye had nothing to do with improving housing in the area for first time buyers, young families, puppies and kittens and all the other usual nonsense that gets thrown around at local planning meetings. Indeed this small corner of the garden of England was for years the whipping boy of the New Labour housing dream as it was singled out as an area where huge housing growth could be delivered (most of it, it should be said on marshland!). Currently as I understand it there are plans to deliver 13,000 new homes by 2016 and 31,000 by 2031, so that combined with increased housing development in Canterbury, as well as other towns in Kent would suggest that it was not a necessity to turn a peaceful sleepy retirement village into a glorified housing estate like those that you can see on Google maps to the south of Ashford Nr Kingsnorth and Stanhope, areas incidentally that suffer terribly from increasing unemployment and serious social unrest.
The story of Wye is a complex one and one that should be considered in the wider scheme of the local area. As such the labelling of anyone who tries to save their local village from destruction as a NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard) is vindictive, callous and offensive. It suggests that people should not contest or question their local planning authority and that civil servants always know best. Well sorry, they don't, neither do they have the right to impose their vision of Utopia on any community no matter how big or small without full consultation and then by following a transparent, accountable and democratic process.
Rant over.
9. mark wadsworth said...
Ship, and why are new homes so tiny without being cheap? It's because for a given buyer budget, the more expensive the land, the less money is left over for the actual building. And why is land so expensive? Because the NIMBYs fight tooth and claw over every square inch of Hallowed Greenbelt or Garden Grabbing.
So for the NIMBYs to say that they oppose new development because they are just little boxes is the ultimate in hypocrisy. It's like saying starving Africans don't deserve food because they clearly don't like the stuff or else they'd eat more.
10. greenmind said...
The debate about development, nimbyism and overpopulation can't be solved without establishing a vision of where we want to be in 50 or 100 years time. Check out: http://www.thevisionproject.org/index.html ; I like the last one "opening the dream of the future" (though might be deemed to flakey by most on here ; - )
11. shipbuilder said...
Mark W, your points about NIMBYism are spot on as usual, but I do think the developers have a part to play. The density of housing is as much to do with greed, because they know that their customers will buy pretty much anything they build. And yes, this situation arises partly because of NIMBYism, but you're always going to end up with some sort of stand-off, no matter how planning laws are relaxed or whatever measures are taken. I don't know about this village in particular, but I'm sure if the development was one of 'traditional' stone cottages (or whatever suits the area) with large gardens, the NIMBYs might have found a lot less support and indeed the developers could even have found some new customers from within the village. I can't see these type of objections getting much support if the effect of a development is to actually enhance the look of a village and let's be honest, when was the last time you saw one of those?
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13. tenyearstogetmymoneyback said...
shipbuilder wrote "and let's be honest, when was the last time you saw one of those?"
Last time I drove through Poundbury ?
I wonder what people would say if Bath had never been built and someone was proposing it now. You have to remember
that most of Bath was built by speculative builders out to make a quick profit. With the Crescent (now one of the most
famous sites) you bought the frontage from the devleoper and built whatever you liked behind it !
14. peter rocker said...
The sense of style, art and arcitecture for new building has certainly been lost, almost completely. Even when developers are forced to fit in with local styles, it often fails. They make the buildings too big, or out of proportion ( the building itself or the windows or other features).
If the UK is not overpopulated, why do we need so many new houses? And when they are built, most of them will be junk.
15. peeping tom said...
mark wadsworth said...
"Maybe we should just nuke Wye?
More NIMBY lies in the above comment: "But the real problem we have is overpopulation"
The UK is not 'overpopulated'."
_______________________________________________________________________________________________________
which is why the UK is only 60% self-sufficient in food production and now dependent on imports of gas and electricity (the latter from France via the 2 gigawatt cable link at Sellindge mentioned in the article).
16. letthemfall said...
Ironically the problem is perhaps that there is not enough planning. Developers, who seem to have a large dose of philistinism in their blood, put up these ugly little shoeboxes so they can make the most money possible within the current perverse and unequal planning laws. I say unequal because the volume and success rate of nimbyism is in proportion to wealth. There may be an argument here over cause and effect, but my observations suggest the beautiful low density areas with big expensive houses are as sacrosanct as Wentworth golf course. Planning permission is a phrase that has no meaning in these areas.
We are back at inequality again. That is the true problem.
17. peeping tom said...
And we are also back at England now having a higher population density that the Netherlands, so that even with reduced inequality, there is not enough space to house all 50 million plus people and retain enough agricultural land, unless we all live in high rise shoe boxes. But why not concrete over the whole country and turn it into a Los Angeles style suburb of 50 thousand square miles? Who needs a bit of rural breathing space? Only NIMBYs of course.
18. mark wadsworth said...
PT: "...there is not enough space to house all 50 million plus people and retain enough agricultural land"
OK, let's agree that the UK and NL are equally densely populated (about one acre per person, overall). How come the UK is "only" 60% self-sufficient in food and the Dutch export food to the UK?
Because the Dutch are not such NIMBYs - they have greenhouses and polytunnels and so on, and just get on with it, while the UK NIMBYs wail on about "traditional farming methods" and the "rural way of life" while whizzing around in their four-by-fours.
The UK could easily be self-sufficient in food, if it wanted. As it happens, we can make more money producing and exporting stuff other than food so it is better to export aeroplanes or sportscars and import food, but that's an economics point - agriculture is only about 2% of UK GDP by value.
19. mark wadsworth said...
PS, population of UK is 62 million, not 50. Or do you mean just England?
20. paul said...
If the UK is not overpopulated, why do we need so many new houses? And when they are built, most of them will be junk.
That's because you forget the last time the UK embarked on a massive house building project - just after the war to build all the council houses. Its nothing to do with overpopulation and everything to do with linear population expansion - the people who took those council houses had children after all!
21. peeping tom said...
'mark wadsworth said...
PS, population of UK is 62 million, not 50. Or do you mean just England?'
____________________________________________________________
In my posting above, I mean just England as that is why I said England. England alone must have an even higher dependency on food imports than the UK as a whole. As for clinging to 'traditional farming methods' then the number of hedgerows separating fields of different crops would not have declined. What agricultural land there is in England is dedicated to monocultures of sugar beet, rapeseed and wheat, the surplus of which, if there were a surplus, should balance any imports but it doesn't.
22. the number cruncher said...
Peeping Tom @ 11 - you do not know what you are talking about - the strength of you opinion is obviously inversely proportional to your Knowledge. Or are you just interested in promoting a political agenda and care nothing about for the facts.
The idea we cannot feed ourselves is utter nonsense. This is one of my areas of professional interest.
we export most of the food we produce and import 60% - its a two way street-
The reason we import so much as we want to eat things like baby sweet corn and mange tout from Kenya
We also import bulk food stuffs for cattle and pigs like soya etc.
Our agricultural system could easily feed us all without any imports - we just would not be able eat what we wanted and be limited in our chioce to seasonal availability. This is all about economics, as is our energy needs, we could easily produce more energy - its just cheaper to import it in the form of gas and oil from other countries. That's the outcome of free trade.
23. the number cruncher said...
PT @ 17
Our total food imports are about £26 Billion per year and exports are nearly £10 Billion
but for human consumption Britain exports as many calories as we import
We export cheaper bulk foods and import more expensive food
Sounds like you are reading to much utra right wing / NFU/CLA propaganda.
24. peter rocker said...
I wouldn't define whether the UK is over-populated or not by whether we can produce enough resources to sustain ourselves.
To be blunt, why wouldn't the UK be better with half the current population, no matter whether we could sustain more?
We could quadruple the size of Epping Forest! You can walk from one end to the other in 2 hours at the moment.
The problem is, the policiticians see the unbalanced levels of older relative to younger people, and decide we should have more babies!
We need to find a way to wind down the pupulation level in an ordered, and, of course, acceptable way.
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26. peter rocker said...
Regarding quality of new homes, there have been CABE housing audits which have shown low quality:
http://www.cabe.org.uk/housing/audit-results