Wanted – your thoughts sought on town-centre living – and parking?

A public consultation is underway to seek the views of people in Macclesfield on proposals for rejuvenating two sites to create schemes for town-centre living.

The local development order process enables developers to streamline their proposals and applications.

Cheshire East Council is now seeking the views of residents and businesses through a consultation exercise beginning August 3.

A number of property owners have been approached to invite their interest in seeing their underutilised buildings turned into useful housing schemes.

Residential-led local development orders were introduced by central government to stimulate more redevelopment of brown field sites where buildings had been vacant for some time.

They remove the need for developers to make a formal planning application, creating confidence and certainty around a proposal and saving time and money.

Cheshire East Council has received grant funding of £100,000 to progress local development orders and has now embarked on a consultation in the town running from August 3 to September 13.

This will include two drop-in events at Macclesfield Town Hall on August 10 and September 6. All comments and feedback will be considered before any decision is reached.

Sites currently earmarked by the Council – in the Hibel Road and Whalley Hayes areas – meet with the urban potential element of the emerging local plan for Cheshire East.

Councillor Ainsley Arnold, Cabinet member for housing and planning, said: “This is an exciting opportunity to redevelop specific areas of Macclesfield and at the same time meet a housing need.

“But I must emphasise we are in the very early stages of this process and we will require the support of a number of property owners and stakeholders in order to progress this.

“LDOs are an expedient method for streamlining concepts and turning them into reality for the benefit of residents and businesses.

“While they enable the planning process to be speeded up, all the customary due diligence, checks and balances remain in place.”

LDOs require the local planning authority to consult with all interested parties including neighbouring properties, stakeholders and voluntary groups, and to publish the draft order including information on public access to al relevant documents.

The Council has set up a dedicated email address for questions from the public. They can email macclesfieldldos@cheshireeast.gov.uk

Further information about the consultation can be viewed on the Cheshire East consultations page.

Editor: Churchill Way car park has already been earmarked for development – a ‘leisure led’ scheme we are told, which curiously is seeking an ‘anchor retail’ tenant. Deja vu anyone? If this scheme goes ahead we will lose the town’s largest car park. If Whalley Hayes car park goes as well I wonder where all the visitors to the town will be expected to leave their cars.