Give your views on new levy on developers

Guildford Borough Council is asking for feedback on its proposals for how much developers will have to pay towards the cost of local infrastructure in the future.

The Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) is a new charge system which lets councils fund, provide, replace or maintain infrastructure (such as transport, schools, GPs surgeries and playgrounds) with funds raised from new developments with the council deciding how much has to be paid per square metre of development.

The consultation runs until 1 March 2015 so if you want to make your views heard then you can respond to the online survey here.

More details about train station redevelopment

Solum Regeneration, the company behind the planning application to redevelop Guildford train station, held two public exhibitions in January to let people find out more about their plans and to give their views. For those who missed the exhibitions, more details have now been published on their website.

The scheme is planned to cost £150 million and will involve redeveloping the station concourse and building 445 homes and a multi-storey car park.

If you want to give your views on the proposed redevelopment then you can give Solum your views here and you can find the planning application on the council website and officially comment on it here.

Personally speaking, while I’m in favour in principle of improving the railway station (particularly creating more space for bicycles) and building more homes in the town centre, I’m still quite dubious about the wisdom of putting so many new cars on the road right next to the already clogged gyratory and I do think they should be doing a lot more to link up with the bus network. So for me this is a wait and see what the final proposal looks like situation.