Neighbourhood plan reaches final stage

RESIDENTS in Blaby will get the chance to say “yay” or “nay” to a document designed to guide growth in the parish over the next two decades.

The referendum on the Blaby Neighbourhood Plan will take place on Thursday February 1.

Organised by the district council it will act like a regular local election with polling stations open for voters and polling cards due to be sent out shortly.

A spokesman said: “The intention of this plan is to reflect community-wide views, comments, observations and concerns about Blaby’s future, in a context of local and national planning requirements. It aims to reflect the community’s over- whelming desire to make Blaby an even better place to live and work, now and for future generations.

“This plan seeks to ensure that Blaby will retain its unique and distinctive character, in particular managing the balance between retaining open space while potentially accommodating some development over the plan period, for example devel- oping the town centre shopping areas and addressing housing allocations as necessary, for the benefit of current and future generations.”

The local referendum is the final step in the process of adopting the plan which has been in the making since early 2014.

In particular plan developers hope it will help secure green space protection for land around Long Walk with a spokesman saying: “It’s taken a long while as you know but if the people of Blaby approve this neighbourhood plan being used to help decision making in Blaby we will secure the long term protection that the area deserves. We will finally be able to say that we have won the hard fought case for protecting this beautiful area.”