Report ignores history – and current anger

CALA Homes/RBWM have recently published their Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) Scoping Document, for the proposed development of S.W. Maidenhead, including the golf course (MGC).

The timing of this is particularly interesting, because for an EIA to be at all meaningful, it would normally be undertaken prior to any development planning being undertaken for a particular site.

The purpose is to carry out a thorough assessment of the flora and fauna living on the site, and to determine what effect the proposed development would have on them.

Mitigation measures would also be investigated, in order to minimise any detrimental effects.

In this case, however, the council, together with development partner CALA Homes, have first worked out the maximum number of new homes that can be crammed onto the site as 2,600, in addition to two new schools, a medical centre, and a community centre.

They are now trying to write the EIA so that it suits their pre-determined plans, and it would therefore be more appropriate to call it a Development Impact Assessment, assessing the impact of their plans on the site, rather than the other way round.

Phrases in the scoping document suggest ‘the development may result in an increase in air pollution’, and that it ‘may result in an increase in traffic on roads adjacent to the site’.

There is no ‘may’ about any of this; the proposed development will definitely result in an increase in harmful air pollution, and a significant increase in the volume of traffic.

Whoever wrote the scoping document did not do their research very thoroughly.

They have decided to scope out of the assessment water on the golf course, claiming there isn’t any.

In fact, there is an underground water