LOCAL PLAN

DOES Ainsdale need 250 new houses and maybe 400 extra vehicles?. That would be the reality if Sefton’s Local Plan was implemented for Ainsdale!

I refer to their proposal to build 240 houses on the Green Belt land which forms the playing fields at the rear of Ainsdale Hope High school.

The infrastructure is totally inadequate to support development on this scale.

Access roads are already narrowed by the need for rail commuters to park near the station, at times there are long queues of standing traffic waiting for the barriers to lift. I think the record is a 20minute wait! This problem would escalate, making the crossing even more difficult to negotiate.

Our water supply during the summer months is often pathetic. Use of a hose is not an option. Again, a large housing development would require considerable investment to ensure all utilities were of an acceptable standard.

The proposal by Ainsdale Community Wildlife Trust to create a wildlife area here deserves support.

Over one hundred plants, some rare, have been identified on the site, which adjoins the Birkdale sand dunes conservation area.

The field is already used by numerous seabirds as a rest area: curlew and oyster catchers also regularly feed there, together with nocturnal visitors, such as owls, bats and foxes. There are also red squirrels in the vicinity.

Many people cannot access the dunes but would be able to visit the reserve.

We need to preserve and conserve this tiny area of Green Belt, for future generations.

Once it has gone, we cannot retrieve

it.

I hope other Ainsdale residents might agree with me, Ainsdale is a lovely place to live, help to keep it that way! Please?

L Seddon Knowle Avenue resident