Fulford - a village where local voices are rising up

FENWICK'S Lane is a lovely, quiet street of mellow brick buildings. Unless you happen to live in Fulford, you'd never have reason to go there. But the lane is one of the many off-the-main-street corners that make this urban village on the southern edge of York so special.

The lane was once used to drive cattle into York, says Fulford parish councillor Mary Urmston. And you can well imagine that. Even though it is comparatively close to the centre of York, Fenwick's Lane has a rural feel.

To those who don't live in Fulford, the village is probably regarded as just another suburb of York, if a leafy one. To those who do live there, it is very much its own, distinctive community.

There is a lot of talk in Fulford about the character of the village.

"It is in the Domesday Book as a classic medieval village with a main street and two back lanes," says parish councillor Karin de Vries. And so it is: not once, but twice.

In 1086, 20 years after the Norman Conquest, Gate Fulford was a community of 'six villagers' and 'five ploughlands', as well as 20 acres of meadow. Water Fulford, meanwhile, had nine villagers and four freemen, eight plough-hands, 26 acres of meadow and some woodland.

There is more to Fulford than history, however. Much of the village is a conservation area, and a surprising number of the houses lining the main street are listed buildings.

Lovely red-brick houses are common, and you have the John Hunt Memorial Homes; St Oswald's Church; and some fine pubs.

Another thing that makes it special, says Cllr de Vries, is that much of the parish is fields and farmland.

"It is completely surrounded by green areas," she says. "And then you have the Ings, the village green, the site of the Battle of Fulford..."

Ah, yes, The Battle of Fulford. Down the years, the parish council has fought fiercely to protect the village's character against what it sees as over-development.

Nowhere has that resistance proved more fierce than in the case of Germany Beck: the planned development of 650 homes just to the east of the A19 where it comes into Fulford.

The parish council resisted the proposals at a public inquiry, and subsequently tried to block the scheme by claiming the land the houses would be built on was the village green. It has been ably assisted by archaeologist Chas Jones, who insists the 1066 Battle of Fulford took place on part of the Germany Beck site.

Inevitably, the long-drawn-out squabble became dubbed the 'Second Battle of Fulford'.

It is a battle that even now, with planning permission long since granted, isn't quite over. Both the parish council and Mr Jones continue to fight.

The parish council has appealed against a decision to refuse its application for a judicial review into the approval of planning permission reserved matters (yes, it has become that technical).

Mr Jones, meanwhile, has appealed against a High Court decision to throw out his challenge against English Heritage's refusal to designate the site as being where the battle took place.

St Oswald’s Church in  Fulford

City of York Council said that a neighbourhood plan must comply with national legislation and must have appropriate regard to national policy and be in general conformity with existing strategic local planning policy.

The parish council makes no apology for its determined resistance to the housing development. "We want to try to preserve the historic character of the village," says Cllr Urmston.

Now it is hoping to take advantage of new government rules to develop a fresh weapon in its armoury. It has applied to produce a 'neighbourhood plan': a community-level planning framework which should, in theory, give the views of local people more weight when it comes to planning decisions that affect where they live.

The neighbourhood plan will essentially be a blueprint – drawn up by local people themselves – which will set out what they see as limits on reasonable development in their community (see panel).

In the absence of any formally approved city-wide local plan, parish council chairman Alan Smith hopes a Fulford neighbourhood plan would have "some status to resist plans that go against all our character".

Getting a neighbourhood plan will be a long-drawn-out process. At the moment, the parish council is merely consulting on the area to be included within any plan.

A plan will then need to be drawn up by a committee of local people, put out to consultation and referred to an independent examiner before being formally adopted. Copmanthorpe, which is much further advanced in terms of getting a neighbourhood plan than is Fulford, has been working on its plan for a number of years.

Tour of the parish of Fulford with members of the parish council, Vivienne Clare and Alan Smith, and Stephen Lewis

So the Fulford neighbourhood plan is unlikely to be ready in time to have any impact on Germany Beck – and it is, anyway, unclear what difference it would have made even if it had been in place when the Germany Beck scheme was first being considered.

But there are many other things about Fulford worth fighting to protect, the parish council says: for example, the grass verges that line either side of Main Street.

"York [ie the city council] wants to put bus lanes here," says Mary Urmston.

Ultimately, the neighbourhood plan will express the views of local people on everything from housing density to building on flood-risk land, green belt, traffic volumes and air quality.

"It is a key opportunity for local people to have an influence," says Karin de Vries.

It is vital, therefore, for people in the village to get behind the plan from the outset, says Cllr Smith. "We want it to be seen as coming not just from the parish council, but from the whole community," he says.

At the moment, the parish council is consulting merely over the proposed boundary of its neighbourhood plan - whether it should be restricted to the parish of Fulford itself, or take in a wider (or smaller) area. Once the area of the proposed plan is agreed, the parish council will set up a committee of local people to start drafting it.

The consultation period ends on February 18. To find out more, visit york.gov.uk/neighbourhoodplanning. You can have your say by emailing neighbourhoodplanning@york.gov.uk

Over to you...

FACT FILE: What is a neighbourhood plan?

A NEIGHBOURHOOD plan is a new, ultra-local tier of planning guidance made possible by the 2011 Localism Act.

By allowing communities to produce such a plan, the Act aims to give them ‘greater power to shape development by taking a more active role in the development of planning policies at a local level’, a briefing note from City of York Council says.

A neighbourhood plan can set out general planning policies for the development and use of land in a neighbourhood, such as:

• where new homes and offices should be built

• what they should look like

• what new community facilities are needed and where.

The aim is to give local people more say in ensuring they get the right type of development for their community.

The neighbour-hood plan will become part of the statutory development plan for the area, and will have ‘far more weight than some other local documents, such as parish plans’, the council briefing note says.

But the plan ‘must comply with national legislation’ and must be in ‘general conformity with existing strategic local planning’, the authority says.Precisely what weight a neighbourhood plan would have in a city like York where, as yet, there is no formally adopted local plan, is not clear.

Several parishes around York are interested in setting up neighbourhood plans.

Heslington, Strensall, Huntington and Elvington have all expressed interest; Murton has submitted an initial application; Fulford is consulting on the boundary; and Dunnington is in the process of drafting a plan.

A Poppleton neighbourhood plan is undergoing a ‘pre-submission’ consultation, while Copmanthorpe is the furthest advanced parish. Its plan is undergoing final consultation before being submitted to an external examiner for approval.

Parish council chairman David Carr said the plan had been drawn up by a ‘neighbourhood planning group’ made up of parish councillors and local residents. It was put together following three residents’ surveys, and the aim was to “set out a way that the village can get bigger that it can cope with,” Cllr Carr said.

The Copmanthorpe plan sets a limit on the number of new homes local people think are feasible (135 as opposed to the 650 in the city council’s draft local plan); identifies opportunities for 40,000 square feet of new business space; expresses a hope for more community facilities, including playing fields and a skateboarding park; and seeks protection for green field land around the village, and green spaces and hedgerows within it.

Exactly how much weight the neighbourhood plan would be given when it comes to deciding planning matters is the $64,000 question, Cllr Carr conceded.

“But governments of every shape and colour at the moment are keen on giving local communities a bigger voice in their own planning development, and the neighbourhood plan is all about localism,” he said. The city council’s local plan was ‘extremely contentious’, he added – and had not yet been formally adopted or been tested through a public inquiry.

“So we would expect the neighbourhood plan to be approved and to have considerable weight.”

There will be a public exhibition about the Copmanthorpe plan at Howell Hall in Copmanthorpe on February 21 from 1pm to 6pm. The consultation period on the Copmanthorpe plan ends on March 9.

To have your say, go to the February 21 public exhibition, visit www.plan4Copmanthorpe.org.uk, email comments to neighbourhoodplanning@york.gov.uk or pick up a form at Copmanthorpe library.

Also see...

13 fantastic old Fulford photos: 1956-1996>>