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ITEM EN5

ENVIRONMENT SCRUTINY COMMITTEE –
19 MARCH 2003

Minutes of the Meeting commencing at 10.00 am and finishing at 1.55 pm

Present:

The Scrutiny Committee considered the matters, reports and recommendations contained or referred to in the agenda for the meeting, together with a schedule of addenda tabled at the meeting and agreed as set out below. Copies of the agenda, reports and schedule are attached to the signed Minutes.

1/03. APOLOGIES FOR ABSENCE AND TEMPORARY APPOINTMENTS

Apologies for absence and temporary appointments were received as follows:

Apology from	Temporary Appointments
Councillor Sibley	-

2/03. MINUTES

The Minutes of the meetings of the Committee held on 11 and 18 December 2002 were approved and signed.

Matters Arising from the Minutes

With regard to Minute 60/02 (Oxfordshire Plan 2003/04) the Committee voiced their concern that the current draft of the Oxfordshire Plan did not incorporate any of the Scrutiny Committee’s suggestions or comments.

The Committee AGREED to ask the Executive to inform the Committee on how its comments had been incorporated or not as the case may be in the Oxfordshire Plan.

3/03. PETITIONS AND PUBLIC ADDRESS

The Chair reported that the following requests to address the meeting had been agreed:-

Request from	Agenda Item/Issue
Mr A. Lester Covered Market Tenants Association	The Castle Site, Oxford
Dr Philip Hawtin Chairman of Cumnor Parish Council	8 – Carterton, Witney and Oxford – Transport Link

Mr Lester addressed the Committee on behalf of the Covered Market Tenants Association regarding the proposed market at the Castle Site. He reported that the proposal was that there should be a seven day market with 20 stalls and a different theme each day which would mean that 20 different traders would arrive each day using vehicles upwards of the size of a transit van. They would have access to the site before the start of trading and leave the site at the end of trading, just at the peak time for public transport bringing people to and taking people out of the City. To achieve access to the development the developers planned to install a gateway through the rear of the site from Paradise Street, which was a very narrow and difficult street to manoeuvre in. There were only two ways to access the site via Paradise Street, the first through New Road and Castle Street both of which were bus priority routes agreed with the bus companies; the second was through St Thomas Street which had part of the road, adjacent to the old Morrells Brewery site, narrowed effectively to a single carriageway and or Tidmarsh Lane.

He urged the Committee to explore the effect this would have on the Oxford Transport Strategy in that area, which, Councillors through a long and arduous consultation process had agreed was fundamental to the success of public transport access through the City, and to revisit the issue and refuse the developer the opportunity to resolve his problems by making longer-term problems for others.

He further urged the Committee to visit the site (Paradise Street), to assist in the Committee coming to a proper conclusion.

Mr Luck reported that the application had been determined by the City Council and that they had consulted the County Council on traffic issues during the process and that the County had made no objections on the final application, on the basis that the development would not have a detrimental effect or the traffic in the City and that further traffic measures were proposed in the areas of concern including camera enforcement.

In light of the advice received from officers, the Committee agreed not to add a review of the Castle Site planning application to their work programme. However, the Committee agreed to monitor levels of traffic in the area once the site was open.

4/03. SCRUTINY REVIEWS

(Agenda Item 5)

The Committee received updates on the various Reviews underway as follows:-

Highway Consultations on Planning Applications

The Committee received an update from Councillor Mold of the Scrutiny Review of Highway Consultation on Planning Applications. He reported that the finalised report would now be presented to the next meeting of on 7 May 2003.

Highway Drainage and Quality of Repairs

The Committee received an update from Councillor Bryden on the Scrutiny Review of Highway Drainage and Quality of Repairs. He reported that analysis of the questionnaire sent out to all parishes was on going and that the review group were now discussing the final group of people that needed to be interviewed. He further reported that the review deadline of 7 May was impractical and would need to be extended to the next scheduled meeting in July.

Corporate Environmental Policy and Energy Saving Scrutiny Review

The Committee received an update from Mr Hehir and members of the panel on the Scrutiny Review of the Corporate Environmental Policy and Energy Saving. It was reported that the Scrutiny Co-ordinating Group had approved the scoping document for the joint review at their meeting on 31 January 2003. Mr Hehir further reported that he would be meeting with Mrs Moore and Mrs Ohlenschlager to produce a more definitive scoping and that the review was due to start in April.

The Chair of the Committee expressed concern regarding the over-running of some of the reviews and requested that a meeting be set up with all lead members of the reviews and the Scrutiny Review Officers to assess progress.

The Committee AGREED to note the updates and to ask officers to convene a meeting at the earliest possible date between the Chair, Lead Members of each Review and Scrutiny Review Officers to assess the progress of all the Reviews currently underway.

Biodiversity Review in Oxfordshire

On 16 October 2002, Craig Blackwell, the County Council’s Ecologist had made a presentation to the Committee outlining the benefits of preserving biodiversity sites throughout the County. He outlined the benefits of clarifying the range of habitats and species in Oxfordshire. He thought that a way to address the need to look at biodiversity in the County would be to include appropriate policies in policy plans such as the Structure Plan and Minerals and Waste Local Plan and include biodiversity in the planning process. He further highlighted the need for further resources to allow for continuing support for partnerships working on biodiversity projects.

The Committee had agreed to identify this area for a possible future review and a Lead Member Group was appointed to scope the review so that the Committee could determine whether it should be commissioned.

The Committee AGREED to:

1. note the updates;
2. invite Craig Blackwell to a future meeting of the Scrutiny Committee to report and answer questions on how Biodiversity issues were currently taken into account in relevant and appropriate policies and plans; and which it determines.
3. RECOMMEND the Executive to give an assurance that Biodiversity was properly taken into account of in the relevant policies and plans which it determines.
   
   

5/03. SCRUTINY COMMISSIONED WORK PROGRAMME

• Future Development of Brize Norton;
• Rural roofing County Council policies;

6/03. SPEED MANAGEMENT POLICY

1. endorse the Speed Management Strategy and welcome the establishment of a Working Group to deal with the Strategy;
2. ask the Executive to positively consider membership from the Environment and Community Safety Scrutiny committees on the Working Group.

7/03. CARTERTON, WITNEY AND OXFORD – TRANSPORT LINKS

(Agenda Item 8)

On 15 October 2002, the Executive had resolved to ask the Director of Environmental Services to report back via the Environmental Scrutiny Committee, on the further development of the Strategy in the light of the results of the consultations with an invitation to the Scrutiny Committee to advise the Executive of any changes they considered should be made to the proposed strategy before adoption by the Executive.

The Scrutiny Committee considered a report (EN8) which provided details of the response to the consultation on the A40 Strategy Review. It explained that the general response has been very supportive and recommended that on the basis of this support, the new A40 Strategy should be adopted with a view to progress being made on the design and implementation of the various individual components and measures that form the Strategy.

Dr Hawtin addressed the Committee on behalf of Cumnor Parish Council on the proposal to give buses priority at Swinford Bridge on the B4044 Eynsham to Oxford Road.

The Cumnor Parish Council believed that the County’s proposal to create a bus priority arrangement in the Swinford Bridge area was ill conceived and impracticable; the suggestion that the scheme was solely to improve the movement of existing buses was disingenuous; that increasing the number of buses travelling along the B4044 would damage the local environment and the quality of life of the residents and would offer no compensating benefits and that there were no cost-effective benefits to be gained by spending money on attempting to improve the movement of buses along the B45044 and available money would be better spent on further and more immediate improvements t the A40 itself.

He urged the Scrutiny Committee to reject the suggestion that money should be spent on an ill-conceived scheme to offer buses priority to Swinford Bridge.

Councillor Robertson pointed out that the proposed improvements were only at the pinch points along the B4044 and were an attempt to resolve bus priority and the flow of buses along the B4044.

Councillor Hook addressed the Committee as local member for Cumnor. He supported the strategy generally but urged the Committee to take the proposed bus priority on B4044 out of the Strategy on the basis that it was a rural road, the road was used by cyclists, the road included a listed bridge and the scheme had no local support.

The Committee AGREED (by 7 votes to 4) to endorse the Strategy with the exception of bus priorities on the B4044 at the approaches to Swinford Toll Bridge.

8/03. FORWARD PLAN

in the Chair

Date of signing 2003

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