Draft Greater Cambridge Local Plan for consultation

Comment

Representation ID: 208327

Received: 30/01/2026

Respondent: Gladman Developments

In accordance with Section 19 of the 2004 Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act, policies set out in Local Plans must be subject to Sustainability Appraisal (SA).

The Council should ensure that the results of the SA process conducted through the preparation of the Local Plan clearly justify the policy choice made, including proposed site allocations (or decisions not to allocate sites) when considered against reasonable alternatives. In meeting the development needs of the area, it should be
clear from the results of the assessment why some policy options have been progressed and others have been rejected.

Comment

Representation ID: 208328

Received: 30/01/2026

Respondent: Gladman Developments

A minor house-keeping comment would be that draft local plans are often very long documents, and so it is useful for the reader to have access to the whole document as one, single, PDF file. Unfortunately, the draft plan is not available in this format and we found it difficult to navigate the document via the website portal, which requires scrolling through the web pages and/or downloading several PDFs which comprised the whole document in six parts. A single file that can be downloaded is therefore
requested for future consultations. It is difficult to know which of many large PDF files to download to find the policy or map sought. This is also the case for the
Sustainability Appraisal work.

Comment

Representation ID: 208329

Received: 30/01/2026

Respondent: Gladman Developments

It would be easier for the reader if the policies were numbered as well as/instead of having lettered codes. This would help the reader with navigating through such a long document.

Comment

Representation ID: 208330

Received: 30/01/2026

Respondent: Gladman Developments

The minimum end date of the plan should be 15 years from adoption, as per paragraph 22 of the Framework. The draft plan seeks to cover the period 2024-2045, i.e. 21 years. Gladman supports this approach as it gives additional years should there be any delays in the plan-making process or during examination.

However, in order to be consistent with national policy, Gladman would recommend that the plan period to starts in a more recent year – 2025, ending in 2045. The council may then want to amend the ending year to 2046 to maintain the 21-year plan period.

Comment

Representation ID: 208331

Received: 30/01/2026

Respondent: Gladman Developments

There is too much dependence on allocations that have not come forward from the adopted plans, despite being allocated eight years ago. There cannot be any realistic confidence in those sites adopted in the 2018 Local Plans (for Cambridge or South Cambridge) that they will now come forward if there has been no movement on them since adoption.

Object

Representation ID: 208332

Received: 30/01/2026

Respondent: Gladman Developments

Legally compliant? Not specified

Sound? Not specified

Duty to co-operate? Not specified

This policy is not necessary and over-onerous. We argue that the content requested in a Sustainability Statement can easily be included as part of a Design and Access
Statement and/or Planning Statement. This appears to be acceptable for minor development applications (within paragraph 3 of the draft policy), however there is no explanation for why there is a requirement for this to be a separate document for larger schemes.

Object

Representation ID: 208333

Received: 30/01/2026

Respondent: Gladman Developments

Legally compliant? Not specified

Sound? Not specified

Duty to co-operate? Not specified

Policy BG/BG (Biodiversity and geodiversity) should require the nationally‑mandated 10 % Biodiversity Net Gain rather than the 20 % stipulated in Paragraph 2.

20% is only requested where it is ‘feasible and effective.’ However, given that the request is 10% higher than what is required by national policy, inevitably the majority of the development industry will be seeking exemptions with
the primary focus being the viability of a scheme. Such an exercise is unnecessary and overly onerous to result in a requirement that is already set nationally. The request
for 20% should be removed.

Comment

Representation ID: 208334

Received: 30/01/2026

Respondent: Gladman Developments

Whilst we agree with having a mix of housing types on new development sites, we would suggest that each housing type (1-bed, 2-bed etc.) be given a percentage range, rather than an exact figure. Currently as written, every development would be contrary to this policy unless it is the exact percentage of each bedroomed house given in Table 2.

Comment

Representation ID: 208335

Received: 30/01/2026

Respondent: Gladman Developments

Whilst Gladman acknowledges the importance of self
and custom build units, having a 5% requirement on schemes of just 20 units or more would surmount to a significant number of such units being a policy requirement.

It is suggested that this policy is amended to having a ‘sliding scale’ for the percentage of such dwellings needed per site (i.e. a lower percentage on much larger scheme, as this will still provide a larger number of self/custom build dwellings). Alternatively, the threshold of 20 units should be increased to a number in the region of 70 units, which is the approach being taken by Tonbridge and Malling in their draft local plan.

Comment

Representation ID: 208336

Received: 30/01/2026

Respondent: Gladman Developments

We note in draft policy S/JH that provision will be made for at least 48,195 new homes across a range of tenures. This is broken down by the existing adopted supply (totalling 37,865 units), plus 13,463 additional units planned for under this draft local plan which would meet the need as well as allow for a 6.5% (3,133-unit) buffer on top of what is needed (i.e. 51,328 units in total, comprising of existing, adopted sites and draft allocations under this draft plan).

Whilst Gladman agrees to allow for such a healthy buffer, as well as plan beyond the minimum of 15 years (to allow room for any inevitable delays in the plan-making process), the distribution of development could be made more sustainable in the authority. There is an over-reliance on larger sites to come forward and be built out within the plan period. There needs to be a more proportional breakdown to allow for organic growth in suitable settlements (as broken down in the settlement hierarchy, draft Policy S/SH) to ensure that there are appropriate levels of development in these locations.