A PROPOSAL that land next to Chepstow’s Highbeech roundabout should be developed for housing and a hotel will be considered by councillors next week.
But no final decision is to be taken at Monmouthshire County Council’s full meeting on Thursday, September 26, as the site known as Mounton Road is being listed for inclusion in the council’s replacement local development plan, which will guide where new housing and employment sites should be located through to 2033.
When councillors approved the first stage of drawing up the new planning blueprint, in December 2022, it identified land at Bayfield, further north along the A466 Wye Valley Link Road, as the preferred site for new housing in Chepstow.
That document went out for consultation until the end of January this year and Monmouthshire County Council planners have since been responding to comments received from the public and other interested bodies including the Welsh Government.
In September revisions to the plan were put forward and they will now be considered by councillors on Thursday when they will be asked to endorse the preferred strategy.
That will then allow the next stage of work on developing the plan to take place and it would then be put out for further public consultation in the spring next year before being submitted to the Welsh Government in September 2024.
Sites included in the final agreed plan will be considered suitable for their suggested use but individual planning applications would still have to be made.
Planners have suggested “swapping” the preferred site in Chepstow from Bayfield to land between Mounton Road and St Lawrence Lane, which is adjacent to the Highbeech roundabout.
They say the new site would also allow for commercial uses, including a hotel and care home, alongside new housing.
The A466 connects to the M48 and the Highbeech roundabout is often congested at peak times and a report to be considered by counillors states it also close to the Air Quality Management Area on the A48 Hardwick Hill. The report says highway capacity will need to be addressed as part of any future development plans.
The land at Mounton Road is also currently listed as part of the “green wedge” intended to ensure countryside between the town and Pwllmeyric is maintained. But the report states it wouldn’t have to be retained as woods to the south west form “a strong boundary limiting the impact that development would have on adjacent land”.
The filed is currently used for grazing and the land is considered the best quality agricultural land, but that is in common with other main towns in Monmouthshire and the council’s view is that prime agricultural land would still need to be developed as other areas are flood plains that cannot be built on.
Advantages of making Mounton Road the preferred site, according to the council planners, are that it is within a 20 minute walk from the town centre and 15 minutes of the Bulwark Lidl and the train station is 19 minutes away on foot. Pembroke Primary can be reached within 15 minutes walking and the secondary school 17 minutes.
The council will also be asked to approve potential new sites for housing in Monmouth, now a ban on new builds can be lifted due to planned improvements to the waste water treatment works.
When the changes were presented to the council’s scrutiny committee in September it didn’t endorse the revised plan.
