What ?

Residents in the area around Rangeworthy, Wickwar, Brimsham, Yate, Chipping Sodbury, Iron Acton and Hall End have been horrified to learn about proposals to put a Gypsy and Travellers site in the middle of this rural area.

South Gloucestershire County Council have spent your money opposing planning applications for change from agricultural use.

Now, we are being pushed to have 10 extended semi-permanent families and 2 travelling families in several different structures on the same site.

The proposals are contrary to Government guidelines on the location of Gypsy and Traveller sites. These guidelines recommend the selection of sites that are close to buses, schools, shops, GPs, etc and for the sites to encourage integration with the local community as a key part of local council strategy. This site's remoteness alone is contrary to 7 of the 23 recommendations made in the Goverment guidelines.

Where ?

The proposed site is a 27 acre area of land surrounding an existing house on the north side of Tanhouse Lane, Rangeworthy. The land also runs alongside the west Limekiln Road. It is all the area south of the wooded area and east of the railway shown on the map below. This is in a rural area to the north of Yate, Brimsham and Chipping Sodbury

How Big ?

South Gloucestershire regard a "pitch" as typically 3 structures. A residential caravan, a touring caravan and a "day room". There is no real limit to the size of a pitch, The only definition is that it is the accomodation and area occupied by a single extended family - each pitch could accommodate 3 generations of an extended family. once occupied, the residents could easily expect to add more structures. That would be a huge number of people vehicles (some commercial) and animals going up and down Tanhouse Lane and the neighbouring lanes!!! Have a look at the picture on the right showing a single family site in Hampshire. Click on it to have a closer look. Then multiply that by 12 to give the 12 units this application wants.

Gypsy site, The Lakes, Swanmore   © Copyright Peter Facey and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.

When ?

The times are all summarised in the calendar page. Specific times are re-emphasised in the text at various pages on this web site.

Latest

The site at Tanhouse Lane was only put forward by the council on Monday 15th June 2009. The period for comments lasted until Monday 13 July 2009 so officially this is closed. Don't let that put you off, if you haven't objected yet, please do so.

We regard the Homefield site as a local test case. It is very important to get this planning permission overturned. See the Homefield page for details of our actions.

We are planning to hold a social evening at some point in the future. We are aiming for this to be a fund-raising event, All contributions/help with this welcome. Let us know what you can offer.

The action group continually need funds, particularly to help with the legal challenge above.. If you or a friend can afford to contribute a little more this will be more than welcome. Cheques should be made payable to Hall End Action Group and sent to the HEAG.c/o Hall End Cottage, Hall End, GL12 8PD

Make sure we have your contact details (email preferred as this is cheaper).

What can we do about it ?

First, help as much as possible to make up the numbers in protest to the Homefield site. Join us when you can.

The Tanhouse Lane site also appears on the South Gloucestershire Gypsy and Traveller Development Plan Document (DPD) You only have until 13th July to object to the Tanhouse Lane site.

We urge you to get involved with both of the issues.

Object strongly. However, please avoid any argument that could be taken as racist. This will not help our case. Your objection will then be wasted. See the Objecting page for arguments that were deemed suitable for Homefield. You are free to use extracts where you think they apply to Tanhouse Lane. If you think of any that are specific to Tanhouse Lane let us know and perhaps we can include them here for others to use.