Thank you, all of you! Now the next step: the planning application.
When the petition closed today, 10,722 people had signed online, and a further 417 had signed by hand on paper sheets at drop-in sessions and in local shops. That’s more than 11,000 signatures in all. Nine residents also wrote letters to the Prime Minister, and children from Portishead and the surrounding villages sent us 102 drawings and messages, from “Save all the trees” to “Do not destroy the woods please”.
Around four in ten online signatures came from North Somerset, and nearly a third from the BS20 postcode alone, which covers Portishead and its neighbouring villages. This is a town speaking, not a handful of neighbours.
All of it has been collected into one 713-page document, every name, letter and drawing, which we will hand in at 10 Downing Street on Wednesday 14th October. We’ll ask the Government to look hard at the Tower Farm and Black Rock allocations while the Local Plan examination is still running.
This is the last update you’ll get from this petition, but it isn’t the end of the campaign.
Here's what’s new:
The planning application is in. The outline application for up to 400 homes at Tower Farm (reference 26/P/1618/OUT) was validated by North Somerset Council on 1st October, and comments close on Thursday 5th November.
The petition shows how a community feels, but it isn’t a formal planning objection. A comment on the application is, and anyone can make one, whether or not you commented on the Local Plan last year.
Avon Wildlife Trust, who own and manage Weston Big Wood, are working alongside us and have started speaking up for the wood publicly. Stuart from the trust will be with us at Downing Street next week, and the AWT will be at the public meeting on 21st October and our Gathering on the 31st October at Merlin Park. They'll also be making a representation at the hearing on the 8th December too! Click here to learn how you can help.
Three things you can do next that would make a difference:
1) Comment on the Tower Farm application by Thursday 5 November. Go to planning.n-somerset.gov.uk, search for 26/P/1618/OUT, open the Comments tab and choose Make a Comment. Or write to Planning, 2 West Post Point, North Somerset Council, Town Hall, Weston-super-Mare BS23 1UJ, quoting the reference number above. (Please note that emailed comments are not counted by NSC.) Write in your own words about what you know: the school run on The Downs, how you use the wood, the wildlife you’ve seen, water on the fields after rain. The Council weighs planning reasons, not the number of objections, so one accurate comment from someone who lives here counts for more than a long one copied from elsewhere. Click here for our short guide on how to comment.
2) Tell us what you see. Between about 2.45pm and 3.45pm, how many cars are parked on The Downs, and is anything unsafe? After rain, is there standing water or a spring by the public footpaths? Which bats, owls, deer or birds have you seen, where and when? Note the date, time and place, take a photo if you can, and send it to info@swbwportishead.co.uk with the topic in the subject line, or even better, create an iNaturalist account and log it there. Please stay on public paths, keep children’s faces out of photos, and avoid disturbing wildlife. We'll gather everything into one dated record for the campaign’s response to the Council.
3) Ask our MP to speak up. If you live in the North Somerset constituency, email Sadik Al-Hassan MP at sadik.alhassan.mp@parliament.uk. Give your address, because he can only act for constituents, and tell him in your own words why the wood matters to you. Ask him to say publicly where he stands on Tower Farm and Black Rock, and to take part in the Tower Farm session of the hearings on 8th December. He has already written to the Housing Minister and to the Council about Tower Farm, and the Planning Inspectorate’s own guidance in paragraph 5.5 says an MP can take part in a hearing session for constituents even without having commented on the plan before. We hope he will.
Key dates:
- Sat–Sun 10th–11th October: petition weekend with Portishead Town Council
- Wed 14th October: hand-in at 10 Downing Street
- Wed 21st October: public meeting, Somerset Hall, Portishead, 7.30–9pm, hosted by Portishead Town Council with Avon Wildlife Trust
- Tue 27th October: deadline for written hearing statements (for those taking part in the hearings only)
- Sat 31st October: community gathering, lower field of Merlin Park, 10am–12 noon
- Thu 5th November: comments close on the Tower Farm application
- Tue 8th December, 10am: the Inspectors’ hearing on Matter 13, which includes Tower Farm, Town Hall, Weston-super-Mare. Anyone can come and watch, and a full room counts.
Our parliamentary petition 777301 is also still open, until 12th February 2027. It asks the Government to clarify Grey Belt policy for land next to nationally protected nature sites, like Weston Big Wood, and at 10,000 signatures the Government has to respond in writing: https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/777301
You might also be interested in this grey belt parliamentary petition too: https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/766093
From today, every Save Weston Big Wood update will be on Facebook at facebook.com/swbwportishead. Please follow us there.
Please, if you do one thing this autumn, comment on the application before 5th November, and please keep following this campaign on Facebook.
Thank you for everything you’ve done to get us this far!
Tom & Susan
Save Weston Big Wood