Access Road
As part of the SITA proposal they plan to construct an access road from Backworth Lane (B1322) to the landfill site.
This is a quote from their Environmental Statement (ES):
4.4.8 To the west of the site, introduction of the new road junction, site access road........would bring localised changes. However, these elements are neither uncharacteristic nor unusual within the wider landscape........The access route would only result in a small change and as such would have virtually no (effect? - sic) on landscape character.
You can get an impression of this "small change" by moving your mouse over the picture above. The "prime quality agricultural" - SITA ES - in the foreground is planted with winter wheat. The field further back is a recognised nesting site for skylarks, a red list endangered species in the UK.
In case anyone thinks I'm going over the top putting two trucks in the picture, consider this - the proposed site will receive 200 trucks a day; they also need to return where they came from. Assuming a ten hour shift, and that all the trucks use this new road (that's the point of it after all - direct access from the A19), that's one truck in each direction every three minutes. This view will be the norm, not the exception.
The road is 7.2m wide, exactly the same as the B1322 which is used in the overlay. The camera position for the background and overlay is the same in perspective terms and the focal length of the camera is the same to try and give an accurate impression.
The width of the swathe cut through the fields and hedgerows is (according to SITA's plans in the ES - map) nearly 30m - four times as wide as the road pictured here. It widens to nearly 40m as it crosses the skylark field, 90m just before the woods on the horizon, then narrows to destroy a 20m wide section of these woods.
The road then drives through a newly restored (by North Tyneside Council - left) leisure walking and riding path (who will want to ride here when they have to cross such a dangerous and busy road?), cuts a 20m wide chunk out of what was once the village green of the Havelock mining settlement and runs on into another prime quality field.
Next it cuts crosses another regularly used bridleway (right) and starts to climb an embankment to a road over rail bridge before terminating in a new reception and processing plant (not allowable in a green belt area). There is an illustration of the visual impact of the bridge here.
This is simply vandalism.
Garry Clennell
top
