What's it all about ?
Stony Stratford (the 'jewel of Milton Keynes') is a busy market town with a vibrant High Street. Shoe-horning a massive supermarket into the town centre is not a good idea, and will cut off other, flexible, future-proof, options for development of Cofferidge Close... read more >>
Cofferidge Close is a pleasant mixed-use development in the centre of Stony Stratford's Conservation Area...read more >>>
A planning application - rejected by MKC in March 2013- for major demolition and replacement with a bigger supermarket and car park was filed in January 2011... read more >>> 
Stony Stratford Town Council and many hundreds of local residents objected to the proposal as being out of scale ...read more >>>
The Town Council and many residents would prefer a 'Plan B': re-use the existing buildings, maintain the trees and landscaping.. read more >>>
Links & Resources
Stony artist Peter Osborne's evocation of Cofferidge Close
( with thanks to Michael O'Sullivan for the photo)
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What now ?
Now that MKC has rejected the application for the demolition of much of Cofferidge Close and the construction of an out-of-scale supermarket, what happens next ?
There are three possibilities - the developers may: 1) appeal against the MKC decision, 2) come back with a completely new application, 3) put the site up for sale. >> Click here for more about these three possibilities In the meantime, watch this space for further News ... March 14th: DCC rejects the application !
The meeting of the DCC was packed tonight. The members voted unanimously to reject the application for re-development of Cofferidge Close, on the grounds presented by the MKC case Officer, Debbie Kirk (scale, heritage, loss of the Dental Practice). Excellent presentations were made objecting to the proposal, by Rob Gifford (Chair of Stony Town Council), Phil Wharton (Stony Ward Councillor) , and Graham Benjamin (from the 'Save Cofferidge Close' group). The applicant's representatives made two rather weak presentations, which failed to convince the DCC...
So, good sense has prevailed, and this battle is won, but,as the DCC Chairman pointed out, if the developers appeal against the decision, the war is not yet over... Presentations made at the DCC meeting
Councillor McLean said of the three presentations made in objection to the planning application for Cofferidge Close: “They were the best presentations I think I have heard in my two years of being on the Development Control Committee”. This is praise indeed!
Rob Gifford, Phil Wharton, and Graham Benjamin have kindly made the texts of their presentations available for us to put on the website, and you can download them as pdf files below: >> Objection by Rob Gifford, Chair of Stony Town Council >> Objection by Phil Wharton, Stony Ward Councillor >> Objection by Graham Benjamin, Save Cofferidge Close The other star of the evening was Debbie Kirk, MKC Case Officer, who has shown remarkable skill, patience, and commitment in handling this application and preparing the report recommending rejection. You can download a summary of the reasons she cites for objection, below: >> Case Officer, reasons for rejection summary We do not have copies of the two presentations made by the applicant's agents, sorry ... >> Draft minutes of the meeting from MKC March 8th: Stony Medical Centre for 'Plan B'
 Click above to download letter
A letter from Dr Goyal, GP Principal of the Stony Medical Centre, appeared today on the MKC website expressing a very strong interest, on behalf of both practices in the current health centre, in leasing the vacant Cofferidge Close office block. He says it would be "... the perfect site for a health centre (and) allied services including pharmacy, physio, etc". The current Market Square building, he says, is now unfit for purpose, is too small, and would require major refurbishment.
This proposal demolishes the main argument given by the applicants for the demolition of the office block, namely that they cannot find a suitable tenant for it. What could be more suitable for a long-term tenancy than a Medical Centre ? Furthermore, unlike a big supermarket, the move from the Market Square to the Close would have no net impact on traffic or parking problems in the town centre. >> Read more... |
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This site has been created and is administered by a group of independent residents of Stony Stratford
This site has been created and is administered by a group of independent residents of Stony Stratford
