Representation by Steven Whitmore
- Date submitted
- 23 June 2023
- Submitted by
- Members of the public/businesses
I write in opposition to the proposed Hinckley national rail freight interchange. I submit that this venture represents a colossal threat to the area, both now and in the future. My reasons are not brief, nor should they be so. We are told that the proposed Hinckley national rail freight interchange is of significant importance to the country’s infrastructure. But what do the people of Hinckley get in return for taking on board an industrial development one third to one quarter the size of the town? This, I believe, is a fair question to ask. In their promotional literature, the developers are keen to promote the prospect of creating 8,400 jobs. But does this constitute such an undeniable advantage that it makes the environmental and logistical risks worth taking? It is true that 8,400 jobs represents a tempting offer to any market town and its local area, perhaps more so when you factor in the damage done to the economy by Covid-19, the global downturn, and the challenges posed by our new relationship with Europe. But will all of these jobs go to Hinckley people? Will we be the ones directly to benefit? In exchange for the great harms we will be forced to bear? The parliamentary debates and local council reports on the development reveal an uncomfortable truth, and it is this: It is highly unlikely that Hinckley will benefit exclusively in terms of these proposed 8,400 jobs. Almost certainly, we will see an influx of workers from Nuneaton, Coventry, Leicester, and maybe even farther afield. Taken together, this would mean an incredible amount of new traffic descending on a town well known for its transport bottlenecks. The development team representative I spoke to during the 2022 public consultations was very keen to stress the efficacy of their transport modelling. But when I pressed him for details, none were forthcoming. It is therefore no surprise that recent reports by both Hinckley and District Borough Council and their Blaby counterparts voice great concern that the developers do not appear to have done their homework on this key part of the plan. So you may wish to think about the 8,400 jobs bonus this way ... Whatever the final proportions of jobs going to local people and to those from Leicester and beyond, it is indisputable that the two main arteries feeding Hinckley from the M69 are already under serious strain. As plenty of commuters will tell you, the traffic along Sapcote Road frequently backs up beyond the Aston Flamville junction at rush hour. On the other side of town, the unusually restrictive railway bridge close to Brookside guarantees chaos whenever it is blocked by unwary HGVs. Such congestion instantly transforms any nearby roads into whichever rat run Google considers the least worst option. On a good day, there remain frequent holdups and tailbacks. Gridlock — and the potential for widespread traffic disruption — is already with us here in Hinckley. So large numbers of new vehicles, wherever they come from, are not welcome because it is almost certain that our roads will become more congested more frequently. The greater the proportion of the 8,400 jobs going to Hinckley people, the greater the congestion issues we will face — because how else are these people going to get to work? The greater the proportion of the jobs going to people from outside the area, the more we will see congestion on the M69, the A5, Coventry Rd, Ashby Rd, and so on. Either way you look at it, the promise of jobs is not the big attraction it might seem because it brings with it a substantial increase in the numbers of vehicles on already busy local roads, with no answers given about how the town will cope with this. Remember too that a rail freight interchange of national importance will undoubtedly attract high levels of commercial HGV traffic in addition to personal vehicles. In exchange for hosting an environmental nightmare on their doorstep, the people of Hinckley will pay a heavy price in traffic congestion and all the inconvenience this will bring. So what happens to the air quality once all these cars and vans and HGVs begin descending on the town in huge numbers? What happens to the levels of pollutants in the atmosphere when half mile long diesel trains pass through our residential areas, fields and woodland with substantially increased frequency? It is inconceivable that a 660 acre industrial development and its accompanying freight traffic flow will have zero or no impact on air quality and pollution levels. Only the deluded could possibly imagine such an outcome. The density and size of the warehouses and the volume of the traffic serving them can only mean that Hinckley residents will see an increase in the kinds of problems air pollution has been demonstrated to bring, including respiratory illness, breathing-related allergies, and environmental damage. The more you look at it, the more the promise of 8,400 jobs comes with a hefty and unwelcome price tag. So why should we willingly accept levels of pollutants in the air rising to figures the town has never seen before? Like the potential for substantial traffic congestion, increased air pollution is a reality that the town will have to endure if these proposals go ahead. The time to ensure we do not end up suffering from difficulties we currently do not face is not tomorrow, it is NOW. Increased light pollution is another example of what we can reasonably expect to happen if this development goes ahead. Places like Earl Shilton do not see the clear night skies you might find in Devon or Cornwall, it is true, but our part of Bosworth/Blaby does benefit from plenty of open countryside devoid of lighting. The proposed development is almost 1.5 times bigger than the whole of Stoney Stanton, and unless the night shifts are to be conducted in total darkness, the increase in light pollution will be dramatic — particularly for the residents of Elmesthorpe. How do we know this? Because the 66 acre so-called Brexit Lorry Park in Kent has been described by its angry neighbours as “brighter than Wembley Stadium”. The proposed Hinckley development dwarfs what we see in Kent. You do not need a crystal ball to tell you what the impact on light pollution of a 660 acre industrial site will be because the results are already in. The people of Kent show us exactly what to expect in terms of light pollution if this scheme goes ahead. They had no choice, we are told, and it looks like the people of Hinckley now have similar options. Let’s hope this consultation process reverses the increasingly grim outlook for local democracy. So how will the proposed development benefit rail commuters and people living close to the railway line? Hinckley and Burbage have historically been divided by two modest strips of railway track. This line cuts right through the town — so what are the implications for the traffic travelling along this single rail artery? For pollution? For noise? For impact on rail travel for local residents? What we have been told is that this line is to host a volume of traffic like none it has seen before in order to service a cluster of a 9 colossal warehouses, some the size of Leicester’s tallest high rises laid on their side. Why do these warehouses need to be so colossal? One reason given is because there needs to be sufficient space to cope with the freight regularly delivered by half-mile long trains (of which the site itself will eventually house 16). We are told that “each freight train can remove up to 76 HGVs from our roads, removing 1.6 billion HGV kilometres annually,” but it is unlikely that the residents of Brookside and other areas directly adjacent to the railway line will be especially chuffed about this news. The more freight this sites removes from other regions roads’, the more of it ends up on our doorstep. The quoted figures indicate an enormous amount of extra diesel trains moving right through the heart of Hinckley. We already know that the expected volume of traffic is sufficiently large to force the closure of Narborough’s level crossing for 40 minutes of every hour and bring the town to a standstill. Given such astonishing levels of freight train activity fundamental to the development, we should be very worried by the noise and pollution these trains will inflict upon us. Remember too that trains break down from time to time, so here are more opportunities for the Birmingham to Leicester line to grind to a halt. All of which begs the question: is a single railway line the most advantageous location for any kind of interchange? Any transport bottlenecks here will impact directly on the effectiveness of the development itself because there is no alternative way in or out for the trains. The more you consider the impact these proposals will have, the more you wonder: do any of the planners actually live round here? If they did, they would see their vision for our town is an unreasonable ask. As history shows, it is all too easy for out-of-towners with big ideas to create developments with disastrous consequences for local residents. Worse still, once the damage is done, it is not always possible to reverse it. This is especially true for natural habitats and green spaces. Once these valuable resources are developed, they are lost forever — and if developments encroach upon them, they are irreversibly harmed. The pandemic demonstrated beyond all doubt how our open spaces need to be cherished and preserved. But to view the preservation of Burbage Common and Woods solely in terms of human enjoyment and wellbeing would entirely miss the point about conservation. Before any common land or woodland can be a safe haven for people, it must be a safe haven in its own terms, for the all the wildlife that flourishes there. As each year passes, Britain loses more of its natural diversity to similar looking warehouses and lorry parks. Unless we learn to say NO to such developments for benefits beyond ourselves and our own lifetimes, our countryside will ultimately be destroyed. If the proposals go ahead, extensive borders of Burbage Common and Woods will effectively become industrial boundaries. What is at stake for the people of Hinckley and its environment is as much about the future implications of the proposed development as it is for the substantial negative impact we face in the present moment. Why do I say this? Because the most important consideration regarding this entire development relates to what we may reasonably expect in the future once Hinckley is established as a rail freight town. If we look ahead to where the residents of Hinckley might be in 10 or 20 years time once the site is fully operational, the danger of allowing this scheme to go ahead becomes considerably clearer. Remember, here is a national rail interchange, deemed so important that the usual processes for planning and local council involvement have been overridden. So, once it is built, will this be the end of the story? Will a national rail freight interchange deemed fit for purpose in 2025 be sufficient to cater for the demands of the 2030s or 2040s? You only have to look a few miles down the road for the answer. Just as the original 80s plans for Centre 21 close to Narborough and Enderby have resulted in a retail and office colossus that continues to outstrip the planners’ grandest blueprints (and devours more open spaces year by year), so the proposed Hinckley site will not be bound by the structural development we see in the current plans. Just as the original Magna Park freight interchange five miles down the road close to Lutterworth has now ravaged the surrounding countryside and expanded to become the largest such development in Europe, so the nationally significant Hinckley rail freight interchange will grow and grow and grow. You would have to be alarmingly unattentive to dismiss such a possibility from your mind because this is precisely what happens with developments of this kind. If you had said, back when Magna Park was at the planning stages, that its warehouses would eventually stretch all the way along the A5 to the Willey turnoff, you would have been called a scaremongering fool — not to mention a master of innuendo. So what areas of land can we reasonably expect may be consumed by this project in the 2030s, the 2040s, and beyond? I put it to one of the development representatives during the 2022 consultations that the proposed A47 link road offers incredible opportunities for the future development of warehouse space on the site. Once the national rail freight interchange is up and running, there is no good reason why further warehouses or parking space could not be built on the Earl Shilton side of the railway line also. An increased national population demanding ever more goods and services may well discover that the Hinckley interchange is no longer fit for purpose 10 years from now, so who is to say no to such a plan? Looking further ahead, what reason would there be to prevent the site expanding to the other side of the motorway on the land adjacent to Sapcote? There is, after all, plenty of it, and you could easily run a bridge across the M69 to make it all work. Does this sound crazy? Unimaginable? Or is it crazier and more unimaginable to assert that the Hinckley national rail freight interchange of 2025 will never, ever expand beyond the borders described in the plans before us here in 2023? Guaranteed? Unless you have been living under a very small rock a long, long way away from civilisation, failure to come to this conclusion would constitute a miracle. This is why stopping this development is of paramount importance. Once it is here, it changes the town detrimentally, and forever, and those changes will not be limited to the current site. Unless we wish our children and grandchildren to be going through precisely this consultation process in 2030 or 2040 regarding the proposed Northern Perimeter Road Extension or the Burbage Woods (South) Extension, or some other inevitable expansion, then we must stop this NOW. Because none of this ever needs to happen. The proposed development will generate all kinds of problems the area currently does not have, and we will be the ones to suffer. Unless we oppose this development, we are willingly walking into a future with more traffic congestion, dirtier air, sullied natural resources, fewer open spaces, and more generators of common woe than common weal. We are at the stage where we have the power to stop this. It is, of course, merely the power of local residents to stand in opposition to the almost certain rampage of a behemoth ... But the people of Hinckley are, in all of this, a uniquely interested party regarding the go-ahead for this development. And I, for one, say NO.