Villagers ready to fight planning move

Villagers ready to fight planning move

The move means the village will be considered as part of Exeter

Residents of a Devon village have reacted angrily to plans which they say would lead to Exminster becoming a suburb of Exeter.

Exeter planners have decided to redraw the limit of the Exeter's Principal Urban Area to include the village and residents are concerned they will be overrun with new homes.

The government is calling for Exeter to build 11,000 new homes by 2016.

But people living in Exminster say the village has already doubled in size in the last 15 years and cannot cope with more development.

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"Suddenly this new proposal defines Exminster as part of the Exeter urban area," said local county councillor Brian Berman.

"It means that it tears up the local policy and when it comes to more housing development and it will be considered as part of Exeter and it will be developed to a much larger extent and nobody here wants that."

In the last 15 years 800 new homes have been built in Exminster and that is as far as residents want it to go.

Already they have raised more than 1000 objections to the new plan which they delivered to County Hall in Exeter.

Thirty years ago we learnt that you've got to keep the pressure up and, if necessary, escalate it to Parliamentary level

Ken Beer, Exminster resident

30 year ago residents fought a successful campaign to have a stretch of the M5 diverted away from a proposed route over their rooftops.

And now villagers are gearing up for another fight.

Local historian Ken Beer helped fight the motorway proposal 30 years ago.

"Thirty years ago we learnt that you've got to keep the pressure up and, if necessary, escalate it to Parliamentary level," said Mr Beer.

"This is what we did then and this is what we'll do again."