Reviewing the Lower Hoddern Farm Transport Assessment
Dear Lewes District Council,
Background
Planning Application LW/17/0226 included a Transport Assessment which Lewes District Council LDC referred to East Sussex County Council ESCC as the Highways Authority responsible for the sections of the A259 road that are in Lewes District.
ESCC commissioned "The GTA Civils Review", a 40 page review of the Transport Assessment by GTA Civils, which was then passed back to Lewes District Council LDC.
As this was highly technical it is assumed that when this was passed to LDC, it was accompanied by a less technical summary of the key conclusions, to assist LDC in makng an informed decision.
No such summary was added to the documents on the LDC Planning Website, nor was the review itself published on the site. That is LDC, possibly following advice from ESCC did not publish the critiques.
Information Requested
Please provide a copy of any information passed to LDC by ESCC concerning the conclusions of the GTA Civils Review, including emails or letters or minutes of meetings or memoranda of telephone calls, about the outcomes of the review.
Please provide a copy of any recommendations made to LDC by ESCC on how the Planning Application might be taken forward, in the light of the conclusions of the GTA Civils Review, including but not limited to suggestions as to the additional steps the developer might take to provide an acceptable Transport Assessment.
If the reason for not publishing this information on the Planning Website was a simple oversight. please state this. If it was intentional, please provide a copy of the minutes (or similar) recording this decision and it's rationale.
Yours faithfully,
rob shepherd
Thank you for your information request received today.
I am currently reviewing your request and investigating whether there is
any information available for disclosure. The council, in accordance with
Section 10 of the Freedom of Information Act (2000), will reply to your
request promptly and in any event not later than the twentieth working day
following the date of receipt.
Please contact me again if you require any assistance with your request
and I will do my best to provide the relevant help and advice.
Kind Regards
Information Governance Officer
Lewes District Council and Eastbourne Borough Council
Dear Mr. Shepherd,
Information Request: FOI 6716
Thank you for your information request dated 30^th April 2018 received in
our office on the same day.
Please provide a copy of any information passed to LDC by ESCC concerning
the conclusions of the GTA Civils Review, including emails or letters or
minutes of meetings or memoranda of telephone calls, about the outcomes of
the review.
Please provide a copy of any recommendations made to LDC by ESCC on how
the Planning Application might be taken forward, in the light of the
conclusions of the GTA Civils Review, including but not limited to
suggestions as to the additional steps the developer might take to provide
an acceptable Transport Assessment.
If the reason for not publishing this information on the Planning Website
was a simple oversight. please state this. If it was intentional, please
provide a copy of the minutes (or similar) recording this decision and
it's rationale.
I have reviewed your request and investigated whether there is any
information which can be disclosed to you. Please find below the
information the council holds, and which I am pleased to provide to you.
I attach redacted copies of pertinent emails and reports as follows -
Email 3 May 2017:
Marked as CONFIDENTIAL
GTA Civils 26 page report – to inform ESCC highway authority
This document was not put on the planning application file because it was
a background document feeding into the formal consultation response from
ESCC highway authority and it was marked confidential. However, it is
understood that under a previous FOI request (1 October 2017) the GTA
Civils report was made public.
Email 5 October 2017:
ESCC highway authority comments and tables of traffic data.
The highway authority comments are public and are on the application file.
The tables of traffic data should also have been published, but they were
not. This was a genuine oversight.
Email 24 October 2017:
ESCC highway authority confirms that the Transport Assessment had been
improved and the matters raised by GTA Civils had been addressed.
This email was sent in order to assist the case officer in responding to
an individual query from a Mr L O’Connor. It can easily be added to the
application file and made public if that is acceptable to ESCC highway
authority.
I trust that this deals with your enquiry to your satisfaction, but if you
feel that Lewes District Council has misunderstood or not responded
appropriately to your request, you have two courses of action:
o You can clarify the terms of your original request to allow this to be
looked at again (if you expand your request this will be dealt with
as a new request)
o All applicants have a 'right of appeal'. An appeal should be focused
on the original request and should identify how the council’s response
failed to answer your Information Request. Appeals must be made in
writing (or e-mail) within 40 working days of receipt of this response
and addressed to the Information Governance Appeals Officer, to the
address below.
Information Governance Appeals Officer
Lewes District Council and Eastbourne Borough Council
1 Grove Road
EASTBOURNE
BN21 4TW
E-mail : [1][email address]
After the council’s internal appeals procedure has been exhausted, a
further appeal about the same Information Request can be directed to the
Information Commissioner for adjudication. Full details will be provided
should an appeal proceed to this stage.
Please note:
If you are considering re-using the information disclosed to you through
this request, for any purpose outside of what could be considered for
personal use, you are required under the Public Sector Re-use of
Information Regulations 2015 to make an Application for Re-use to the
organisation you have requested the information from. Applications for
Re-Use should be directed to the address detailed in the footer below.
Please contact me again, quoting your reference number, if you require any
further assistance with your current request and I will do my best to
provide the relevant help and advice.
Yours sincerely
Regards,
Kevin Rance
Information Governance Officer
Tel: +44(0)1273 471600
[2][email address]
Lewes and Eastbourne Legal Services acting on behalf of Lewes District
Council and Eastbourne Borough Council
Lewes District Council: Southover House, Southover Road, Lewes BN7 1AB
[3]www.lewes.gov.uk. Minicom 01273 484488 Eastbourne Borough Council: 1
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