7:00pm Tuesday 16th March 2010
By Timothy John
THE door is still open to suggestions for a site to house gypsies and travellers visiting the Great Dorset Steam Fair.
That’s the pledge from Joyce Guest, the under-fire district council manager co-ordinating a site suggestion project with county council colleagues.
Mrs Guest has insisted that both local authorities are sincere in their search for more sites to consider as possible alternatives to continued use of a field near the villages of Tarrant Monkton and Tarrant Launceston.
“It’s the best we have got at the moment, but another could be just as good.
“All we are trying to do is find a solution to what is a really knotty problem.
“At the end of the day, we don’t want to upset the settled community, but it’s a question of what we can get and what is available,” said Mrs Guest.
Seventeen sites have already been published for consultation among people living in villages close to the fair, but three have since been withdrawn by the owner.
Villagers have objected to council officers setting the criteria against which the sites are judged. And they say officers’ conclusions on a site’s ability to gain planning permission should be reached by elected members of Dorset County Council’s planning committee.
A field on the eastern side of the C25 road, south of Hyde Hill has been used every year since 2007 and still has planning permission for a further two years.
Villagers in Monkton and Launceston have condemned its continued use and called for other villages to share the burden of hosting up to 100 gypsy caravans a night for the week surrounding the Steam Fair.
Their preferred location for the traveller camp is near Oakley Farm, at Wimborne St Giles.
Monkton and Launceston parish councillor, Kate Graeme-Cook, said officers had spoken against a site near Pimperne over its visual impact.
“They have said it’s available but that planning permission would be denied because of its visual impact. But visual impact is not part of their planning criteria.
“The district council wants the site to continue where it is and is putting up barriers,” said Cllr Graeme-Cook.
Parishes have been asked to submit their preferred site by March 31.
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