Another benefit of this Lib Dem vision would be the building of 300,000 new homes in a co-ordinated and controlled way in this part of the country, starting with Bicester as pioneer. It would thereby reduce the pressure to add hundreds and sometimes thousands of homes to every town and village here, which would turn villages into town and towns into cities indiscriminately, concreting over our Green Belt.
There should certainly be no large scale house building at Barton-le-Clay, sited as we are on the aquifer of the Barton Clay Vale between the chalk escarpment of the Chilterns to the south and the Greensand Ridge to the north, stretching up into Cambridgeshire..
The winter rains of 2014 saw water levels here rise in much of Barton to within six inches of the ground. When we flood it is through the water table rising, flooding gardens, patios and, in the worst cases, homes. Culverts on Manor Road brimmed with rainwater and homes at the juncture of Stuart Road and Windsor Road saw their gardens and patios flood. Building over more of the aquifer makes no sense given that the water table will rise again as rains fall. And with climate change, we are having wetter winters and warmer summers.
How is it for you in heavy rain? Does your garden become waterlogged or the patio flood? What do you think of the idea of having Bicester and other towns on the Cambridge-Oxford axis developed into garden cities like Letchworth and Welwyn? Janet Nunn wants to hear your views on janet.nunn@ntlworld.com
