About the Vale

Welcome to the Vale

The land is located within North Somerset, close to its eastern boundary and a short distance to the south west of Bristol City Centre. It covers 292 hectares of land in total and is bounded to the north by the A370 Long Ashton bypass and across the A38 to the south.

Where Should New Homes Go?

The four authorities in the West of England have come together to prepare a Joint Spatial Plan (JSP). The JSP will set out the housing, employment and infrastructure requirements for the whole area for the next 20 years. It will also identify those areas which the authorities consider the most sustainable locations for future growth.

How Many New Homes? One of the greatest challenges facing the authorities is the scale of housing required. The authorities’ own evidence suggests this could total 85,000 new homes during the 20 year period. This would mean 17,000 new homes need to be built on greenfield land.

The Vale – A Sustainable Location Taylor Wimpey believes that developing this land is a highly sustainable option. One of the key reasons is that it is close to the jobs, services and facilities within Bristol – all of which would be easily accessed by public transport (including the new MetroBus) and cycling.

A development the size of The Vale also has the potential to provide much of the necessary supporting social and community infrastructure which will be needed alongside the development, including new, modern, purpose built facilities for existing and future residents.

Our Planning Application Taylor Wimpey is promoting the allocation of The Vale through the JSP process whilst preparing a planning application at the same time. The planning application will be submitted before the JSP has been examined by an independent inspector but we are not expecting it to be determined until the JSP has been finalised. The preparation and submission of a planning application at this stage in the process will provide clarity, certainty and demonstrate to all interested parties what a development at The Vale would look like should the site be allocated in the JSP.

The Green Belt The land on which The Vale sits is within the designated Green Belt. Green Belt boundaries can be changed where there are exceptional circumstances, such as the need to plan sustainably for significant levels of new development.

Providing New Infrastructure

Building new homes without access to schools, transportation and jobs stores up problems for the future and can strain existing infrastructure.

The Vale is ideally placed to provide new homes in tandem with transport links, opportunities for new jobs, publicly accessible open green space and community infrastructure such as schools, doctors’ surgeries and dentists etc. The opportunity exists to provide the infrastructure that is needed because of the amount of land controlled by Taylor Wimpey and the scale of the proposed development.

For example, the scale of the new community will support three brand new primary schools and a new state of the art secondary school. These schools will be paid for by the developer on land which is well connected to and accessible from the new homes. Delivering a development in this way ensures that high quality modern facilities are provided at no cost to the local authority. Local authority resources can therefore be directed to the maintenance and improvement of existing schools.

Delivery of a well-planned new community will deliver the infrastructure needed to support residents’ needs and enable it to thrive – without putting pressure on the local authority.

Sustainable Living

We believe that the development of a new community at The Vale represents the best opportunity to meet a significant proportion of the district’s future development needs on a single, sustainable site.

  • Development on a single site in a sustainable location will help safeguard the identity of towns and villages across North Somerset.
  • The location provides a unique opportunity to connect to the strategic transport network, linking with the A370, the A38 and south Bristol as well as building upon the MetroBus network and potential for a new rail station as part of MetroWest’s future expansion.
  • The new community would offer improved surface access to Bristol International Airport (BIA) by more sustainable modes of travel.

Public Open Space Not Private Land

The land comprises 292 hectares of predominantly closed-off private agricultural land, landfills and a golf course. Considering the sustainability of the site, we believe it is capable of delivering the community and social infrastructure to support the needs of the new population. We firmly believe that green open space which is accessible for all must be a key part of this infrastructure.

Up to 50% of the land will be transformed from closed-off private land to accessible green space and parkland which everybody is free to explore, while also providing a feeling of spaciousness and promoting biodiversity. This parkland and all the community assets will be controlled by residents and this legacy will guarantee their provision in perpetuity.

Site location plan The Forge Children Drawing Houses Master and apprentice

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