THE launch of a major planning initiative for Okehampton and Okehampton Hamlets saw ‘one of the biggest public consultations Okehampton has ever had’ last weekend.

Last Saturday saw the launch of the a joint neighbourhood plan between Okehampton Town Council and Okehampton Hamlets Parish Council at the Charter Hall.

Three hundred and twenty people came through the door throughout the day to share their thoughts on the needs of the town and find out more about the neighbourhood plan process.

Town mayor Cllr Paul Vachon said: ‘It was a really good event, I was amazed by the turnout.

‘It is one of the biggest public consultations Okehampton has ever had. 210 people signed our sign-in book and there were lots of people wanting to help with the development of the neighbourhood plan. The team behind the event did very well.’

Cllr Jan Goffey said: ‘After the event I had over 7,000 words of notes to type up and the results are very interesting.

‘I found that the major item for people of the town is our infrastructure. We had more comments about that than anything else by a big, big margin.’

Speaking about the town’s infrastructure, Cllr Robert Rush hoped that the new developments in town would ensure the construction of a second school and the long-awaited link road between Exeter Road and Crediton Road.

He said: ‘I know what’s been done to Okehampton in the past but I want to know what we’re going to do for Okehampton in the future. I feel something needs to be done by the town council first and then higher up.

‘Okehampton has suffered, we should be promoting Okehampton and be doing something for it.’

Neighbourhood plans establish general planning policies for the development and use of land in a neighbourhood like where new homes and work space should be built, and what they should look like.

The plan can be detailed or general depending on the desires of local people. Neighbourhood plans allow local people to get the right type of development for their community but the plans must still meet the needs of the wider area.

The Okehampton Town and Hamlets Neighbourhood Planning Group is a new community-based organisation set up to engage with all the people of Okehampton to prepare, develop and gain acceptance of a neighbourhood plan that reflects the communities’ future needs and values.

The plan the group decides upon will say what the community should look like in the future and how this will be achieved.

Importantly, the plan will have real decision-making powers on planning applications in the parishes. This has never been the case in the past.

At a full council meeting on Monday evening, Okehampton Town Council discussed a number of issues raised by members of the public at the meeting. These included town roads, infrastructure and the cutting of public transport services, particularly the 318 town bus service.

Cllr Vachon said: ‘The loss of services like the 318 is a major issue raised in responses to the neighbourhood plan. It needs to be addressed and we need to think how we can lobby Devon County Council to retain or bring back such services in future.’

A town council working group has been hard at work creating a traffic management plan document for Okehampton.

The document aims to highlight problematic areas on the town’s roads and try and create a solution to ease traffic flow.

Responses from the public and findings by the working group will be fed into the neighbourhood plan so that traffic management becomes part of the plan’s remit.

Cllr Tony Leech said: ‘Hopefully we can take forward our traffic management document as soon as possible so it can be part of the neighbourhood plan.’

Cllr Goffey added: ‘It was interesting to see how many comments in our traffic management plan document were brought up by the public at the consultation event. It shows the document is highlighting genuine problems.’

Under the Localism Act 2011, local communities were given the right to prepare a plan that puts local planning policies in place to interpret and add detail to local authority plans and policies.

Earlier this year Dartmoor National Park Authority and West Devon Borough Council confirmed their approval of Okehampton Town and Okehampton Hamlets Parish Councils’ proposal to designate a joint Neighbourhood Area, for the purposes of preparing the Neighbourhood Development Plan.

The entirety of both parishes are included in the plan. This means that the entirety of the town will be included in the plan as well as the hamlets of Brightley, Southcott, Meldon and Stockley.

If you would like to get involved but could not make it to the Charter Hall launch, you can email [email protected] visit the Twitter feed @okehamplan or www.okehamplan.btck.co.uk