Many readers of your Chippenham front page article last week, on the proposed development of large-scale employment land just north of Allington Farm, will welcome the prospect of up to a 1,000 new jobs coming to the area.

The site is adjacent to the current A350 widening project making it even more accessible to the M4 and requiring no major infrastructure developments.

Even more welcoming is the news that Wiltshire Council planners appear, at last, to accept the position of the many people and organisations in the Chippenham community that large-scale employment land development should be sited to the north of the town and onwards towards Junction 17 of the M4.

For several years the planners have been saying that Showell Farm to the south of the town was the only large employment site available to Chippenham, despite having twice had Government-appointed planning inspectors reject the site, stating it would be an isolated site in the countryside and separated from the town by the railway line.

In the latest inspector’s report on the Core Strategy the Showell site was again struck out as a strategic site and yet the council still persists in supporting the site for development. One has to ask why?

The council has identified the need for 26.5 hectares of new employment land around Chippenham in the period to 2026 as part of its plans. The proposed development north of the town is 30 hectares with the furniture chain, The Range, proposing to take only a part of the site, leaving plenty of space for other new businesses.

In addition, the council has already approved new employment land development of 2.3 hectares at Hunters Moon and 2.7 at Birds Marsh.

With other developers to shortly propose up to 10 hectares of employment land as part of mixed use developments, Chippenham could well have nearly 50 hectares of land available for new business. And yet the council still intends to bring the Showell development back to the planning committee for approval in the near future. Again, one has to ask why the planners persist is supporting this isolated site?

Let’s hope the elected members of the planning committee will this time listen to the many people and organisations who have repeatedly pointed out that building a development seven roundabouts down the A350 and not in the Chippenham area, makes no sense for the sustainable development of the town.

Tony Peacock, Showell, Lacock.