Lorries coming and going 710 times each day

Mar 10 2010 By Polly Manser, Buckinghamshire Advertiser

RESIDENTS living alongside the A40 at Holtspur are bracing themselves for more noise, dust and vibration now that the Springfield Farm landfill site has been granted permission to increase lorry journeys by 90 per day.

It means that up to 710 lorries can go into or leave the site in Broad Lane every day.Bernard Tuner, of North Drive, who will be affected more than most, said he was 'disappointed but not surprised' at the decision.

"The law of England is such that the small man has no chance at all," he said.

Mr Turner added that tests for noise, vibration and dust carried out in his garden were done while the landfill site was not operating. It has been shut for more than a year, since potentially hazardous substances were found to have been dumped there before the current owners took over the site.

Christine Aldridge, also of North Drive, said: "I'm very disappointed. You don't notice the effect much in the winter, but when the summer comes and the windows are open, that's when we'll notice it."

Buckinghamshire County Council (BCC) had argued that an increase would be unfair on people living nearby.

But Inspector Alan Boyland upheld the appeal by Springfield Farm against BCC's refusal to allow lorry movements to increase by 90 to 470 per day for extraction and landfilling of waste.

An extra 240 will also be granted on 50 days in the year for the delivery of clay and for landfill engineering.

Mr Boyland ruled that traffic on the A40 would increase by no more than 1.5 per cent. He said that residents already suffer noise from the A40 and the M40 and that the increase would be 'less than perceptible'.

"While I sympathise with concerns of residents to some degree," he said, "I do not accept that the impact of the proposed scheme would be as overwhelming as some people have suggested."