Finsley gate homes plans - development welcome

Assuming that this project does go ahead, Finsley Gate will add to the already transforming areas around the former Weavers’ Triangle and along Trafalgar Street, which are progressing well.

As someone with a professional interest in social history, all these developments preserve something of the town’s historical past, through integrating original buildings, or part thereof, with new carefully considered 21st Century designs and needs.

Such projects support sustainability in various ways, which surviving mills and other buildings provide. However, what intrigues me as a Burnley resident, are the substantial brown-field sites for potential development across the town and surrounding areas similar to the one at Finsley Gate.

Indeed, this raises the question of why are green-field sites being considered at all for housing developments? Surely, it makes sense to infill in order to improve the local ambiance and to encourage new inhabitants into an area of population decline, both of which will support economic growth in a variety of ways, rather than expanding out into green-field sites which are important for agriculture and natural habitats in an already diminishing countryside nationally.

Dr Martyn Walker

The Kilns, Burnley