Campaigners have attacked a ‘worrying lack of evidence' that the Government's proposed eco towns offer genuinely-sustainable lifestyles. The Campaign to Protect Rural England said most of the CLG's 15 shortlisted schemes were re-hashed versions of unpopular local planning proposals. Campaigners against nine of the proposed sites – including those in Essex, Warwckshire and Oxfordshire – lobbied Parliament on 30 June. They called on ministers to rethink, and focus on one or two ‘truly exemplary' schemes. Marina Pacheco, CPRE head of planning, told The MJ that campaigners backed the DCLG's plan for an eco town in Bordon, Hampshire, ‘because it would be built largely on brownfield sites'. But Pacheco said the other 14 proposals were ‘either flawed, insufficiently transparent, or already discredited schemes'. A report by the LGA last week warned eco towns could become ‘slums of the future'. Many of the proposed sites were on greenfield land and their distance from employment centres would make them unpopular and increase use of local roads, potentially undermining national environmental targets. But the DCLG this week published research claiming that 46% of adults supported eco towns, while just 9% opposed the plans.
