Please help!

Reservoir Appeal

The Reservoir needs your support to help save it from the clutches of Thames Water!
From now until 28th July 2010, YOU as the local public have the opportunity to write to the appointed Inspector to voice your thoughts and add further comments. We implore you to write in, in response to Thames Water's appeal, and make clear your opposition to their proposal.

This really is your last chance to influence the fate of the Reservoir site. If the Inspector overrules the Council, the Reservoir's days will be numbered.

How can you help? You can do one of the following:
  • Submit comments online - click on the links to comment on both the planning application and the listed building application
  • Send an email to the case officer
  • Write a letter to the case officer (and please post to STBRR at either 29 Western Road RG1 6PD or 6 Glenbeigh Terrace RG1 6PB)
    • Please download our Example Letter with some suggestions for comments

    If you wish to see Thames Water's arrogant appeal documents, you can download them here for the site application, and for the listed building application.


    ***Each individual piece of correspondence makes a difference!!!!!!***

    Other ways to help

    Below are some of the other ways you can help the campaign. We'd like to thank everyone for your ongoing support!

    Visit us at Twitter!..... Join our Facebook Group!

    1. Write to the local press! Write or email your views on Thames Water, and what YOU think should happen to the site, to GetReading. (Click here to send an email)
      and the Chronicle (Click here to send an email)
    2. Download a copy of our Banner!! Print it out and put it in your car to show your support and spread the word!
    3. Do YOU have any recorded sightings of wildlife on the reservoir? Please please click here to email us about it

    Why is there such fierce opposition to the proposed redevelopment?

    Here are some valid reasons why we think the planning application should be thrown out:

    • The plans do not comply with the original planning brief for the site, put together in 1997, which specify no more than 80 dwellings (current TW plans are for 96), no higher than 2 storey buildings (current TW plans include 2.5 and 3-storey buildings), and retention of the embankments
    • Traffic and access - the access via the congested Bath Road will have a significant impact to the already busy road and the junction with Berkeley Avenue, which is a recognised traffic bottleneck
    • Public transport into the town centre and London is also already at capacity during rush hour: allowing more indiscriminate development without investment into the transport infrastructure will further exacerbate this problem
    • The reservoir is home to many diverse species, many rare or protected. This is the last sizeable green space within the centre of the town - there is nowhere else for them to go
    • Loss of a vital 'green lung' in an area already recognised by the Council as being deficient in green open space
    • The Reading Biodiversity Action Plan states clearly that Reading aims to be 'leading by example' to 'protect, conserve and enhance Reading's diversity of wildlife'. Allowing a 150-year-old site containing rare and diverse wildlife and plants to be completely demolished, is not in keeping with this initiative
    • The Reading Core Strategy devotes a section to the importance of Open Spaces, including a commitment to the 'protection and enhancement of the biodiversity of open spaces'. The reservoir site is exactly the kind of area that the Council should be striving to protect.
    • The decommissioning process will affect the bus route into town. No mitigation measures have been offered to cater for this. Therefore anyone who takes the bus to work along the Bath Road could suffer delays. Buses along this route come from as far as Newbury, Mortimer and Calcot.
    • The tree lined frontage may disappear, causing loss of visual amenity
    • There are many empty buildings already standing in the centre of town which could first be used for housing, rather than flattening yet another green site
    • The proposed development offers more houses, more cars, more pollution, which means less natural wildlife and wildlife habitat, poorer views and reduction in quality of life
    • What sort of a Reading do we want to be inhabiting in 10 years time? Protecting this site would go some way to stopping Reading from becoming a soulless, concrete jungle, and help preserve some of our national heritage

    Local Residents


    As local residents you can raise the following additional objections to RBC to oppose the development, and we URGE you to personalise the draft letter and send it in!

    • Loss of visual amenity: Surrounding residents have clear views of the unspoilt area that is the reservoir site
    • Overlooking issues - houses in the surrounding streets would have bedrooms overlooked by front rooms of dwellings in the proposed development
    • Loss of outlook: proposed plans include buildings up to 3-storeys high. This would change the skyline for houses and flats as far as several streets away
    • Overbearing: The 3-storey high buildings would tower above the tiny Victorian-style houses of the adjacent streets
    • Overshadowing: the surrounding streets would suffer loss of light at various times of the day
    • The 'Village of RG1' consists predominantly of Victorian-style housing and small narrow streets: the proposed development with its 3 storey high appartment blocks would not be in keeping with the character of the area
    • The reservoir forms a unique wildlife haven within the centre of Reading. The diversity of animal and plant species is a tribute to the conservation management of Thames Water - it should be preserved and safeguarded for our children and grandchildren to enjoy
    • Only 156 parking spaces proposed for 96 dwellings. This is unrealistic and would lead to residents of the new development looking to park their cars in the already overcrowded surrounding streets, adding to the existing parking problems there
    • The increase in noise to what is currently a quiet and tranquil area would have a detrimental effect on the quality of life of residents
    • The increase in dust from the decommissionning and the construction work would have a significant impact on the ability of residents to enjoy their properties
    • The reservoir is already in an Air Quality Management Area (AQMA) - any new development in this area will exacerbate this
    • Brunswick Street - an already tiny and ill-equipped road - would become a thoroughfare for anyone trying to drive to the new development from the Tilehurst Road side of Reading
    • The proposed development offers no benefits whatsoever for local residents
    • the reservoir embankments deaden the traffic noises of Bath Road, Tilehurst Road and of the British Rail Southern Line and give an element of privacy fo the local residents
    • The reservoir restricts both vehicular and pedestrian traffic to surrounding roads and this, amongst other qualities of the site, has enabled the survival and growth of a very real community spirit. This would all be lost if the development were to be permitted.