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FDOG October Update

Flood season came early this year, and we have once again experienced severe flooding in the area. The Furtho Development Objection Group was ‘flooded’ with photos and drone footage of the excess water.  This was the highest flooding we’ve seen since Christmas Eve 2020 and there can be no doubt that these exceptionally high floods are becoming more frequent.  We are collating the photographic evidence to ensure that the Environment Agency, Lead Local Flood Authority and the Planning Officer can be in no doubt that we need the flood zones to do their job.  Building on flood plains and flood zones means that the excess water has to go somewhere.  The nine enormous warehouses being constructed on the flood zone at Furtho can surely only exacerbate the problem.

See below just some of the photos that were shared with us:

West Northants Council appears to be taking the issue seriously with Cllr Adam Brown, Leader of WNC quoted as saying ‘it’s clear that we are receiving more frequent instances of extreme weather which is affecting our residents and businesses, and all agencies need to work together to prioritise how we address this’.  The solution seems obvious to us - STOP BUILDING ON FLOOD ZONES!

Some of us were lucky enough to see a rare and amazing display of the northern lights earlier in the month, with the sky changing colours from green to pink.  We were also sent photos of the aurora from the flood plain looking towards the proposed warehouse development at Furtho.  Undoubtedly it would not have been as spectacular had there been the light pollution that will come with a 24 hour warehouse operation.

April 2024 Update

In our last update, we mentioned the new West Northants Council’s draft Local Plan (LP); this is now out for public consultation - you can find out more about it here westnorthants.citizenspace.com.  We are all invited to give our views and help shape the future of West Northamptonshire.  FDOG are very concerned that there appear to be some amendments to the new plan that favour the warehouse development going ahead, which we think is an outrage.  Where previously access from a new roundabout from the A508 was a requirement of the Local Plan, now access to the site is specified as ‘from the A508’.  The current proposals show a ghost junction right turn from the A508 which we believe will be extremely dangerous without a roundabout and all those trucks turning. The largest warehouse, Unit 1, cannot be built if a roundabout is required so it seems WNC are kowtowing to the developers requirements.  In a nutshell, where previously the developers proposals were not compliant with the Local Plan, now they are!  

You can find out more information on all our concerns about the Local Plan HERE.

We urge you to go along to your Parish Council meetings to find out about this and make sure your representatives are saying what you want them to. Deadline for comments is 2nd June ‘24.

We are very proud that our work so far has enabled us to stop the development in its tracks, but we could not have done this without the help of your donations, some fundraisers and contributions from some Parish Councils.  We have raised £12,500 so far and we have used this to pay for four consultant reports covering hydrology, ecology and transport; as well as legal advice - all very expensive.  In addition we have to fund website hosting, banners, printing and insurance.   We know that we will need significantly more funding, probably the same amount again if not more, to continue the campaign and to challenge the new proposals when they materialise. 

To help our fundraising efforts, we launched our first Stop3000Trucks merchandising to coincide with our very first NoWare music event which is being held on 27th April (stop3000trucks.org/NoWare). We now have 100% cotton t-shirts, sweaters, hoodies and tote bags and quality art prints available to buy.  All profits from sales go straight to the Stop3000Trucks fundraising campaign.  Order from stop3000trucks.teemill.com to show your support.

Our campaign relies heavily on Social Media and we could now do with some assistance to manage this going forward.  If this is something you could help us with, please send us an email.  If you are able to help or support in any way, whether that be practical or financial, it all helps us achieve our aim of stopping this inappropriate, ill thought-out development.

Lastly, we will be at Cosgrove Parish Council’s Annual Parish Open Meeting on 15th May in the Village Hall.  Please come along to meet us and hear the latest news.

It isn’t too late to submit an objection to the current proposals; the WHY OBJECT section of our website explains how to do this. 

All of us on the FDOG Steering Committee appreciate your support and encouragement.  Keep it coming! This is not going to be a quick fight! For more information, please send us an email: info@stop3000truck.org

March 2024 Update

We hope that you're all looking forward to the Easter break, and can find time to enjoy the wonderful countryside that we are privileged to have on our doorsteps. It is still quiet from the developers regarding their plans, but there is no rest for the seven members of the FDOG Steering Committee. It might seem that all we do is ask for money but, I assure you, we are very busy stretching the funds we have as far as possible. 

In the past few weeks we have met members of the Save Weekley Hall Wood campaign. This was the group that was successful in having their warehouse application rejected by the planning inspectorate.  Their success shows that Furtho Pit is not a fait accompli (despite what some gloom-mongers say) and with your support, we CAN defeat it.  We also met members of the Save Towcester Now campaign.  Both groups shared valuable insights and ideas from their own experiences and are cheering us on. They also confirmed that it costs a lot of money to oppose a warehouse development - so we can’t afford to stop asking!

Between the seven of us, we have to date (17th March) attended the March Parish Council meetings at Castlethorpe, Cosgrove, Old Stratford, New Bradwell and Potterspury. Also this month we have had sight of a draft version of West Northants Council’s new Local Plan.  It will be coming out for public consultation shortly after Easter. We have several concerns with the new plan, and will be highlighting them and explaining our thinking to help with your responses to the consultation. Keep an eye on our social media and website, and we urge you to go along to your Parish Council meetings to make sure your representatives are saying what you want them to.

We have also been planning our first fundraising music event, NoWare, which will be held on 27th April at Cosgrove Village Hall.  We are thrilled with the poster, created free of charge by our  very talented designer. We will be selling T-shirts and tote bags with similar designs as well.  This is the first of several NoWare music events in local villages.  If you are a musician, in a band, or know local bands, and could suggest an event in your own Parish, please get in touch - you won’t be expected to do it alone. stop3000trucks.org/NoWare.

Finally, we celebrated reaching 1,000 followers on Facebook - a well-deserved cake was presented to our social media manager.  Huge thanks for her very professional - and always entertaining - job at keeping everyone informed.  Now on to 2,000!

It isn’t too late to submit an objection to the current proposals; our website explains how to do this here.



All of us on the FDOG Steering Committee appreciate your support and encouragement.  Keep it coming! This is not going to be a quick fight! For more information, please send us an email: info@stop3000truck.org.

February  2024 Update

As I write this (10th Feb), the floodplains of Cosgrove and the surrounding villages and towns are submerged in water for the second time this year - and we’re only 6 weeks in!  It’s inconceivable that the land at Furtho Pit was ever allocated for development, but this is where we find ourselves.  Some people say that the proposed site doesn't flood as badly as neighbouring fields. While this is true, it still does flood at times and the developers themselves accept it may do up to 2m deep. Their engineering consultant states the flood risk goes as high as ‘danger to all.’ Yes, you read that correctly!

This land is designated flood plain and provides the soakaway that we can’t afford to cover in concrete. How on earth did West Northants Council (WNC) find this land suitable for development? Well, one of our enquiries revealed they never did their own research, but relied on information from the developer!

You may have seen in the news this week about another bungle by North Northants Council (NNC). They sent neighbour consultation plans about a new warehouse in Corby to the wrong street!  Residents woke to find a 60ft tall warehouse being erected almost in their back gardens, and they knew nothing about it.  Now it's too late to stop and people’s lives and properties are ruined.  This again highlights one of the reasons we bang on about the importance of attending Parish Council meetings.  Maybe, if there had been more scrutiny a couple of years ago, we wouldn't be in this situation. Aside from the cost of poo bins and hedge cutting and so on, PC meetings discuss very important planning applications that impact us all.  We should have a say in the decisions that are made about where we live. Less than an hour once a month isn't a lot to ask for our communities.

Some more encouraging news about 2 other local-ish campaigns that have successfully opposed warehouse developments in their parts of Northamptonshire.  Near Brackmills, the Government Planning Inspectorate appeal upheld WNC’s refusal for 18 warehouses, saying ‘it would be an intrusion into countryside and the large, bulky buildings would harm the views from towns’,  as well as closing the gap between a built up area and Great Houghton village. Sounds familiar? Then at Weekley Hall Wood, the campaign to stop 5 warehouses was successful - again on appeal. FDOG are going to meet these campaigners to find out what we can learn from them.  What we know already is that it cost nearly £40,000 in consultant and legal fees to achieve their result; despite the council itself being opposed in this case. 

But great things can be achieved when communities work together. Today, wonderful volunteers held a Table Top Sale in Stony Stratford, raising more than £750 for our campaign. Heartfelt thanks to everyone involved. We need to see more events in other villages during the coming months.  Please check the 'Make a Difference' and 'Fundraising' sections of this website for details on how you can help.

It isn’t too late to submit an objection to the current proposals; this website explains how to do this, under 'Why Object'.

January 2024 Update

Happy New Year!

We hope you all had a wonderful, festive break.  Here are our New Year resolutions for 2024, how about adopting one of them for yourself?

1) Join some friends together and organise a fundraiser

2) Ask at least one local business to display a poster (download from here)

3) Encourage 5 new people to follow Stop3000Trucks on Facebook

4) Attend at least 3 Parish/Town Council meetings

5) Share and interact more with Social Media posts

6) Be positive, supportive, and believe we can do this

Without doubt, our efforts in 2023 stopped the development in its tracks and forced Frontier into drastic revisions.  They had hoped to have the warehouses up and running for several months by now.  However, we can’t rest on our laurels as the application has not been withdrawn, and we are expecting to see new proposals submitted any time soon.  So we will need to continue to fight back this year.

In the December update, we outlined how the money we have raised so far has been spent: namely website hosting, banners, printing and insurance. The largest expenditure has been on four consultant reports covering hydrology, ecology and transport; as well as legal advice. Every week, the FDOG Steering Group members give many hours, unpaid. We know many of you have already donated, there have been a few fundraisers and some Parish Councils have stepped up, but we need significantly more funding to continue the campaign and to challenge the new proposals when they materialise.  If you are able to help or support in any way, whether that be practical or financial, it all helps us achieve our aim of stopping this inappropriate, ill thought-out development.

We received some wonderful news just before Christmas that Grafton Regis have very generously donated £2,000 from their Millenium Fund towards our cause and, hot off the press, we can let you know that Stoke Bruerne Parish Council have also donated £500.  This is extremely welcome news and gratefully received.  Thank you.

Finally, we have received a wealth of photographic evidence of recent flooding in this area; if you follow us on Facebook you will have seen all the pics.  We think this is surely reason enough not to allow this development to go ahead.

It isn’t too late to submit an objection to the current proposals; this website explains how to do this. 

All of us on the FDOG Steering Group appreciate your support and encouragement.  For more information, please send us an email: info@stop3000truck.org or visit stop3000trucks.org.

December 2023 Update

As we head towards Christmas we want to thank you for all your fantastic support this year.  Whether sharing our Facebook posts, contributing to the fundraising, delivering leaflets, or of course objecting to these inappropriate and ill-thought-out warehouse proposals, each and every action has added strength to our cause and bolstered  our determination.

We have had a much needed, fairly quiet month whilst we wait to see what new proposals the developers submit, so in this edition we wanted to give you an update on our fundraising and how the money has been spent.

The Furtho Development Opposition Group has raised nearly £11,250 since fundraising started in earnest in June 2023. Local Parish Councils have also supported the Group’s activities by commissioning and part funding the consultants’ research and reports. The most income has come from you via the Crowdfunder. A big thank you to everyone who has contributed - we know some of you have donated more than once. We have also received £1720 via direct donations from four individuals, so again big thanks to those anonymous donors, your generosity is really appreciated.

Finally, there have been three fund raising events raising £2020 between them. Thank you to The Greyhound in Haversham, as well as Holly and Bhenji from Cosgrove for organising these. Apart from giving their time, these people, their families and friends used their own money to underwrite and create their events.  We are extremely grateful to them for their generosity and support.

So where has the money gone?   We have spent £800 on internet hosting banners, printing and insurance.  The largest expenditure has been on consultants and legal advice - £5,900 so far and a further £3,300 in the pipeline. Four reports covering hydrology, ecology and transport have stopped the development in its tracks and forced Frontier into drastic revisions.  The steering committee has now engaged a legal firm to look at the findings of the commissioned reports and local planning regulations etc. This will help us formulate further objections and develop a case for presentation to the Strategic Planning Committee.

The events and fundraising could not have happened without the support of the community and their family and friends. This unsung support is truly valued. Whatever the eventual outcome, the campaign has brought the communities together. Everyone who has supported and participated should feel proud. Thank you all, we wish you a very Happy Christmas.

It isn’t too late to submit an objection to the current proposals, as these will be considered up to the date of the WNC Strategic Planning Committee meeting where the decision will be made.  This website explains how to do this. 

All of us on the FDOG Steering Group appreciate your support and encouragement.  For more information, please send us an email: info@stop3000truck.org or visit stop3000trucks.org.

November 2023 Update

We have had a much needed, fairly quiet month whilst we wait for any revised proposals from the developers. So in the absence of anything new, we wanted to give an update on our fundraising and how the money has been spent.

The Furtho Development Opposition Group has raised nearly £11,250 since fundraising started in earnest in June 2023. Local Parish Councils have also supported the Group’s activities by commissioning and part funding the consultants’ research and reports. The most income has come from you via the Crowdfunder. A big thank you to everyone who has contributed - we know some of you have donated more than once. We have also received £1720 via direct donations from four individuals, so again big thanks to those anonymous donors, your generosity is really appreciated. Finally, there have been three fund raising events raising £2020 between them. Thank you to The Greyhound in Haversham, as well as Holly and the Mistry family from Cosgrove for organising these. Apart from giving their time, these people, their families and friends used their own money to underwrite and create their events.  We are extremely grateful to them for their generosity and support.

So where has the money gone?   We have spent £800 on internet hosting banners, printing and insurance.  The largest expenditure has been on consultants and legal advice - £5,900 so far and a further £3,300 in the pipeline. Four reports covering hydrology, ecology and transport have stopped the development in its tracks and forced Frontier into drastic revisions.  The steering committee has now engaged a legal firm to look at the findings of the commissioned reports and local planning regulations etc. This will help us formulate further objections and develop a case for presentation to the Strategic Planning Committee.  The events and fundraising could not have happened without the support of the community and their family and friends. This unsung support is truly valued. Whatever the eventual outcome, the campaign has brought the communities together. Everyone who has supported and participated should feel proud. 

October 2023 Update

We have some good news to share! The Environment Agency (EA) are upholding their objection to the development.  This is in no small part due to the hydrology report commissioned by Cosgrove Parish Council and FDOG, which highlighted a number of flaws in the developers’ proposals; not least, the increased flood risk that building on this land (which is a flood plain) would create.  The developers’ response to this was to propose a reservoir in the country park, which would hold 44,000m3 of water. That’s the same as 20 Olympic size swimming pools! We needed an official response and asked Cosgrove Parish Council to commission a second hydrology report with financial support from FDOG and Stony Stratford Town Council.  This second report highlighted that the reservoir would need to comply with the 1975 Reservoir Act and that it was inappropriate for a small brook in a rural area. We sent a copy of that report to the EA, who wrote a strongly worded objection that described the new flood prevention measures as a ‘radical compensatory flood storage mitigation measure’, which will have the legal status of a reservoir and be deemed ‘high risk’ due to potential loss of life if the dam fails.  They also outlined all the areas where the proposals do not meet local and national policy and stated four additional conditions that the developer would need to meet should all the flood risks be resolved to the EA's satisfaction.

In addition to this, on the back of the Ecology report commissioned by FDOG, the Wildlife Trust has changed their response to an objection as our report flagged that a Priority Habitat is present on the site - something the developer completely missed!

Councillor Ian McCord has subsequently posted on Facebook a note of congratulations for all our efforts and at the Cosgrove Parish Council meeting on 5th October, he said ‘that it’s very rare for a statutory consultee to review their position’.  This has given us heart that our efforts are worthwhile and we should all believe that we CAN make a difference. 

The likelihood now is that the developers will submit new proposals that should have to go through another round of public consultation.  We don’t know when this will happen, but be assured that FDOG will be watching closely and keep everyone updated. 

At the Old Stratford Parish Council meeting on 10th Oct, the PC agreed to pledge £500 towards a consultant to review and challenge any new proposals.  We continue to ask for your support in fundraising for the same reason. Our next the fundraising event is the curry night in Cosgrove on 27th October.  Please click here for details.  As I write, 30% of the ticket sales are already gone in just 24 hours!

It isn’t too late to submit an objection to the current proposals, as these will be considered up to the date of the WNC Strategic Planning Committee meeting where the decision will be made.  The stop3000trucks.org website explains how to do this. 

All of us on the FDOG Steering Group appreciate your support and encouragement.  For more information, please send us an email: info@stop3000trucks.org 

19 September 2023

It’s been another eventful few weeks for the Furtho Development Objection Group.  The latest deadline for objections is 21st September 2023;  you can object again to the new proposals (uploaded to WNC’s planning portal on 15th August), even if you have already objected before.  Remember everyone in your household can object, it is not one per household.   Once the deadline has passed it isn’t too late to submit an objection as these will be considered up to the date of the West Northants Council (WNC) Strategic Planning Committee meeting where the decision will be made.  The date for this meeting is yet to be confirmed but could be as early as 17th October.  If you are unsure how to do this, please read through all the valid reasons to object and how to submit them on this website.

As mentioned above, the decision for the proposal will be taken by West Northants Council Strategic Planning Committee. It will be based on a report prepared by the case Planning Officer who will make a recommendation to either approve or reject the proposal.  Only two members of the public are allowed to speak at this meeting.  We feel it is neither reasonable nor sensible to expect residents to shoulder the responsibility for this case without any planning knowledge which is why we have been doing our utmost to raise awareness and raise funds for this cause. If the development is refused, the developer has the right to appeal.  We don’t - all we have left is a Judicial Review, where we’d have to prove there had been a legal mistake.  The cost of a JR is astronomical - £20k upwards for even a simple case.  So every individual and valid objection made now is really worth the time and effort.

On 2nd September, a few wonderful volunteers from Stony Stratford arranged a stall in the High Street and later at York House to try and increase awareness of the proposed warehouse development.  It seems there are still many who are unaware of the proposals.  Our Stony volunteers are rightly concerned that if this development is approved, it will have a significant impact on this lovely market town, not least because of the increased flood risk.  A few members of FDOG went along to support them and a further 180 objections were sent to WNC.

As many of you are aware the FDOG campaign against the Furtho Pit warehouse development needs funds to pay for the professional help required to prepare its case.  Holly Becks held an extremely successful Tabletop Sale in Cosgrove village hall raising £456.93 for the cause, despite being one of the hottest days of the year. A heartfelt thanks to Holly, her family, and all those who supported the event.

Here is Holly with her cheque made out to S3KT.  The event also saw the first outing of a 1:500 scale model of the proposed development which attracted a lot of interest. If any of you can organise more fund-raising events, please get in touch via email info@Stop3000Trucks.org. 

You can also contribute via the Crowdfunder under 'Fundraising' on the menu above.  Alongside our fundraising and Crowdfunder we have approached all the Parish Councils in the area to ask for a financial contribution.  In September we received the news that Cosgrove Parish Council were willing to contribute a further £1000 and Castlethorpe Parish Council have pledged £500.  We are extremely grateful for this as we do not feel that it should be the sole responsibility of residents to oppose a development of this size.

As ever, all of us on the FDOG Steering Committee appreciate all your support.  For more information, look through this website or send us an email: info@stop3000truck.org.