On Friday the 20th and Saturday the 21st of January, the Crown Estate held a public consultation at the Blandford Corn Exchange so that the CE could explain in more detail the potential for development of the Crown Meadow/Bryanston Park area of Blandford Forum and so that the public could give the CE feedback etc).
The Blandford Buzz has previously written another article on this blogsite called The Crown Estate Proposed Housing Development In Blandford...&...Gone With The Wind and you can read this article by clicking on this link. TBB phoned the Crown Estate during the process of writing the said article and the spokesman on the behalf of the CE was helpful and gave a useful explanation (which TBB incorporated into the said article) about the "Local Plan" which one can reasonably assume is why the CE are proposing that the land west of Blandford be used for development to accommodate (pun not intended) future housing needs.
The Blandford Buzz wasn't invited to the public consultation held at the Blandford Corn Exchange on the 20th & 21st but nevertheless TBB went along. TBB was greeted quite warmly by the representatives "pitching" on the behalf of the CE (TBB understands that there was only one representative who was a direct employee of the CE in attendance at the public consultation on Friday the 20th only).
The reps were receptive to TBB, allowing it to taking photographs of the public consultation boards etc and they also answered questions that TBB put to them in the full knowledge that TBB would publish the said photos, queries and their answers to such questions on this site.
However alack alas, on Saturday morning, TBB was strictly told by one representative at the consultation on the behalf of the CE, that TBB was not allowed to quote any of the reps at the consultation. This is unfortunate because it would have simplified things for TBB because this site could have published more balanced articles pertaining to the consultation as TBB was told by a rep at the consultation that the CE is doing some interesting things in relation to the environment - TBB hoped to share such details with you on this site.
Now though, the only real valid information that TBB can share with you is the opinion of some members of the public which TBB had the opportunity to speak to and photograph at the consultation. OK TBB is aware that it could extract information from the CE website and include it in this series of articles on the CE consultation in Blandford - but this is not the way TBB envisaged it would work on these said articles. TBB had planned to use direct quotes by the various agencies representing the CE at the consultation - as well as the CE employee at the consultation on Friday who told TBB about some of the CE's work, which would have made great reading.
TBB must also add that it is not a puppet and does not have the time to trawl through the CE website searching for information to counter being thwarted from directly quoting the rep/s for/on the behalf of the CE at the Blandford public consultation on the 20th & 21st of January 2012.
