Representatives from Pill and Easton-in-Gordano Parish Council and Abbots Leigh Parish Council met with North Somerset Council senior planning officers and North Somerset Councillor Jenna Ho Marris on 28th July 2025. Below are some notes from the meeting regarding the Local Plan process and the current potential sites for development around Pill and Easton-In-Gordano in both parishes.

The potential sites being considered by North Somerset Council for large scale housing development are colour coded in the Local Plan map.

Yellow means very sustainable sites, which are likely to go forward to the next round.

Orange sites are less sustainable and there is less likelihood that they will go forward, however many will be selected.  The sites in this parish are all coloured orange.

1. For the next few weeks, the North Somerset Council planning officers are collecting technical information about the sustainability of all sites. 
2. In October the North Somerset Council cabinet will be assessing all sites and deciding on those sites which will go forward to the next round.
3. Another public consultation will be held then, which will begin in October and run for six weeks.
4. Following that consultation, the North Somerset Council cabinet will then make its final decision on the sites that they will be recommending for development to the central government appointed inspector whose decision will be final.

At this time, councils and/or parishioners should be getting ready for the public consultation.  The residents of the parish along with the parish council should wait and see which, if any, of our sites are selected by the cabinet in October and then focus our efforts on responding to the public consultation.

The petition that has been set up can be submitted as a response to the public consultation, however the North Somerset Council planning officers confirmed that the number of objectors carries less weight than the different points of objection that people submit.  It carries more weight when ten people object, giving ten different reasons for objection, than if one thousand people object, giving the same reason(s).

The meeting noted the separate, outline planning application that has been submitted on the same day for up to 186 dwellings at Courthouse Farm. Please see our web page on this application for more details on how to have your say. This new outline planning approval application is separate and unconnected to the Local Plan, although this is one of the five sites being considered by North Somerset Council in its Local Plan.