FIFE Council's approval of 1000 new houses for St Andrews over the next 20 years, as part of more than 30,000 seen as needed across Fife, will damage the town beyond recognition.
That's the view of one of St Andrews' four councillors, Conservative Dorothea Morrison, in the wake of the local authority's approval of the finalised Fife Structure Plan — a blueprint for development over the next two decades.
Councillor Morrison
said the ancient town, described by Historic Scotland as "the most important small historic burgh in Scotland and a medieval university town unique in Britain and rare in Europe," could not possibly retain its identity if it had to sustain 1000 new houses.
Her group on the council believe that 700 houses could be more easily absorbed.
However, even that would need to be handled "with extreme care," and use all the land available to the west of the town and brownfield (already in use) sites which could become available during the next 20 years.
Dispersing the new-build through all the settlements in the area would also lessen the impact of so many new houses, Councillor Morrision suggested, adding that "if and when" the Madras College Kilrymont Road site became available (pressure is on the council to build a long-awaited new single site secondary school in St Andrews) it could absorb some of the new houses.
The three Lib-Dem councillors for St Andrews — Frances Melville, Bill Sangster and Robin Waterston — are taking a cautiously optimistic view of the decision to approve the Structure Plan which is now in the hands of the Scottish Parliament.
Read more in this week's Citizen