Directors of a project to build more than 200 affordable eco homes in Bridport say their plans offer an 'alternative' to the Vearse Farm housing project and support the 'real needs' of frontline workers in the community.

Those behind the Watton Village project have written an open letter to the people of Bridport after a High Court judge ruled the 700-home Vearse Farm development can go ahead following a legal challenge.

Vearse Farm will be on farmland within the Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) on the edge of Bridport within the Symondsbury parish, whilst Watton Village plans are for 200 homes on land at the base of Watton Hill of St Andrews Road, close to Bridport town centre.

Directors of the Bridport-based Smart Community Project, which is behind Watton Village, write to residents: "We want you to know that Bridport has an alternative to this mass housing project. An alternative that would support the real needs of our beloved town and community.

"As activists who feel passionately about building effective local housing, we have created a plan to develop over 200 homes, 10 minutes from the town centre, all with solar panelled roofs, 99% heat efficient and affordable to rent for local people currently on housing lists living in real housing poverty."

According to the plans, 25 per cent of the new homes built on Vearse Farm should be affordable housing but Advearse, a campaign group opposed to the development, backed by the Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE), had previously raised more than £30,000 to take Dorset Council's decision to grant the development planning permission to a judicial review.

Although Mr Justice Swift upheld the decision at the High Court, he said Advearse's criticisms were ‘well-founded.’

West Dorset is one of the worst areas in Britain for affordable housing and Dorset Council is under pressure to build more than 15,000 new homes by 2036.

Land for Watton Village has been leased to the Smart Community Project for 40 years by a local landowner. Over that period the project will pay back a low cost loan from a major UK pension fund.

Directors say affordable rents will annually service the loan and cover all maintenance costs.

Their open letter continues: "We believe that Bridport doesn’t need housing development on the scale of Vearse Farm but should create proper affordable homes for its local workforce of frontline people, nurses, teachers, shop workers, council workers and many others based on 25 per cent of local average salary levels.

"As a Bridport resident and one of the directors of the project, Roy Mathisen is passionate about using his knowledge of the local community and its housing crisis, to respond to this by creating a housing development project that delivers affordable housing for those most in need, rather than creating homes that are simply out of many local peoples' price range.

"The issue of housing is an important one, and one which will continue to be of importance once the virus crisis is over and the realisation that we are one community and all our lives depend so much on our local services and workforce."