This evening the coordinating committee of the Village Action Group met. Chair, Peter Trewhitt said “Despite our previous achievements, over the last year we have been in danger of being seen as the Village Inaction Group. However that is to change“. The committee have organised the following:
8pm Monday 21st of April
Sycamore Inn
A meeting of the Environment Group
This is an open meeting for all to discuss how we want to see the village environment be maintained and protected, also to specifically discuss our response to the Peak District National Park Authority’s appraisal of the Parwich Conservation Area
8pm Wednesday 21st May
Sycamore Inn
A meeting of the Affordable Housing Group
The movement to provided more affordable housing serving Parwich and the neighbouring hamlets has lost momentum. If you need or may need in the future affordable housing or if you are interested in helping the cause, come along and have your say.
PARWICH.ORG 
is this an april fool as at one meeting you are having a night to see how the village can be maintained and preserved and then the following one is about building new housing which will surely change the village and how it looks as well as taking green land away?
No, this is not an April Fool!
In the original 2000 survey nearly 100% voted to protect the village environment and way of life. We wish to maintain and protect our environment which includes an active and living community. With the levels of house prices on the current market we can not sustain our community without ensuring some affordable housing. Such housing need not be in conflict with the appearance of the village, was not the cottage a major feature of the development of the village as it is today? Apart from the Hall, Knob Hall and the grand Georgian farmhouses most village homes were initially built as affordable accommodation. Presumably you are not opposed to any change at all to the village’s appearance, or want a complete moratorium on any new structures. Some change can be for the better. Do you want to create a dormitory without a school, without any shop, where the pub is replaced by a smart restaurant, where the remaining affluent people bring their electricians and joiners in from Derby and mini-bus loads of gardeners and cleaners arrive on the holiday cottage changeover days?
Obviously any new builds need to be carefully thought out and could fit in better than a number of additions to some of the bigger houses the the PDNPA has allowed, but they need not be the only option: buying existing houses, converting farm buildings and dividing or adapting existing buildings are all viable alternatives. If you are interested in protecting our community come along to the Housing meeting! And if you want to ensure that any new buildings (affordable or not!) fit in with the character of the village come along to the Environment meeting. The two aims need not conflict with each other.
On a personal note, I have had the extrordiary good luck to be able to live in an old georgian farmhouse, I am passionate about our heritage, but when the community dies is when I start looking for somewhere else to live.
Well said, Peter. I agree 100%, and I don’t think there has to be an unsolveable clash between affordable housing needs and environmental concerns. It’s all a balancing act, and I think it’s excellent that the whole village has the opportunity to discuss all of these issues at the public meetings.
Thankyou for your response. Was the 100% of the respondents 100% of the village? As i am lead to believe many many people made no response. which means it is unrealistic to claim 100% of the village partook.
House prices are currently falling but not in Parwich why? because people are still willing to pay. The first affordable housing built (Smithy Close) now on the market at £215,000; is that affordable? NO. Other recent building work has taken place in the village and is all for personal gain. Whilst not against this as we live in the modern world I find it rich when these people then try to tell me that more affordable housing should be built.
The cottages you refer to were built on existing sites hence the nuclear developments which was such a feature of ‘old Parwich’.
The school is a vital part of the village and we are lucky that young people wish to live here and others are willing to move in with their families to keep this instituition going BUT it is the proliferation of holiday cottages (31 at the last count) which is creating this dormitory you mention.
You mention a Village meeting, however you have decided to hold this meeting in a place where I decide not to inhabit. This therefore makes it a non open meeting. WHY is it not being held in the village Memorial Hall which should be the true centre of the village.
I don’t wish to be personal, but you introduce the point ‘ on a personal note’. Is not the whole problem with the village: One solitory male lives in a large rambling Georgian (sic) farmhouse which has for years housed (and I have played in with them) a family. Is not this a major symptom of Parwich’s present day predicament?
In the 2000 survey there was a 67% response rate, which is remarkably good for this sort of survey. Of those responding 97% indicated protecting the village environment and way of life was important. The Action Group hopes to have the previous surveys and action plans on the website relatively soon, but I can print a copy for anyone that requests it.
Bill as you feel strongly on the issues of our environment and housing, we would welcome your input for both of the meetings on the 21st of April and 21st May. The more people involved the more we are likely to achieve. I am sorry you feel unable to attend them yourself, the reason the Action Group chose this venue was that latterly our meetings in the Memorial Hall have been so poorly attended.
I am interested in your figure 31 holiday cottages in the village. It is certainly an important issue. I am aware of 12 holiday lets in the village (with 6 or so being subsidiary parts of other houses) and 6 or so second homes, so the Action Group would welcome your figures to use in discussions with the District Council and the Peak Park
In relation to my own home the number of occupants has fluctuated over the last hundred years, with primarily just one person living here from about 1900 to 1924 (though with live-in servants). It has been occupied by families with children for around 35 years out of the last 100, about the same amount of time or slightly less than it has been occupied primarily by one person, though this will be balanced out by the evacuees during the War, when it was also used for nurses accomadation. However the nation wide trend for people to live in smaller households certainly puts increasing strain on housing stock.
PS I am in touch with Zelda, and I will let her know that she and her sisters are still remembered fondly in the village.