European Legislation and the UK Government require Local Authorities to produce Habitat Regulation Assessments (HRA) (sometimes referred to as Appropriate Assessment) for all of their major plans or projects undertaken as part of the Local Development Framework (LDF).

The aim of the HRA is to establish whether the plan will effect the integrity of internationally important nature conservation sites. These internationally important sites include: Special Protection Areas (SPAs), which are related to bird populations; Special Areas of Conservation, which have important habitat features and Ramsar sites, which are internationally important wetlands. These sites are referred to as 'Natura 2000 sites'.

The HRA helps to assess the likely impacts of the plans and policies on the internationally significant sites, how significant these impacts may be, whether mitigation is needed to protect the Natura 2000 sites or whether it is unlikely that any adverse impacts can not be offset by the plan.

Current Habitat Regulation Assessments

Core Strategy

An HRA has been produced as part of the Core Strategy Preferred Options process. A copy of this document can be downloaded from the right hand side of this page.

The Core Strategy Preferred Options document is currently out for consultation. This consultation runs until the end of August 2009.

For more information please view the Core Strategy webpage.