SH Report Contents (No Photo)

Client: Gateway 14 Ltd Report Title: ES Volume 1 - Main Text and Figures 3. Existing Land Uses and Activities 3.1 Introduction 3.1.1 This Chapter presents a summary of the predominant existing land uses and activities currently occurring on and around the Site. This Chapter also describes the key environmental characteristics of the Site and its adjacent areas in relation to the technical topics considered within this ES, thereby identifying environmental resources or receptors which may be affected by the Development. An overview of sensitive environmental resources / receptors is provided in Table 3.1. 3.1.2 A full description of the baseline conditions relevant to each technical assessment undertaken as part of the EIA is provided within ES Volume 1, Chapters 7 to 15. 3.2 Location and Setting 3.2.1 The Site is located on land south of the A14, east of the A1120 and north of the B1113 at Creeting St Peter near Stowmarket, Suffolk within the administrative boundary of MSDC. Site location is shown on Figure 1.2. 3.2.2 The existing 67.3 ha Site is currently in agricultural use and comprises four large fields with an area of a further field in the south east of the Site. The fields are separated by hedgerows, fences, a farm track and public highway (Mill Lane). 3.2.3 The Site is currently divided into two parts by Mill Lane which runs east to west through the northern half of the site and access to the Site is currently afforded from Mill Lane. 3.2.4 The Site is bound by: • The A14 dual carriageway and embankment to the north. • Open agricultural fields with the isolated farmstead of Clamps Farm to the east. • The Ipswich to Cambridge railway line and Muntons Malting works to the south. • The A1120 and Stowmarket to the west. 3.3 Topography 3.3.1 The highest point of the site (~47 m AOD) is in the north. The topography falls from here to the north east and south east boundaries, to a low of approximately 25 m AOD in the southern corner, the site forming the north western valley slope of the River Gipping valley. The River Gipping was located approximately 190m from the Site at its closest point. Project Name: Gateway 14, Creeting St Peter, Stowmarket, Suffolk ES Volume 1, Chapter 3, Page: 3-1 Client: Gateway 14 Ltd Report Title: ES Volume 1 - Main Text and Figures 3.4 Mineral Resources 3.4.1 Historical Ordnance Survey maps and environmental and geological data provided by Groundsure Ltd (as part of the desk study), along with additional data from the British Geological Survey and the findings of intrusive investigation works detailed in a ground investigation report submitted with the planning application. The British Geological Survey (BGS) 1:50,000 scale series online mapping of the area indicates that the majority of the site is underlain by Superficial Deposits of the Lowestoft Formation with River Terrace/Glaciofluvial Deposits (sand and gravel) and Alluvium (clay and silt) recorded in the south of the site. The underlying bedrock geology is recorded as the Crag Group, with the Newhaven Chalk Formation indicated to subcrop in the southern part of the site. 3.4.2 British Geological Survey Sand and Gravel Resource Publications have been published for the neighbouring districts of Woolpit (TL96 1983) and Ipswich (TM14 1981), although no publication is available covering the site itself. Both publications outline that the River Terrace Deposits and the Crag (as indicated as present at the site) are considered as potential sources of sand and gravel resource. The Gipping Valley has a history of sand and gravel extraction, particularly between Needham Market and northwest Ipswich. The River Terrace Deposits are indicated to have a mean composition of 46% sand and 42% gravel, although this is recorded to vary significantly. The Crag is recorded to have a very low gravel content, which along with the complex chemical composition (high calcium carbonate and iron mineral content) results in it not being widely used or excavated for aggregate. 3.4.3 The site ground investigation identified that River Terrace Deposits (RTD) were limited to the southern corner of the Site and were encountered in one borehole (BH5) and one trial pit (TP22). They were disclosed as a variable sequence of soils to a maximum depth of 9.20m. In BH05, the RTD were encountered as layers of medium dense sandy gravel of flint, a medium dense gravelly sand and a firm sandy occasionally gravelly clay. In TP22, the RTD were encountered as a gravelly sand over a gravelly clay with sand partings. 3.4.4 The Crag Group was encountered in the northern part of the site, at depths of between 15.0m and 22.5m bgl. The base, where proven, was encountered at a maximum depth of 25.80m bgl (18.10m AOD) in BH10. It was typically encountered as a medium dense to very dense grey / greyish brown sand with variable gravel content of chalk, flint and shell fragments. 3.4.5 The RTD is of very limited lateral extent beneath the site’s developable area. Furthermore, the deposit was variable in composition containing several clay layers and only becoming consistently granular with depth, beneath two separate water strikes, making possible excavation more difficult and reducing the resource value. As a result, the impact of the development on the possible mineral resource within the RTD is limited. Furthermore, the Crag is already of limited use for aggregate resource, due to its fine to medium sand nature and chemical composition. This, combined with the significant thicknesses of Lowestoft Formation overburden, mean that the development would have a minimal impact on the already low possible mineral resource value within the Crag. 3.4.6 Therefore the development is not considered to have a sterilising effect on potential mineral resource. Project Name: Gateway 14, Creeting St Peter, Stowmarket, Suffolk ES Volume 1, Chapter 3, Page: 3-2 Client: Gateway 14 Ltd Report Title: ES Volume 1 - Main Text and Figures 3.5 Predominant Land Uses and Activities Within the Site 3.5.1 There are no built structures and most of the Site is given to arable cereal production with large fields divided by fencing and hedgerows with field margins of various widths. Within the crop margins around the fields north of the Mill Lane, are isolated small populations of the rare arable plant, shepherd’s needle. Along the western edge of the southern cereal crop field is a species-rich margin, between 6 -10m wide, of unimproved neutral grassland. Smooth meadow-grass and red fescue are abundant with frequent cock’s-foot and crested dog’s-tail grasses. There are also two strips of species-rich unimproved neutral grassland either side of the ditch on the south-east side of the crop field near the area of poor semi-improved grassland. 3.5.2 There is an area of semi-natural broadleaved woodland near the railway dominated by Ash with occasional white and grey willow. There are also two small semi-natural broadleaved woodlands in the north-east of the Site. There is a small cluster of trees alongside Mill Lane at the north-western edge: three semimature/ mature Norway maples along the southern verge and four mature field maples, one Ash tree and a wild cherry tree along the northern verge. The other concentration of individual and clusters of trees is in the poor semi- improved fields in the south of the site, predominantly along the ditches and field edges. Some of these trees having been pollarded. The other individual tree within the site is a mature pedunculate oak, with a young English elm growing beneath it, at the margin of the crop field in the north of the site. There are two short sections of tree lines along the south-west field edge next to the railway track, with Norway maple the most frequently occurring tree. There is another line of trees/scrub at the south-east edge of the site alongside the ditch, with a mix of species dominated by hawthorn and crack willow. At the north-east edge of the site there is a line of scrub and trees next to the ditch along the edge of the site, with abundant blackthorn. 3.5.3 The three sections of hedgerow on the site are intact, managed, 1-2m high and contain several woody species. None of the hedgerows meet the criteria to classify as Important Hedgerows under the Hedgerow Regulations, 1997. 3.5.4 There are several ditches across the site. North of Mill Lane, the ditch along the north-eastern edge of the site is deep, with shallow water but little in vegetation. The wet ditch to the west of the triangle of woodland is well vegetated There are narrow, vegetated roadside ditches and a dry ditch along the edge of the crop field to the east of Mill Lane. The meadows at the south of the site contains a series of ditches and a small area of reedbed swamp at the south-east edge. 3.5.5 Based on this current level of evidence, there is a very high potential to encounter occupation deposits of later Bronze Age/earlier Iron Age date As a result archaeological trenched evaluation of land north of Mill Lane and the excavation of a 0.26ha area to the south has been undertaken. Based on the desk-based assessment and subsequent geophysical survey (ASE 2014 and Magnitude Surveys respectively) there is a moderate to high potential to encounter archaeological remains during the trenched evaluation of land to the north of Mill Lane Project Name: Gateway 14, Creeting St Peter, Stowmarket, Suffolk ES Volume 1, Chapter 3, Page: 3-3 Client: Gateway 14 Ltd Report Title: ES Volume 1 - Main Text and Figures with, given the results of the earlier work to the south, deposits of prehistoric and medieval date most likely to be uncovered.

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