Residents fighting plans for 180 homes to be built in open countryside off Bradwall Road have launched a GoFund Me page to start legal action.

Campaigners went to a Sandbach Town Council meeting recently to ask for £2,500 towards the cost of the action but the plea was thrown out as we revealed here .

Now organisers have set up a GoFundMe page here which has already raised £1,920 of the £3,500 target and donations are continuing to pour in.

Steve Buckley, who organised a recent public meeting to discuss this issue, said: "At the moment, legal action feels the only way to make Cheshire East Council listen.

"We are trying to raise funds to appeal against a very recent speculative housing approval in open countryside beyond the settlement boundary.

"We hope that in doing so, it will also help to prevent other applications on productive farm land from being approved. I have spoken at appeals to try to prevent approvals on other sites in Sandbach and other parts of Cheshire East.

"Sandbach is a historic market town in Cheshire with a population of around 20,000. It has seen housing growth of 37 per cent in the last 15 years, but little or no increased infrastructure. Traffic congestion and road safety is a major concern."

He added: "Forcing Cheshire East to reconsider this application based on corrected transport assessments would hopefully not only prevent this approval from progressing, it would also force them to carry out their legal obligation to scrutinise ALL transport assessments submitted for all other applications in Cheshire East.

"The cost of legal action can feel like an impossible mountain, but if we unite and act together, even the worst case scenario costs are manageable."

He added: "The choice is simple, we just let the developers do what they want and stop complaining about all the new houses on green fields without the infrastructure to support them, or we actually do something that might help to stop them?"

Donations to the GoFundMe page can be made here

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Simon Brown

(Local Resident and Secretary of the Land Off Bradwall Road Campaign Group)