Sir,
Thank you for giving generous space on last week's front page of the Narberth and Whitland Observer to the new school in Crymych, as well as the tourism project in the south of the county that dominated other newspapers.
The so-called 'Bluestone' development, which is nowhere near Carn Menyn, but has obtained the legal right to build an estate of houses inside our National Park, has made a lot of promises that we have to take on trust.
Can they really be sure that the builders will not cause any environmental problems for that delicate area of woodland close to the river? Can we believe them when they say that this will 'become a beacon of ECO tourism and sustainable development within the UK' AND justify the energy consumption of 'a sub-tropical paradise' indoor water world and eventually a snow dome.
That sounds like an awful lot of wind turbines and solar panels to run the heating, cooling and water treatment plant, plus the sewage treatment needed for their target number of visitors of 500,000 visitors a year. The use of expensive energy at this time when we have been told that we all have to reduce energy consumption by 20 per cent in order to ensure a sustainable planet for our children, seems grossly irresponsible .
We also have to take on trust the number of local jobs created with £55.5 million or more of public funding, including money from Pembrokeshire County Council, who have allowed this development to go ahead inside Pembrokeshire National Park. The beautiful sketches published show that the visitors to the 'village' will have all the shops and restaurants they need on site and therefore no need to venture out to nearby towns, unless they go to a beach.
I am hoping that Mr. Macnamara and his friends are as open to public scrutiny of the environmental impact during the construction and operation of the project, as he appeared to be from your article on page 8.
Declan Connolly, Narberth.