SPECIAL buses are being laid on this Sunday to help people give their views on the Manydown housing development.

Residents are being encouraged to come along to the Shaping Manydown: The Place and its Community event being held in a heated marquee in Basingstoke’s War Memorial Park from 12 noon to 6pm on Saturday and from 10am to 4pm on Sunday.

The central location has been chosen to help people get there by public transport, but extra ‘hopper’ buses will be laid on to make it easier to attend when normal bus services are less frequent on the Sunday.

Buses will run along three routes with pick-up points in Wootton St Lawrence, Oakley, Hatch Warren, Winklebury, Buckskin, Kempshott, Sherborne St John, Monk Sherborne, and Rooksdown.

The public exhibition drop-in sessions will follow two days of workshops where people representing the neighbouring communities, local specialists and other organisations will contribute to planning Manydown and work with master planners and other designers to help shape the development of the northern part of Manydown up to 2029.

As the joint owners of a 999-year lease on the land, Basingstoke and Deane Borough Council and Hampshire County Council have appointed a highly skilled and experienced team of specialists to work on the complex development project.

The community design event is part of the early stage of engagement in the development of a planning application for the northern part of Manydown, proposed for around 3,400 new homes in the draft local plan up to 2029.

Ideas and suggestions of different options for the development, for example types of cycleways, styles of homes and business units and locations of neighbourhood centres, community facilities, schools, health services and open spaces, will be drawn up ‘real time’ as part of these workshops.

These drawings will be displayed on the Saturday and Sunday to give residents a chance to add their comments and views. There will be workshops running throughout the day.

Full details of the event, along with timings for area workshop sessions and the bus timetable is available on the website at manydownbasingstoke.co.uk or by calling the free information line on 08081 683 600.