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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Blackduck" data-source="post: 3230126" data-attributes="member: 18861">I live in Sandbach, around 5 miles away from Somerford, a bucolic former estate village in the countryside between Holmes Chapel & Congleton, so unlikey to be a town site.. I am not familiar with the site, although reasonably familiar with the countryside around. Our local TV news showed a pair of Oysterctachers on the land, a species that is common around the gravel pits hereabouts, but that land is not usually accessible to the GP. I wish I could get to more RSPB reserves - the nearest is Burton Mere some 40 miles away from this site. Next closest of any size are Marshside 50+ and Conwy and Leighton Moss 80 miles each way. So a local RSPB reserve, directed specifically at those farmland species under pressure, would be very welcome in this local area. And I am sure that in the 13 years the RSPB has owned the land, improvements for birds could have been made, and the site could have been made a lot more attractive than it is now.So very much against the RSPB selling the land for development ( a  divisive issue in Cheshire East where the politicians have made a complete horlicks of the local plan). Why could not the RSPB invest in a reserve to attract birds (remember its in the name), local people (and Members)?</blockquote>