Big changes have been made to plans for a 1,000-home village on a former High Wycombe reserve site.

Developers want to create “Little Haldens”, a village with up to 1,000 homes, a primary school, a nursery, community and leisure facilities and shops on the Gomm Valley site in Cock Lane.

The original plans for the site were submitted in January last year, but Jonathan Smales, a former Greenpeace director who heads up the developers Human + Nature along with Michael Manolson, says they have now been "refined".

Some of the key changes include the relocation of the planned vehicle access point onto Cock Lane, which has been moved to the north-west corner of the site.

Human + Nature says this will mean only "minimal" widening of Cock Lane will be needed and less important hedgerow will be lost.

The site will also no longer feature a sheltered housing building because the planned school is being relocated after conversations about access with the Department for Education.

With the school moved, developers say they will be able to provide a full-size grass sports area.

The school will also now only be two-storeys high instead of three and some of the nearby homes have been redesigned to prevent overlooking.

There will also now be a dedicated access and drop-off area, even though families will be encouraged to walk.

The designs of the main spine road through the site, Ashwells Lane, are also being overhauled - it will be widened to 5.5 metres, tight bends have been addressed so bigger vehicles can safely use it and pedestrian crossing points are being added.

A new shared pedestrian and cyclist path is also being introduced on the "uphill" side of the street and a new cycling connection between the site and Pimms Grove has been added.

Bigger parks are also on the agenda within each separate "village" area and a proposed corridor between the railway line and the local wildlife site is being widened to at least 10 metres.

The original plans also showed some planned footpaths within parts of the site that are deemed to be a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) will be removed.

There will also be more street trees and some of the building heights are being reduced.

Mr Smales said: "The proposals continue to set out a clear and necessarily ambitious vision for this potentially outstanding project - to house people well, offer choice and quality, to respect and indeed enhance the valley, grow a civil and neighbourly community, and make a place that can become the greenest and most elegant in England."

The plans have been controversial since the very beginning. There was outrage in October 2014 when Gomm Valley was among five 'reserve sites' around Wycombe to be released for development.

And comments on the plans, which were submitted to Wycombe District Council but will now be decided by the new Buckinghamshire Council that replaced it, are still pouring in.

The Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire Wildlife Trust fears the number of people and pets living in the planned 1,000 homes could have a negative impact on the ancient woodland and SSSIs.

On the other hand, Roger Wilding, chairman of the Wycombe Wildlife Group said the application is the "best option we are likely to get for achieving worthwhile biodiversity gains within Gomm Valley", although commented that 1,000 new homes is "bound to have an adverse impact on High Wycombe's already difficult traffic problems".

A formal period of consultation by Buckinghamshire Council on the revised plans started on May 14 and will run for 30 days.

When the consultation closes, Human + Nature says it will be working with the planning officers to see if any further changes are needed before it goes to planning committee for a final decision.

View all the plans at www.wycombe.gov.uk - search 19/05281/OUTEA on the planning portal.