The results of a survey asking residents what they think about Halstead is nearing publication after a two year wait.

Halstead Town Council has agreed to spend an extra £900 on editing and designing a town plan.

The plan will feature the results of 5,000 surveys sent out to residents in May 2016 asking them for their views on Halstead and what key issues need addressing.

It has taken the town council more than two years to analyse the results but councillor David Gronland, who has been overseeing the production of the town plan, is confident it will be ready for publication in mid-January.

He said: “What we’ve been doing is getting all the graphics together with the results. It has taken longer than we thought but it is almost finished now.

“Everything is all there and we just need to make a few tweaks. It’s just a case of approving it at the council meeting in December. We won’t want to be making too many more changes to it.”

Mr Gronland says the results of the survey and town plan will likely be published online, with some copies also being available to read in print. The town council has received help from Colchester Institute and the University of Essex in putting the data together into graphics and tables.

An estimated £1,100 has been set aside for printing the plan but a final decision on how results will be distributed has yet to be made.

Concerns over whether the results from a survey which is more than two years old will still be relevant today were raised during a town council meeting in October.

But Mr Gronland insists many of the key issues highlighted in 2016 are still at the forefront of many people's minds.

He added: “If anything, it's more relevant than it was at the time because housing was a big issue raised and we have had so many applications going in for Halstead at the moment.

"There are other things like the doctor’s surgery and school places. Traffic is another problem which came up quite a bit.

"It’s going to be tough to resolve them as the town council can only do so much but it gives us an idea of what we can do for the town.”

Mr Gronland added: “The one thing that did seem to come up time and time again was that people thought Halstead was and is a friendly and nice town.

"It was one of the strongest things people felt about which was really pleasing to see.”