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Proposed development by Gladman on land off Front Road
Gladman Developments are proposing a residential development of approximately 50 new homes including public open space and recreational facilities on land off Front Road, Woodchurch. At this stage these proposals are only conceptual and planning applications have not yet been submitted. Until formal planning applications have been made no formal feedback on the proposals can be made, however in preparation we are looking to get initial feedback from village residents.
These initial proposals can be viewed viewed online here – or you can download the PDF here
Part of the proposed site includes an area for development within the Ashford Local Plan (Policy S40) and has previously had planning permission granted for 10 new houses. In order to increase the number of houses Gladman are proposing to request an extension of the development area into the fields behind. This additional land is still currently classed as agricultural.
As part of their proposal, Gladman are requesting village residents to “submit their thoughts” through their online form. Unfortunately the way the form has been designed does not give residents an effective opportunity to provide balanced feedback. We would instead urge village residents to complete the feedback form below as this will better help the Parish Council to understand the wider views from within the village. This will also enable them to respond quickly and appropriately once any planning applications have been submitted.
Location of the proposed development
The blue area shows the plot that is already part of the Ashford Local Plan (Policy S40) – where approval for 10 houses has previously been granted. The area outlined in red shows the extended development area proposed by Gladman.
When completing your feedback you may want to consider the following:
- The proposed development would only partially be on land that has been identified for village development. A much greater proportion of the proposed development area would be on land currently designated as agricultural.
- The village school currently takes the majority of its students from outside of the village but they are still low on pupil numbers. They have confirmed that they do require more children to enroll at the school in the future.
- The additional housing will result in an increase in the number of cars driving through the village. Road access to/from the proposed development could be an issue with the increased number of cars, though the safety of any access would have had to be approved by Kent Highways during the consideration of any initial planning application.
- Most developers are likely to want to build as many luxury 5-6 bedroom houses as they can. The village residents need to let any potential future developer know the types of housing that the village feels it needs.
- The building work would result in significant construction traffic passing through the village until the development has been completed. This could result in disruption in an already busy part of the village.
- The Surgery has recently been extended to include two additional consulting rooms to expand their capacity, in preparation for potentially having to support future additional patients from Chilmington Green.Â
- Southern Water have confirmed that they would be responsible for ensuring that there was sufficient capacity to deal with any additional ground and waste water resulting from this, or any future, development.
- Any development within the village could benefit existing shops, pubs and other local businesses.
- Such a large number of houses could result in the village beginning to feel more “urbanised”.
This questionnaire is being carried out on behalf of the Woodchurch Parish Council. Your privacy is important and we will only use your post code to help group responses from different areas around the village. All information collected will be anonymised before being passed to the Parish Council and your identity will not be shared with any other group or organisation. You will not be contacted as a result of completing this questionnaire. The reason we require you to supply your name is to help protect against multiple form submissions being made.
