‘Total grid lock’ predicted as design of road revealed
A link road proposed as part of the west of Ifield development has been something of a contentious issue. During the last round of consultations, in January 2020, little was known about the road other than the rough route it would take. It has now been revealed it will be built in three phases and will be a single carriageway rather than a dual carriageway. It is expected to run through the proposed neighbourhood centre rather than around it and join Crawley in the Ifield Green/Bonnetts Lane area, with the Rusper Road junction with the development only open to buses. Homes England engagement manager Tom Hustler said it would be more than just ‘a strip of tarmac or concrete with a white line down the middle’. He said: “It won’t just be a road. It will have segregated cycle ways and segregated footpaths. “We want to get people to walk more – and we know they don’t walk if they don’t feel safe, we know they don’t cycle if they don’t feel safe. There’s a lot of design to do.” The idea of building the road in three phases was described as ‘disastrous’ by one commenter, with another predicting ‘total grid lock until the entire length is completed’. Of all the concerns raised by the public, flooding has been high on the list. As the development sits between the River Mole and Ifield Brook, those concerns are not without foundation – but Homes England is confident its water management and flood mitigation plans will address any problems. The plans centre around a number of Sustainable
Urban Drainage systems – known as SUDS – and a network of green spaces and naturalised drainage channels, known as swales. Mr Hustler said: “Essentially what that means is you hold the water so it doesn’t flood the next parish downstream – but instead of holding it in big concrete tanks, you hold it in green space. “The land around the River Mole would get boggy if you had very heavy rain and it would flood and hold water if you get exceptional rain, then it slowly drains down. “It’s all about the right shape of water flow and the right trees and the right plantations. But it means that we can use the existing River Mole as a means of holding the water back so that it’s released slowly after a massive rainfall.” What do you think of the plans? Email ct.letters@ jpimedia.co.uk