Hands off our idyllic village!
Residents battling to stop 1,200 new homes
An ‘idyllic’ seaside village home to rare wildlife could be ‘disfigured beyond recognition’ if plans to build at least 1,200 houses are approved, locals say.
Developers are closing in on the medieval settlement of Pagham in West Sussex, which currently has just 3,500 homes.
Campaigners say the village is one of many facing mutilation from needless growth, based on ‘inflated’ housing targets.
Retired IT manager Alan Pivett said the plans would block views of Chichester Cathedral and the South Downs.
He added: ‘People love Pagham because it is idyllic. The beauty of being able to look at these features that have been there for hundreds of years will be lost. People feel it would be disfiguring a beautiful village beyond recognition.’
Gill Homer, who founded the Pagham and Aldwick Greenfield Action Movement with husband Albert, said the extra homes would spell ‘ruination’, adding: ‘I have never seen a threat as big as this to our way of life. It is going to completely transform a little country village into a nightmare.’
The group is most concerned by a 250-house Taylor Wimpey proposal and a 300-home bid by Hallam Land Management. Locals say the roads and sewers would not cope, and fear for Pagham Harbour nature Reserve. Close to 2,000 protest letters have been sent to Arun district council over three developer bids in the village.
Pagham council chairman Ray Radmall said: ‘What has been a nice seaside rural holiday venue is not going to be the same at all.’
Even parish priest the Rev Mark Eminson wrote to district council official Karl Roberts saying he hoped he would be ‘inspired by the common good as opposed to targets of developers’ greed’.
The village is home to a popular holiday park, and the reserve receives many visitors in autumn when rare migrating birds are seen. Village district councillor Dawn Hall said: ‘There is too much at risk.’
Pagham is also a centre of food production as it gets more sunlight than anywhere else in the UK, an average 1,902 hours a year.
A district council spokesman said the area’s housing needs had ‘risen sharply’ due to national figures from the Government, adding: ‘A total of seven additional sites are included within the plan to meet these increased requirements.’
But Paul Miner, of the Campaign to Protect Rural England, said Government- imposed targets were ‘inflated and unrealistic’. ÷THE housing minister yesterday pledged to keep vital protections for the ‘precious’ green belt.
Gavin Barwell told BBC Radio 4’s Today, if the Tories are elected, ministers will do more to develop brownfield sites – land in towns which has been built on before.