‘Scrap bus route, spend £250k on fixing bottleneck’
Call to divert cash from ‘white elephant’
Funding set aside for a new bus service could be pumped into upgrading a road junction after a council U-turn.
Last January Maidstone council’s planning committee granted Taylor Wimpey permission to build 181 homes at The Peafield in Barming.
A condition was that the developer signed a Section 106 agreement to pay nearly £250,000 towards supporting buses.
It was envisioned that the money would be used to provide a peak-time service shuttling residents of the new estate to Maidstone town centre.
But Cllr Peter Holmes (Con) last week told a meeting of the Joint Transportation Board: “This bus is not wanted nor needed. It’s a white elephant scheme. The money will be squandered and will be of no benefit to Maidstone.”
Instead he suggested the cash be put towards paying for the planned £3.2m improvements to the junction of Fountain Lane with the A26 Tonbridge Road in Maidstone. That scheme is currently stalled because there is no money to pay for it.
His request resonated with members of the board.
Cllr Paul Cooper (Con) said: “It is tremendously old-fashioned to be still subsidising bus services.
“The trouble is that national planning policies put a high value on public transport when the reality is that we don’t live in 1975 any more.”
Heath ward councillor Ashleigh Kimmance (Lib Dem) said: “The issues with the A26 junction have been going on for donkey’s years. Mitigation measures for that junction should have happened long ago.”
Cllr Tom Cannon (Con) said
that providing the bus service would be “the sort of waste of money that residents find exceedingly annoying”.
He said: “After three years, when the subsidy runs out, the bus service will be gone.
‘’Strategic infrastructure in Maidstone is far more important than a bus route that nobody wants. We need to keep Maidstone moving.’’
The council’s chief planning officer Rob Jarman explained a Section 106 agreement was a
legal document and so the developer would have to apply for permission to vary it.
“It would very much be down to Taylor Wimpey wanting to play ball,” he explained.
But he also warned that even if it were possible to transfer the money it would not fully fund the planned junction improvements, which include a double roundabout.
The board voted in favour of requesting Taylor Wimpey divert the promised funding.