Controversial garden villages given green light by inspector
Two garden village communities can go ahead as part of a town’s Local Plan Review, a government inspector has concluded.
Inspector David Spencer has spent the past two years examining the plan put forward by Maidstone council setting out where development in the borough should be allowed over the next 15 years.
Three key components are the creation of a 5,000-home garden village at Lenham Heath, a 2,000-home garden settlement at Lidsing on the border with the Medway Towns, and the redevelopment of the Invicta Park Barracks site in Maidstone for 1,300 homes. Mr Spencer found that each of the proposals as presented in the council’s original submission in 2002 was “unsound” – but that with the appropriate modifications that he suggested, all of them could be made acceptable.
Maidstone already has a Local Plan from 2017, but this review is to meet the increased demand for housing.
The original plan provided for 883 new homes each year. The review increases that by 31% to an average of 1,157 per year. The inspector acknowledged this would potentially adversely affect the environment, but took the view that with appropriate mitigation measures “the effects would not significantly and demonstrably outweigh the benefits of providing much needed homes and supporting a strong, competitive economy in the borough.”
Although much of the focus of attention up to this point has been on the two garden communities, Mr Spencer highlighted that, over the whole plan period, 60% of the housing growth would be within the Maidstone urban area.
Part of that would be at Invicta Park Barracks, which the Ministry of Defence says it will close by 2029. Submitted for a maximum of 1,300 homes, the inspector said the wording should be changed to allow some “flexibility” – ie a possible increase to more than 1,300.
However, he insisted policies would be needed to shield listed buildings and the “sylvan” woodland within the site, and also to ensure that a Hindu place of worship (associated with the Gurkhas) remained after the development. Supporters of a Leeds/Langley Bypass are also likely to be disappointed after the inspector concluded that a policy reserving a corridor for housing development that would help pay for the new road was “unsound” and needed to be dropped.
He said that delivering a relief road to connect the A274 to Junction 8 of the M20, would likely require the construction of an additional 4,000 homes to fund the road, which is currently costed at £57 million. Although he did not rule out this being reinstated in later iterations of the plan. At Heathlands, the inspector noted that the garden village would “in its early stages result in notable landscape and visual harm”.
To counter that, he required a number of policy changes to beef-up landscaping protection. He also required the provision of a new railway station. Previously, the station had been only talked of as a possibility.
The site would also require off-site highway interventions on the A20 and at Junction 8 of the M20.
Even so, he expected the first housing could be delivered by 2031.
Mr Spencer acknowledged that “to a significant degree, the Lidsing proposal would be regarded as part of the wider Medway urban conurbation” and he noted that Medway Council was opposed to the allocation.
But with an improved connection to the adjacent M2 Junction 4, and with measures to discourage traffic from journeying through Boxley and Bredhurst, the proposal could be sound.
Creating a fourth arm to Junction 4 of the M2 would require replacing the existing Maidstone Road overbridge with a new realigned bridge and a new arc of approach road to the south. He thought the first Lidsing homes might be delivered as early as 2029.
Other housing allocations in the Local Plan Review also remain, but often with increased mitigation measures.
They include 998 more homes at Lenham and 250 homes at Abbeygate Farm in Tovil.
The inspector concluded that because of the delay caused by the lengthy examination process, the plan would need to be extended to 2039.
Over that time period a minimum of 19,669 homes would be required.
But in a change from previous plans, he said the housing should be provided in a “stepped trajectory.”
The target would be 1,157 homes in the first year, stepping down to 1,000 a year from years two to six, before stepping up to 1,150 homes per year in years seven to 12, and stepping up again to circa 1,350 dwellings in the latter parts of the plan.
The approach reflects the delays in bringing forward the garden village schemes.
Even so, Mr Spencer suggested the plan would still result in a small housing shortfall of 279 homes, which, he said, was not sufficient to declare the plan unsound.
The inspector’s report was considered by cabinet members on Tuesday before being presented to a full council meeting yesterday (Wednesday) when councillors were asked to adopt the plan, with the inspector’s modifications.
Cllr Janetta Sams (Ind) said the community in Lenham was “dismayed” at the inspector’s conclusions.
She said: “This Local Plan is a disaster for everyone living in the borough.”
Kate Hammond is the spokesman for the Save Our Heath Lands campaign. She said: “This Local Plan goes no way to resolving the many existing issues in Maidstone.
“Residents have been repeatedly calling for the right infrastructure to be provided including better roads, new doctors’ surgeries and more school provision.”
Eddie Powell, chairman of Harrietsham Parish Council, said: “The devil is in the detail, and this plan has no detail. Its viability is marginal and without a change in the current economic environment, the figures are unworkable.” Cllr Tom Sams, also an Independent councillor for Harrietsham and Lenham, said of Heathlands: “This is a recipe for gridlock and congestion.
“Building on our green open and food-producing spaces is absolute madness.”
Vanessa Jones is the Independent councillor for Boxley Ward, which will include the Lidsing development.
She said: “It is bitterly disappointing.
Such development will totally destroy the area and negatively impact the lives of thousands of people.”