Rother Valley decision ‘on hold’
A decision on planning permission for the Rother Valley Railway has been put on hold for up to two months. Rother District Council was due to hear the RVR’s application to rebuild the missing two-mile section of the Kent & East Sussex Railway at a planning meeting on February 9. While the council’s planning committee had recommended that it be granted, the decision was deferred. A council spokesman said: “A decision was taken by officers to postpone the item on the RVR to a future meeting because they needed more time to gather all the relevant information to present to the committee. It will be heard either next month or in April.” If planning permission is granted, the RVR will be able to apply to Parliament for a Transport & Works Act Order, allowing it to rebuild the formation between its current railheads of Northbridge Street and Junction Road - completing the 3½-mile extension of the KESR from Bodiam to Robertsbridge. But local landowners, who control sections of the former trackbed, continue to voice their objections to the scheme, believing it will affect the operation of their farms and pose an increased flood risk. Concerns have also been raised over the proposed level crossing over the A21 bypass, the reason the KESR abandoned the Bodiam-Robertsbridge section in the 1960s. However, Highways England has confirmed that it will not object to the railway crossing the road, provided that train movements do not take place during the ‘rush hours’ of 7am-9am and 5pm-7pm. Describing the postponement as “disappointing”, RVR Press Officer Mark Yonge commented that the delay was particularly frustrating, as “Robertsbridge Junction station is virtually ready to receive trains, apart from constructing the station building.”