Gypsy, Traveller and Travelling Showpeople Development Plan Document

Nothing chosen

With reference to the above proposal for The Lodge site development in Water Lane, and as a resident of Bearsted for 51 years, I am making the following comments to advise against the Plan. Access and Highway Safety: Very inadequate and dangerous. Water Lane is narrow, winding, with blind bends, and is often flooded in places or icy. It can barely accommodate small vehicles, let alone large lorries and trailers, especially when turning in or out of the site - not just during construction, but when the residents are driving large vehicles when going to and from their seasonal work events, The south end of it already has frequent accidents/collisions because of the sharp bend near Crismill. Increased traffic in and out of Water Lane, either at that end or the north end T junction on a blind bend with the busy, narrow, Pilgrims' Way, would result in more chaos and accidents. Pedestrians, cyclists, horse riders would all be put in much greater danger of accidents with the increased vehicular movements than is the case already. Emergency vehicles or work on road repairs, provision and repairs of mains services and carriageway would all be continuously blocking or adversely affecting the comings and goings from the site, as well as affecting the site residents, farmers and other residents of the Lane. Landscape and Environmental Harm: The south side of the North Downs, viewed from Bearsted Road, the A20 and Crismill is mainly an area of outstanding natural beauty, and is a great tourist attraction as well as a very popular area for walkers, cyclists and horse riders. It needs to be protected and to retain its natural beauty, peacefulness and agricultural status. Now, more than ever, we need to utilise fertile and productive farming land to provide food for our fast increasing population, rather than pollute the atmosphere by flying in produce from other countries and destroying the rural nature of our countryside with obtrusive buildings and concrete that will also disrupt or destroy our endangered wildlife. Drainage and sewage pollution are serious concerns, especially in the appropriately named Water Lane. I have seen and smelt sewage flooding down Water Lane and across Bearsted Road. The ongoing housing development opposite on the Lilk Meadow, sited lower down, has already had to put in major measures to prevent flooding and sewage overspill. Old maps, particularly from the Victorian era, appropriately call that area The Bogs, from the days when the Lilk stream was, as it still can be, polluted. This would likely be exacerbated by further development just into Water Lane. There is considerable wildlife in that area of former farmland, which was not looked after or respected when piles of tyres and industrial chemicals were dumped on that farmland a few years back and periodically set alight, until the Council enforced its removal. I appreciate there will be what should be an independent, high standard Habitat survey of the site. Already, wildlife has been seriously affected and destroyed by all the pockets of developments that have been going on in the locality in recent decades. Humans also need pleasant, safe places to walk and exercise for their health and well being, especially in this troubled and turbulent 21st century. Countryside pursuits are essential to us all, and adding more traffic, more dwellings to such essential and popular areas is very ill advised. Light pollution from the proposed site, as well as noise, would ruin the views of the night sky and disrupt the fairly peaceful atmosphere of the local area. This would continue well beyond the construction phase. I am opposed to similar proposed sites across the foot of the North Downs, as they too are on greenfield sites, rather than on Brownfield sites. Also the infrastructure is already seriously inadequate, especially sewage, water supply (still a hose pipe ban in Kent!), energy, schools, transport, shops, doctors and dentists' surgeries, social/leisure centres, hospitals , parking, etc. We should be using existing brownfield sites, or other counties' brownfield sites, for such developments as well as for homeless people and for migrants. Kent is already overcrowded and under-resourced. Thank you for your consulting with residents. I would happily make more comments if I had time.