I have been against the Heathlands development since the beginning. I have walked step by step with the Parish Council, SOHL and other campaigners to try and stop it, and I am disappointed that it was included in the Local Plan and that SOHL lost their legal challenge against it.
This rural location is the wrong place for 5,000 new homes. The same can be said for several other huge developments in the pipeline around Faversham & Mid Kent. Taken together they will be equivalent to adding another town the size of Faversham in my constituency – transforming beautiful farmland and countryside into a more urban area.
I was not reassured listening Maidstone Borough Council (MBC) and Homes England representatives at the Dog and Bear at their consultation last week (see me tell ITV Meridian this here). They assured me that there would be lots of infrastructure and services as part of the development, but there is no guarantee that any of these - like the station - will actually be built.
It’s all very well putting them in the plan, but what’s to stop the developers saying down the line they can’t be afforded? Then you get the worst of all worlds: hundreds of new residents isolated in the countryside relying on the already strained road network, existing hard-pressed doctors surgeries and so on.
Scroll down to read my letter to Maidstone Borough Council outlining my reservations about the Heathlands development – which I know many of you share.
