Opposition to development in Tunbridge Wells

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Transcript

00:00Tunbridge Wells is a local rugby club, but there are plans for it to move down the road

00:04to a new facility, with hundreds of homes being built on this ground. The club says

00:10with 1,000 members, they've outgrown their current facilities.

00:14So how much room we have to play sport, how much diversity that ground offers us, our

00:20facilities here need to be invested in to make sure we are accessible for all aspects

00:25of society, and importantly for our neighbours as well, to reduce some of the burden of parking

00:30on the local community.

00:31Proposals would see more than 350 homes. Neighbours in the area are concerned by this saying it's

00:37just the beginning. So far, there have been more than 100 objections.

00:42You put a whole bunch of huge trucks, building trucks, to move the rugby club and to build

00:47450 houses, it's going to destroy the roads. And then you put in new cars, and then they're

00:51going to increase the volume of the traffic on the roads. And essentially what you're

00:54going to have is a lot more people getting hurt, you're going to have a lot more accidents.

00:58This is an area that has immense biodiversity, and it's been protected for thousands of years.

01:04Once it's gone, it's gone.

01:07And for long-term residents, they say there's been unsustainable population growth.

01:12Largely by professional people moving from London with their families down here. It has

01:20already been putting progressive annual increases on the demands for schools, for doctors, for

01:27dentists, for eating out, for playing out, the whole thing.

01:34Developers told us they're working hard to address concerns from neighbours. Their intention

01:38is to bring forward a scheme that is designed sensitively within its setting, and delivers

01:43on the much-needed local housing need for both private and affordable.

01:48What makes these proposals for homes a little bit more interesting is the fact that three

01:53quarters of the homes will sit in East Sussex. It'll be up to Wylden District Council to

01:59make their decision on those. However, if I just walk over here, I'll cross into Tunbridge Wells.

02:06This is the edge of the town, and the borough of Rorries, the plans could put an infrastructure

02:12burden on to the authority.

02:15It's GPs, it's water. That area of town had problems with the water network a couple of years ago.

02:21It was off for six days over Christmas, so what do these extra 350 houses mean for the

02:25water network? And so on and so forth. There's lots of infrastructure concerns that the community

02:30and that the borough council and that I have, and that we're trying to work to resolve with Wylden.

02:36For now, no decision has been made. Formal planning applications will need to be submitted

02:41separately to the two different districts. It's thought that'll happen early next year.

02:47Gabriel Morris in Tunbridge Wells.