A Horsham developer recently held a consultation exercise on the 350 homes it wants to build in a Waverley Village.
The village champion urges Alfold to turn up and be counted.
Says one resident.
This is a “Paper Exercise” by Thakeham so they can tick the box to say it engaged with the village, then it will dip into Social Media and lift out the odd message that says the country needs more housing, and obviously, that it should be here in Alfold!
This whole Consultation Stinks. It knows that even with 400 odd homes, they cannot hope to put in the Infrastructure that a site the size of Dunsfold Park Garden Village could and should. So piggybacking off them isn’t going to cut it…
In fact, in their Consultation Report of December 2023, after the various Round Table meetings held in the village, they point out that much of what the Community actually REALLY Wants is NOT deliverable by them as it requires Third-Party Consent, such as Schools, Medical facilities, Transport Infrastructure….etc. They even have the nerve to put Sewage Work Upgrades into the section that says HARD TO DELIVER & LESS DEMAND—Really? Ask those who have had their Loos overflowing and the playing fields covered in Pooh!
If they are so desperate to put housing in rural fields in our village, why not put themselves forward to build out on Dunsfold Park? I am sure Trinity College would love to have a developer who really wants to build so many homes for the benefit of our village and others nearby…
Doh—Let me guess. Most likely, DP land will require decontamination due to its previous uses, which makes the build-out MORE EXPENSIVE. Thakeham wouldn’t want that, would they? No, they want to dig up farmland, which is far cheaper.
It will all come back to an Appeal. I am sure the WBC Planning Officers will reject it (they are too busy looking at 199 Lodges on Wildwood), as I would hope the WBC Planning Committee would, but it will then come back to the usual Waverley doesn’t have a 5-year Land Supply -which I thought Gove had dropped!! – but maybe he didn’t tell anyone else.
The new Labour Government just reinstated WW Quotas.
We have a Neighbourhood Plan, which was supposed to protect us, but Thakeham obviously feels it is not worth the printed paper. Shame on them!
The only hope we have is that by the time it goes to Appeal; we will have another Government in place that isn’t lining its coffers with Thakeham donations and Job Offers.
As ever, Grumpy of Alfold
Another resident who attempted to obtain more vital information from the developer and has repeatedly failed told the developer and the WW.
You can continue to hide behind your third-party stooges, but you will need to provide the information somehow.You have already destroyed our village.You are arrogantly continuing to destroy our village.You have destroyed what very little relationships with the stakeholders of the village there were by your continual bullish bullying and lies.Please provide the data request in an attempt to repair your relationships and behave responsibly, transparently, and ethically, which currently your behaviours are not.Please also ensure that your Alfold website pages are updated to reflect that you are not progressing, rather than the continual arrogance that you believe you can continue to trash our village against the villager’s 100% wishes.I am meeting with our MP, Jeremy Hunt, tonight at 7:30 and will share all of this detail with him.
Either way you look at it, Thakeham are behaving like Thugs. It is not sustainable. It is not wanted. It is not in line with the Alfold Neighbourhood Plan.
Well done, Liz! Another illustration that Hunt doesn’t even know what is going on in his back yard – how he got to run the country’s finances……
Whilst I concur with Cllr Townsend’s comments that the bulk of the 480 odd homes that have been allowed have been won on Appeal . In general the Appeals were won due to Waverley’s lack of a 5 year Housing Supply across the Borough so it was deemed expedient to allow this gaping Hole to be filled in in our Little Village.. why not? the only protection we have is GREENFIELDS and not GREENBELT as we are a Rural Village with damn-all infrastructure in place and very few amenities unless you count the Post office and Petrol station.
Our Village is slowley becoming a Drive-Thru Housing estate and now Thakeham want to add another 350 on top of their existing 99 homes..
They have nothing to offer the Village in mitigation and the bulk of what people asked for during the Consultation needs to be met by other parties such as SCC and CCG, Utilities Companies etc….
I am afraid it is too easy for Developers to Target smaller villages as there are so few people living here to object Unlike Godalming, Farnham, Haslemere etc.
The whole system STINKS and I don’t see the smell getting any better under the new Government – But we shall see……………..