Update on local Planning issues Lodge Hill etc.

I just want to update the people as to where we are regarding Medway Council, Homes England, Esquires, Lodge Hill and the Nightingales. As you may be aware the council have been awarded £170,000,000 for a Housing Infrastructure Fund, HIF for short

Most of which is ear-marked to be spent on the Hoo Peninsula, including a new railway station at Sharnal Street on the outskirts of High Halstow. It will also pay for a new road off the A289 cutting across farmland through Chattenden and Lodge Hill eventually emerging at a new roundabout on The Peninsula Way roughly opposite The Windmill Pub.  Comparing the map of the proposed road with the Amec, Foster, Wheeler Ecological Survey conducted in 2016 and their plan locating  Nightingale territories, this will impact hugely this iconic much loved bird.

 At best, at least 8 will be disturbed and/or destroyed. For a Red listed bird this is totally illegal and in contravention of The Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981. Quoting Mark Eaton, one of the RSPB’s Principal Conservation Officers, ‘”To be on the red list you need to be a bird of highest conservation concern, meaning you’re in a pretty bad way. You’ve declined very rapidly, you’re at risk of extinction globally”.

The Council have to concede the fact that this area has 1.5% of the UK population, no matter how inconvenient this is to their plans.

Esquire is a building company that is constructing small estates in Chattenden and Cliffe Woods. They have their sights on a field at Chattenden Farm, 8 or 9 Self Builds and Builder Constructed dwellings. This field butts up right to the boundary fence of Lodge Hill and Nightingale territories. To be clear there is an accepted protocol that should be taken into account by council planners of a 400 metre buffer zone around a SSSI, Esquires seemingly want to totally ignore this

A two page objection to the so called Chattenden Lodge development has been sent to Medway by a Senior RSPB Conservation Officer. We are still awaiting their response.

I have said many times and make no apologies for repeating it. Chattenden Lodge does not exist, there is Chattenden, Chattenden Farm and Lodge Hill. I believe it is a ploy to not mention Lodge Hill on the planning application.