16 July 2020
The Area 3 Planning Committee has rejected the planning application for housing at Forty Acre Field, East Malling after a mammoth four-hour meeting. The land is designated as Green Belt in the Draft Local Plan.
The outline application, TM/19/01814/OA, called for up to 250 new homes on the site, located to the west of Winterfield Lane in East Malling. It included 40% affordable housing and the Council's Planning Officers had recommended that councillors approve the plans.
This has implications across the Borough as Councillors, many of whom have previously voted to place 5,000 homes on the Green Belt, voted against their own planning officer's recommendation to protect open countryside from this development of 250 homes.
Councillors were warned that approving this planning application from developer Wates would be to considerably undermine the case for increasing the Green Belt between East Malling, West Malling, Larkfield and Leybourne.
The Committee was told it should follow the recommendations of the planning officer recommendation as at present the Council can only demonstrate that it has a 2.1-year supply of housing rather than the 5-year supply it should be able to provide.
However, the potential failure to secure undeveloped land to designate as replacement Green Belt, which would allow TMBC to concrete over parts of existing Green Belt in Borough Green, Eccles and SW Tonbridge, could undermine the whole Local Plan the meeting was told.
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