Medway Local Plan - Allhallows Impacts

The Medway Cabinet met in Tuesday 17th December and discussed a number of issues that affect the Local Plan and in particular Allhallows.

1) As I reported at the parish council meeting the Local Plan is further delayed so consultation on the Draft Plan will not be until the Summer. The Local Plan is scheduled for completion in December 2021.

2) They have also considered a Playing Field strategy, but only considered their provision and not any provided by parish councils.

3) The lack of a 3-5 year supply of building land has led to developers moving in and providing their own sites.The council is now saying that it has the required supply in a document called the SLAA (Strategic Land Availability Assessment) - There are obviously a lot of sites around Hoo and Chattenden with one large one at High Halstow, none at Stoke or Grain. There is as much development elsewhere in the Strood, Rochester, Chatham and Rainham and up towards the M2

4) Implications for Allhallows :-

a) Sites already approved or in the process of being approved:

Kingsmead additional residential chalets
Bourne Leisure additional leisure caravans
Behind the British Pilot
Binney Farm

b) Additional sites identified as suitable

Land to west of Avery Way. Church Commissioners Land - could be 650
Land to the west of Stoke Road (village hall side), opposite Beatty Cottages and down to Allhallows Place (new site, numbers not known at present but could be 30-50 guesstimate)
Binney Farm (around 50-100 guesstimate) Land bordering the south eastern boundary of the Recreation Ground and down towards southern boundary of the schoolKingsmead golf course, the major part of the field remains in agriculture.

These would not all happen straight away and would be spread to 2035 and the initial feel was the larger site would be towards the back end of the plan, but that will depend on market conditions and decisions by the Church Commissioners who own the land.

Medway's map of all of Medway, which can be zoomed in better is available at https://democracy.medway.gov.uk/mgconvert2pdf.aspx?id=50287