A White Christmas...?

It is difficult to really imagine the size of the Vineyard Farms planned new restaurant and visitor’s centre for Green Belt land in Upper Bush. The glossy brochures that have so impressed our local Council planning department and that show the hordes of smiling, happy, hippy visitors lounging around, with Mark Dixon’s Tracey Island in the background, don’t really give an indication of scale.

But this thing is big.

Really big.

To give you an indication of just how big Lord Foster’s Flying saucer is, I’ve taken the architect’s drawing of the above ground restaurant, visitor’s centre and ornamental lake (and remember, Vineyard Farms are calling all of this an “agricultural building” to get it exempted from the prohibition of new builds in Green Belt land) and superimposed, to scale, a full-sized football pitch next to it.

The Vineyard Farms complex, compared to the size of a standard football pitch...

You can see that what is above ground is much larger than a standard football pitch. (Just an agricultural building, remember?  Honest guv'nor.  Just a £30m agricultural building, just like wot you get on any farm, right?).

What you don’t see is the majority of the building that is underground. Under the lake is an 85m x 60m chamber for their actual wine making area, excavated into the hillside to a depth of 12 metres. From the eastern side of the restaurant block, the building radiates out underground for another 30 metres, to a depth of around 6-7 metres for the fermentation tanks and barrel room.

Barrow Hill is going to be essentially hollowed out to create Vineyard’s Farms’ underground lair.

And all that adds up to a simply enormous volume of chalk that needs to dug out for this grandiose scheme.

Simple arithmetic (and a bulking factor of 1.4 for chalk) shows that volume to be in the region of 160,000 cubic meters! 

This is a very conservative estimate, and does not include any of the likely required foundation works, or anything else they might be digging up as part of the project. It’s just the estimated volume of the chalk spoil that will have to be dug out for the underground caverns, based on the dimensions given in the architectural drawings.

In Section 5.1.5 of their Construction and Environmental Management Plan (CEMP) they admit that "the total material that will be moved is estimated to be more than 100,000 tonnes" but they somehow contend (in Section 3 of the CEMP) that:

"Finished site levels have been determined to negate the need to remove any spoil from site. During construction, should any excavation spoil be unearthed that cannot be re-used this will be removed from site and disposed of at a suitable licensed waste transfer facility..."

Unless they are planning to just pile up the chalk in ugly, white swathes everywhere in Bush Valley (which would actually fit in with the devastated, torn-up valley they have already ploughed up for their vines), this claim doesn’t seem to stand up.

The excavated chalk would cover a standard football field to a depth of 32 metres (100 feet).

Spread to a depth of 1 metre, it would cover 40 acres, or 12% of the whole of Bush Valley.

The top soil cover is pretty thin, and even if they kept all of the top soil from the above ground restaurant area and the car park, they will only have about 10,000 cubic meters to play with. That will only cover about 50,000 square metres of spread-out chalk spoil to a soil depth of around 8 inches  - about a third of the chalk dug out, even if it was spread as thickly as one metre around the valley.

It is clear that they will have to lift the top soil off of a huge area of Bush Valley just to bury their spoil.  The mess, the disturbance, noise, air-borne dust and sheer ugliness this will cause for a few years is entirely predictable. Poor old Cuxton, and particularly Upper Bush, have been through it all before. It will be on a similar scale to the way Dean Farm valley was despoiled forty years ago...

Dean Valley, top soil removal in the early 1980's - soon to be repeated in Bush Valley?

As above...

It's just not practical to import more top soil or export a lot of chalk off site. They’ll need another 20,000 cubic metres of top soil (or around 700 lorry loads!) imported to site to cover their chalk spoil even if they do spread it pretty thickly. That’s a lot of extra traffic that’s not included in any traffic plan. You can multiply that by five if they have to take the excess chalk off site.

Vineyard Farms have so far managed to bamboozle Medway Council planning department, but fortunately some of the other councillors on the Planning committee are becoming wary of the smoke and mirrors approach of Vineyards Farms in trying to hide the more inconvenient, vague or impractical aspects of their grandiose aspirations.

Vineyard Farms need to be pushed on a lot more detail on how they plan to manage their excavation (as well as a lot of other things). But will anyone get an opportunity to do so?

If they get their way, Bush Valley could be afflicted with a White Christmas – for ever!  

Vanished Cuxton: Canon Shaw's Rectory...

Today's Cuxton Rectory, pictured in 1965 just after completion

The current Cuxton Rectory (pictured above) is a pleasant modern-looking brick-built house dating back to 1965. For better or worse, it replaced the truly elegant late Georgian-style Rectory building that was built in 1833 by the then Rector of Cuxton, Robert William Shaw.

Cuxton Rectory, c.1919...

Built from locally-sourced yellow Kentish bricks and having a slate roof, it was designed by architect Mr. Whitehead of Maidstone and built by a Mr. Tarsell. Construction work commenced on 8 May 1832 and was completed on 17 April the following year at a total cost of £1178-14s (about £180,000 today).

Cuxton Rectory, 1868, watercolour by Emily Clare Harvey

Canon Shaw was by all accounts quite a wealthy man, but not surprisingly over half of the money for the rectory had to be borrowed, which it was under the terms of the Relief Of The Poor Act (Gilbert’s Act) of 1782. Whilst giving government money to rich people seems a very 2021 thing to do, the Gilbert Act was intended to bring the gentry into closer involvement in poor relief administration, and Canon Shaw did indeed do much to improve the lot of the local population (such as building Cuxton’s first school in 1849) in exchange for the loan that helped to fund his splendid new rectory.

Canon Shaw’s rectory replaced the original Parsonage that was located down the hill from the church at the bottom of the valley in Bush Road, in a spot that is now occupied by the existing Scout Hall. The Parsonage appears to have been a damp, rather horrible place to live. As Charles Moore wrote in answer to a questionnaire sent to him by the Bishop of Rochester in 1780:

“…I have expended some hundred pounds and made a considerable part of the walls brick which before were only thin lath and plaster, yet from the great indifference of the house itself and its very low, damp situation (being the very lowest spot in the whole parish, it can never be made comfortable or healthy residence at certain times of the year…”

In 1858, Canon Shaw spent another £600 on the Rectory, enlarging the drawing room and adding a kitchen and over-room extension, as well as enlarging the stables and the coach house. The stable block was situated alongside the old Parsonage in Bush Road. The Rectory had an extensive garden and in 1875, the Rectory stable was converted into a gardener’s house at a cost of £162-11s-2d.

Canon Colson, c,1900...

Canon Shaw’s successor, Canon Colson, was also a keen gardener, fencing off the Rectory Garden in 1875 when he took office and building a heated greenhouse alongside Rectory Cottage at a cost of £140.  In 1876 he founded the Cottage Gardener’s Society, being of the opinion that:

“Few things add more to the temporal comforts and well being of a labouring man’s family than his taking pride in his garden. It may help lead him to better things – certainly keep him from worse…”

If only the robber barons who build our modern houses thought like Canon Colson.

The first fruit, flower and vegetable show was held in that year and the show became an established fixture in Cuxton’s social calendar, with Canon Colson’s hothouse plants (arranged by his gardener, Mr. Wilson) being a centre of attraction for many years.

A map from 1867 shows the extensive garden of the Rectory and the associated glebe land that stretched from the churchyard down to Bush Road. The map shows the area laid out as a park, with groups of trees and with Arrow Cottage, another cottage (now 35 Bush Road) and Rectory Cottage and stables forming the northern boundary along to the corner opposite the White Hart. 

35 Bush Road, c.1910 and c.1970, once part of the Rectory glebe estate

Behind Rectory Cottage was a small pond, to the west of which was the main vegetable garden and an orchard.  Around the rectory were formal gardens and trees. There was, at one a time, even a tennis court, located where the top of May Street is.

OS Map of 1869, showing the Rectory and the glebe land...

Canon Toone, Canon Colson’s successor, continued in the tradition of gardening Canons. He employed Jack and Charles Cogger as gardeners, helped by Walter (Wick) and Jim Cogger.

The Cogger family, tree-felling in the Rectory Garden, 1958. Looking on is Mrs. Rae, wife of Rector Charles Rae...

As was the case with so many of Cuxton’s historic buildings, neglect and the passage of time sadly took its toll on the Rectory. By 1961, when the Reverend Richard Allington Smith came to Cuxton, the building was in a sorry state, its roof timbers riddled with rot and according to the Reverend himself, draughty and difficult to heat.

Despite opposition from the Parish Council, the rectory was demolished in 1965 and replaced by the smaller and undoubtedly more practical but far less elegant structure we see today. Much of the glebe land was sold off at around the same time for housing, hence the name of the mini-estate on Bush Road, The Glebe.

The Rectory, 1964, just prior to demolition...

Canon Shaw’s Rectory, possibly above all other buildings that have been lost from Cuxton, could and should have been saved. It seems staggeringly short-sighted to have allowed its destruction, even by 1960’s standards.

Unfortunately we seem to be returning to those days, when money, vested interests and short-sighted expedience took precedence over the quality of local life…

References:

1)  Cuxton: A Kentish Village by Derek Church (published by Arthur J Cassell Ltd, 1976, ISBN 0 903253 12 7), Chapter 4, pp35-38, Chapter 6, pp59-60.

Vineyard Farms: Raising A Stink...?

One of the many interesting things I learned from last week’s Medway Council Planning meeting (which deferred a decision upon the Vineyard Farms plans for a luxury country club and restaurant complex on Green Belt land at Upper Bush) was the existence of a proposed “energy centre” as part of the development. Councillor Gary Etheridge mentioned that this would produce 46% of the power requirements of the Vineyard Farms new Xanadu (and asked where the other 54% was coming from…).

One of the many criteria a developer needs to meet in order to justify the rape of green belt land is to demonstrate that their proposals are “low carbon” (whatever that really means) and energy-efficient. Vineyard Farms intend to tick this big green box with their “energy centre”.

Very little detail on how this will work has been provided by them, perhaps on the basis that no-one can object to it if they don’t know anything about it. I had seen references to the production of energy from biogas as the preferred “green energy” source in the Vineyard Farms glossy brochures on the Medway Planning Portal, but I had not paid much attention to any of it as there was so little detail.

In short, it seems that the grape pomice (the stuff left over once all the juice has been squeezed out of the grapes) will be put into an anaerobic digester to make methane, which would then be burnt in a gas-fired generator set to produce power. Although Vineyard Farms haven’t said so, the system in their brochure looks very much like the containerised system provided by Qube Renewables, a 2018 UK biogas start-up that has just sold out to a Singapore-based company (part of the ongoing national asset-stripping process that sees any potentially worthwhile UK company bought up by overseas firms: “taking back control” I think it’s called…).

The Qube bio-energy set-up...

The Qube set-up looks somewhat experimental, comprising of a bunch of shipping containers, flexible hoses and tanks that don’t look very pretty at all and which will presumably be hidden away inside the “energy centre”. There isn’t a lot on-line about Qube Renewables beyond what’s on their web-site and it would be interesting to know if they actually have any working units in the UK.

In terms of the energy claims, the “46%” figure did actually add up when I did some back-of-a-beer-mat calculations. If you assume that the vineyard will be 900 acres and yields 3 tonnes of grapes per acre (typical low-end UK yields according to Mr. Internet), that’s 2700 tonnes of grapes. Pressing takes out 80% of the mass as the juice, the other 20% being pomice, so there will be 540 tonnes of that to feed to the little bugs in the bioreactor. It seems (according to Mr. Internet again) that you get around 150 cubic metres of biogas from a tonne of waste, and a cubic metre of biogas put into a gas-fired generator yields about 2KWh of energy. So if all goes well, the bio-digester should produce 150 x 540 x 2 = 162,000 KWh a year, a figure pretty close to the one Vineyard Farms quote in their glossies (158,000 KWh).

If all goes well…

Even when all is running smoothly, anaerobic digesters produce low levels of hydrogen sulphide, the rotten eggs smell. This has to be removed from the biogas as it is acidic and corrodes the gas combustor. Nevertheless, anaerobic digestion facilities tend to have a permanent whiff about them, something the Riggalls Court residents (and maybe the rest of Cuxton) might just get to find out for themselves.

The bugs in anaerobic digesters are delicate little things that need constant TLC. Feed them something they don’t like, or get the temperature wrong, and they die off. Sometimes the bugs just decide to die out of spite anyway. Anaerobic digestion can be a finicky technology. I used to work for a large company that had a biodigestion plant to treat its organic wastes, and it was forever stinking the place out (and the neighbouring town a mile or so away). When anaerobic digesters go wrong, they can also generate mercaptans, the smelliest substances known to man (methyl mercaptan has an odour threshold of one part per BILLION).

And indeed, nearly everywhere you find large anaerobic digestion plants, you’ll find complaints about the smell.

Of course, the Vineyard Farms operation is quite a small one in terms of bioreactors, so the amount of pungent gas should be relatively small. Their digester will also benefit from having a consistent quality of feedstock (unlike food waste-based plants) which should help to keep the bugs happy. Nevertheless, the energy centre is quite close to a residual area. Any problems with it and Cuxton will soon smell them. 

And so will the customers of Vineyards Farms restaurant and café. You can be pretty sure that in the event of the slightest pong, VF will pull the plug on their biogas plant, meaning that the whole operation won’t really be very “green” at all in energy terms. (Only a cynic would suggest that’s why the vent stack from the energy centre is on the eastern side of the winery, so that any smell would be carried away from it by the prevailing south-westerly wind and blown over Cuxton instead…)

The Air Quality plan says nothing about smells or hydrogen sulphide levels. Perhaps it should.

The Qube Renewables stuff still has a whiff (no pun intended) of the unproven about it. Perhaps Vineyard Farms need to show Medway Council (and Cuxton residents) that this technology is a reliable long-term option with no stinky down-sides.

There are other unanswered questions as well. Where are Vineyard Farms going to store 500 tonnes of pomice? They say they are going to put the stuff in “vacuum bags” for storage. I can’t see this stopping it from decomposing, another possible source of odour when the bags are opened. In reality, I think the pomice will have to be properly dried for storage (off-site? More vehicle movements?) which itself would be energy intensive. Perhaps we need to know more about the pomice storage plans.

Personally, I  think the Vineyard Farms “energy centre” is just another smoke-screen, along the lines of the “there’s-no-traffic-in-Bush-Road” smoke-screen and the “local jobs” smoke-screen and the “our-luxury-£30m-country-club-is-really-just-an-agricultural-building” smokescreen. Maybe the bio-reactor will work, maybe it won’t, but either way they’ll get the “green” box tick they need and if they bin it a year or so into operation, who’s to penalise them? They’ll have what they want by then.

I think they should be made to have a Plan B. Vineyard Farms were quick to write off wind and solar power generation as they allegedly didn’t want to spoil the ANOB, but their country club will do that anyway. So why not put a few wind turbines and solar panels (and a bit of battery storage) at the southern end of Bush Valley, an area which is already disfigured by rows of pylons? 

The pylon run at the southern end of Bush Valley: room for a few wind turbines?

They could easily run the wires underground down to their club-house. Nobody would complain, I think, (not even me!) and it would be a much less risky and less smelly bet than anaerobic digestion as a means of providing green power. And if the biogas option really does turn out to be able to generate 46% of the building’s power needs, why not go for the other 54% anyway, like Councillor Gary Etheridge suggested?

Or is cost the real worry?  Is the “energy centre” really just the cheapest option for a disposable asset, to be quietly dropped when the “tick in the green box” is achieved?

We’ve lost our chance to raise an objection to Vineyards Farms energy plans, but maybe we can still write to our Medway councillors now that they awaiting “more information” from them prior to another planning meeting.

Perhaps we could say that we are concerned about the proximity of the Vineyard Farms energy centre’s anaerobic digestion plant to Cuxton village, and could ask them to ask Vineyard Farms:

·         Are their any other biogas generation units similar to their planned one in current operation in the UK?

·         If so, are there any issues with odour or reliability?

·         Where are Vineyard Farms planning to store their annual 500 tonnes of grape pomice prior to use in the bioreactor?

·         How will the pomice be treated to prevent decomposition during storage?

·         Will an odour or hydrogen sulphide condition be added to the local Air Quality Plan?

·         What are Vineyard Farms’s alternative plans for renewable energy in the event that their biogas plant proves unviable?

Or we could just let Vineyard Farms get away with being unchallenged on this. It could be a bit more than just a rat that we are smelling here…

Our Kelly...

Update (11th January):  Ms. Tolhurst has been writing to her constituents, as follows...

"I have become aware that there appears to be some confusion within the local community regarding my own position on this application. I would like to take this opportunity to clarify my position on this important matter.

…. From the outset, I have never confirmed that I outright support the application (my emphasis) and have not submitted any written letter of support to the Council’s planning committee…. But, I did say that I am in favour of a winery in principle given the jobs it will create and the financial benefits to the community and wider Medway Towns..."

Fake picture, true sentiment..."in principle..."  

Compare that to what she originally sent out to concerned constituents a couple of months or so ago...

"I can confirm that, on balance, I am in favour of this application (my emphasis) due to the jobs it will create both on site and in the supply chain, the financial benefits to the community and wider area, and it could help to secure the surrounding land us as agricultural rather than leaving it open to housing developers...

So, to avoid "confusion", let's be clear.  Kelly was "in favour" of the application.  Now, she's "never confirmed that I outright supported the application" but "I am in favour of a winery in principle". The difference between an MP being "in favour" of something but not "outright supporting" it is lost on me. It smacks of fence-sitting.

I think maybe she's changed her mind, simple as that.  She has a history of doing that.

That's good.  And from what she is saying above, maybe she supports the winery, but not where it's going.  Which is exactly where Cuxton Parish Council is coming from. As am I.

Or maybe she doesn't. Who really knows with Our Kelly? 

Perhaps Ms. Tolhurst might even come out and say she supports Cuxton Parish Council's view that the Vineyard Farms apparent "must have" need to build their wine manufacturing plant at Upper Bush because of "quality reasons" is just a smoke-screen, and that it should be built elsewhere.  

But I'm not holding my breath on that one.

I wonder what Tracey Crouch would do?

Medway Council Planning Meeting - The Winery...

The above embedded video (note: now taken down, presumably by Medway council) is a recording of the council planning meeting held at the council offices in Gun Lane on Wednesday 8^th. December at 6.30 pm. The discussions leading to a deferral on the decision took over two hours, which for many would be painful to endure.

Nevertheless, it was a very revealing meeting in many respects and I was glad to have attended in person. For anyone interested, I have provided a written record of the meeting and my own observations below. Just in case anyone thinks I am trying to put an “anti-vineyard” spin on things, I’ve quoted timelines so you can see the debate for yourself, and which will allow you to scroll through the video and draw your own conclusions. 

Even that is rather a long read however, so initially, I have provided a summary of my notes below:

Cllr Dave Harris, Head of Planning was clearly very enthusiastic about the proposals and recommended approval. Although he initially stressed the need for “balance” in making the decision, he presented only the developer’s view of key issues, with no mention of any of the points raised in the detailed objections raised by both Kent ANOB and Cuxton Parish Council. (Indeed, these notes were mysteriously not appended to the Supplementary Agenda for the meeting, even though Cllr. Harris said they were). He also made several other dubious assertions during his presentation, as well as some in his responses to questions from other councillors.

Whilst Cllr. Harris was given 30 minutes to make his case in favour of the development, Cllr. Matt Fearn (struggling with a heavy cold!) was only given 5 minutes. He nevertheless managed to articulate the concerns of Cuxton village regarding the legitimacy of the application, its adverse impact upon the ANOB, the traffic situation and the overall negative impact upon the quality of life in the area.

During the questions and subsequent debate, it became clear that many of the councillors present were unhappy with the approach of Vineyard Farms, some even describing it as “a slap in the face”, “disrespectful” and “a bit of a smokescreen”. In particular, many were concerned about the obvious traffic issues and they were not reassured by the assertions of either their own Transport Planner or Vineyard Farms’s submissions that that the proposals would not significantly compound traffic issues in Bush Road.

They therefore voted to defer the decision until early next year, pending (yet more) presentations by the developer, as well as a site visit by members of the planning committee.

Note that no-one from the village will be permitted to attend these additional Vineyard Farms presentations, or to present our objections in detail.

Councillors also appeared not to know that the critical traffic survey upon which so much depends (conducted by Mayer Brown on behalf of Vineyard Farms as part of their planning submission) was somewhat suspect.

Full notes:

0h:20m. Councillor (Cllr) Chris Buckwell, the meeting chairman, gives introductions and settles some procedural business.

0h:28m:30s. Cllr. Dave Harris, Head of Planning, describes the background to the Vineyard Farms submission, the project location and design. In his opening remarks, Cllr. Harris refers to the need for a balanced approach to considering the Vineyard Farms proposals, and in passing mentions the detailed objections by Cuxton Parish Council and Kent ANOB. (At no point subsequently does he mention even one significantly negative aspect of the plans. So much for “balance”…).

He enthusiastically endorses the proposals and recommends (57m30s) that the committee should approve them. During his presentation, he makes a number of questionable assertions…

• He stated that the detailed rebuttals of the Vineyard Farms proposals provided by both Cuxton Parish Council were appended, in full, to Supplementary Agenda given to those present (29m:48s). Cllr. Buckwell later (59m:30s) pointed out that these key documents (the only ones providing a counterpoint to the Vineyard Farms narrative) had, in fact, been curiously omitted from the Supplementary Agenda, though he did not say why.
• Cllr. Harris stated (36m:10s) that the development was solely of an agricultural nature, and that the restaurant, wine tasting area, café etc were ancillary to the main business. The proposed building (as was pointed by several councillors later) is, in fact, a mixed-use development of a type that is prohibited by the current National Planning Policy Framework.
• Cllr. Harris stated that because an agricultural building is exempt from Green Belt planning constraints, Vineyard Farms could just erect a series of ugly sheds to house their wine processing plant if they so chose, without the need to seek planning permission (52m:05s). He later repeated that veiled “threat” several times throughout the rest of the meeting. Towards the end of the meeting however, it became clear that this threat only exists in Cllr. Harris’s imagination: Vineyard Farms themselves have never made such a threat and that planning permission would still be required for any access from Bush Road.  This begs the question, “if the proposed winery building is solely an agricultural building, why are we even talking about planning permission? Couldn’t Vineyard Farms just build it, if it is exempt from Green Belt constraints as they claim?”
• Cllr. Harris (51m:35s) refers to the instance of case law and claims that it gives credence to the assertion that the development can be classified as purely an agricultural building. The attempt to use the cited piece of case law to justify the proposals has been debunked in the Kent ANOB objection (cf. Medway Planning Portal), which was neither mentioned nor referenced.

Cllr. Harris also refers (33m:20s) to the “positive impact” of vine planting and claims that it gives the area a “Kentish feel”. Even as a personal opinion this is highly questionable: how do ugly masses of poles, scaffolding and steel wire with a monoculture of stunted vines offer a preferable alternative to the colourful seasonal changes of the fields of wheat and barley that we used to enjoy?

He also mentions the Energy Centre (35m:35s) that will allegedly produce 46% of the winery building’s energy needs. Much importance was attached to the ability of this energy centre to give the development its “green” credentials, but no technical details have been provided to the public during the planning consultation stage to allow any review of such claims or of their potential consequences.

Cllr. Fearn was then allowed to voice his concerns regarding the proposals on behalf of Cuxton and Halling. Despite the Head of Planning being allowed half an hour to promote approval of the plans, Cllr. Fearn was allocated only five minutes by the Chairman (1h.00m.05s) to articulate the case for rejection.

During his brief presentation (starts 1h:00m:15s) Cllr. Fearn addresses the following key points:

• Intrusion into the green belt on the pretence that the proposed winery is an “agricultural” building. It is an affront to the principles of the NPPF and meets few, if any of the criteria specified for permitted development in the Green Belt
• The negative impact of the construction and operation of the facility upon the area and its utility as a refuge of tranquillity
• The inaccessibility of the proposed development site and the negative impact that tourist, construction and operational traffic will have upon the local community
• The application fails to demonstrate any tangible benefit to the local community, the majority of benefit being solely for the owners of the vineyard
• Approval of the application will effectively provide a “green light” for green belt development everywhere.
• The strength of local feeling against the development

In conclusion (1h:04m:57s) Cllr Fearn recommended that the committee listen to the local people, refuse the application and request Vineyard Farms to find an alternative to their current proposals, one that offers adequate infrastructure and adequate access for their needs, and does not intrude into the local ANOB.

Cllr Buckwell then opened the question session (1h:05s:30s) and led with a question to Mr. Robert Neave (Principal Transport Planner). Cllr Buckwell described his own knowledge of the problems of access to Cuxton and pointed out that the village is effectively only accessible via the A228 and from that end of Bush Road. He asked if the committee should give a much greater weight to the traffic issues in Cuxton given his comments on the difficulties of access.

Mr. Neave (1h:07m:50s) said he felt that, in his opinion, existing survey data indicated that the development would not cause an unacceptable impact upon traffic volumes, highways safety or compliance with planning guideline criteria. (Note: he and the other councillors appeared unaware of the highly defective nature of the traffic assessment data provided by Meyer Brown, the contractor working for Vineyard Farms).

Cllr. Adeoye (1h:09m:58s) stated that she felt the developers had not made adequate provision for biodiversity protection and that the traffic situation resulting from the development was a “slap in the face” for the climate change mitigation policies espoused by Medway Council. She asked if the developers could provide a stronger case (for approval) as she felt the existing submission was insufficient and that she could not support approval on the basis of the submission to date.

Cllr. Harris (1h:11m:30s) responded that Mr. Neave’s assurance on traffic was adequate. He reiterated the (imaginary) “shed build” threat and that the submission of the applicants was “exceptional”.

Cllr Etheridge (1h:13m:00s) stated that he “totally disagreed” with comments made by the Highways Officer (Mr. Neave) given his own experience of Bush Road. He also noted that the amount of waste water the proposed wine production activities would generate would be in the region of 2.5 billion litres of water per year and asked where that would be stored.

Cllr. Harris (1h:14m:35s) replied that the data was in the applicant’s submission.

Cllr Etheridge (1h:14m:00s) said that data did not indicate a volume of 2,5 billion litres (Note: In the Supplementary Agenda note, Southern Water has already indicated that current sewer capacity was inadequate to handle the applicant’s proposed volume of waste). Cllr Etheridge queried the traffic volume data (Mr Neave went to check the data). He asked about the Energy Centre, and where the other 50% of the winery’s energy use was coming from in the light of climate change criteria and pointed out that no provision has been made for GSHPs or solar energy. Cllr Etheridge also highlighted the anti-social nature of late night traffic noise associated with the winery, asked how such noise could be regarded as acceptable and wanted confirmation that the travel plans would be re-examined in the light of this.

Cllr. Harris (1h:17m:30s) replied that the applicant had adequately considered the energy situation of the building and once more reiterated the (imaginary) “shed build” threat.

Cllr. Etheridge (1h:18m:23s) retorted that he was happy to let the applicant build their wine processing plant as a permitted agricultural development without a restaurant and that he would not be supporting approval of this application.

Cllr. Curry (1h.18m.50s) noted that Gravesham had refused an application to build a winery in Luddesdown and asked what basis that refusal was made upon.

Cllr, Harris (1h.19m.20s) replied that application was not made by Vineyard Farms and that he didn’t know why it was refused. (Update: it was not refused: the applicant withdrew it after GBC made it clear they would not support it due to green belt protection and traffic concerns. GBC seem to take a totally different stance to MBC...).

Cllr. Curry (1h.20m.00s) said it would be useful to know why Gravesham refused a winery application. He went on to state that the application was not for an agricultural building, which could just be built without formal planning permission as a permitted development. It is, in fact, for a restaurant, visitor’s centre, tourist attraction etc. He asked why are we constantly being told otherwise? Cllr. Curry also asked why the conditional £80K funding of the additional traffic plan was going to take place after approval, not before?

Cllr, Harris (1h.21m.40s) replied that Gravesham’s refusal of a winery application was based on the industrial nature of the proposals, but such a reason to know was not necessary (which contradicted his above statement). He also replied that tourism is normal for wineries, and that the restaurant etc. wouldn’t exist were it not for the wine manufacturing facility.

Mr. Neave (Transport) replied to Cllr. Ethridge’s earlier question re. visitor numbers and anti-social traffic noise and stated some numbers. (Note: the anti-social traffic noise query was not addressed). He also replied to Cllr. Curry’s question and stated that the traffic plan funding would be split between work occurring both before and after approval.

Cllr. Curry (1h.25m.00s) asked how that would work and that we don’t yet have the data needed to make a decision.

Mr. Neave replied (1h.25m.55s) that the traffic plan was for the operational phase post-approval and would give the Parish Council a chance to input into any further mitigation measures (Note: AFTER approval is given!)

Cllr. Thorn asked for clarification of the traffic data and said that he thought it was all a bit of a “smoke-screen”.

Mr. Neave replied (1h.27m.25s) and provided a measure of clarification.

Cllr. Harris (1h:28m:00h) gave the reasons for Gravesham’s refusal of a winery application. It was due to the industrial appearance of the building, green belt impact, access, etc.

Cllr. Hubbard (1h:29m:00h) stated that he felt that the application was a “trophy” application, aimed purely at winning awards. He wanted to know what conversations were had with the developer about excluding the non-agricultural elements (visitor’s centre, restaurant etc) of the design from the submission, which would greatly reduce the traffic impact. He noted that a site visit was really required, so that councillors could see for themselves the “country lane” nature of Bush Road and its traffic situation.

Cllr. Harris (1h:32m:55s) replied that he was satisfied that these concerns had been adequately addressed and that the developers had already reacted to concerns.

Cllr. Potter (1h:34m:30s) suggested that permitted development rights should be removed from the applicants once approval had been granted, to stop them building ugly but permitted agricultural sheds in addition to their winery.

Cllr. Harris (1h:35m:25s) replied that it would be a good condition to add post-approval.

Cllr. Gulvin (1h:36m:10s) asked for clarification of what is and isn’t “permitted development”. He stated that he did not accept the argument that wine growing and wine manufacturing had to be on the same site and wanted to know if traffic implications for such an option had been considered, though he felt it would be worse.  Would the building happen anyway with no visitor centre? Would we wind up with an industrial building otherwise?

Cllr. Harris (1h:38m:55s) replied that a winery without the restaurant etc. would be a permitted development and would not require planning permission and that, yes, an offsite winery would generate traffic (Note: that option has not been considered and so no actual data is available for that assertion.)

Cllr. Brown (1h:39m:45s) asked about the impact of permitted development (rather than a design subject to approval by the Planning Committee) upon “biodiversity.”

Cllr. Harris (1h:41m:05s) replied that should Vineyard Farms not be granted planning permission for the winery, they could go down the route of permitted development that would not be subject to planning restrictions (another reiteration of the “shed threat”).

Cllr. Buckwell (Chairman) opened the debate stage of the meeting (1h:42m:00s)

Cllr. Tranter said (at great length) that he had concerns about the amount of detail upon landscaping, and upon the impact upon the local community in terms of human activity (both those who live there and those who visit). He stated that he would like a deferral of any decision to get more data along those lines. 

Cllr Curry (1h:50m:30s) stated the proposal is clearly a mixed use development. He said he was concerned about the traffic impact and felt more information and discussion was needed, especially upon the local quality of life. He stated that he was also unaware of any assessment of the impact of tourism on the area. He stated that the Kent ANOB and Cuxton Parish Council responses to the proposals were the best he had ever seen and should be read. He also noted that “biodiversity/climate change enhancements” provided by the proposal were actually of no consequence given that the much of the applicants land already has Green Belt/SSSI status, and should not form part of any argument in favour. He noted that while many “benefits” of their scheme are being touted by the applicants, it was unclear that there were any for the local community. Does Cuxton actually need the employment opportunities? He stated that the scheme detracted from the ANOB. He called out the “threat” of permitted development and asked if the applicants were actually making that threat. He did not feel that they were. He stated that the integrity of the ANOB was hugely important and that the impact upon the local community was hugely important and he felt that the development was not bringing any advantages.  He said he could not support approval of the plans.

Although the question phase of the meeting was over, Cllr. Harris was permitted to state his disagreement with Cllr Curry’s observations (1h:59m.40s). He repeated his praise for the submission and that all of the information Cllr. Curry needed was in there (implying that Cllr. Curry hadn’t read it) and that tourism brings a lot to Medway. He stated that if any councillor was unhappy with the amount of information provided by the applicants, he would be happy to defer the decision to allow them to provide more.

Cllr. McDonald (2h:02m:10s) stated that he would like to conduct a site visit given so many unanswered questions. He felt that more information would be needed, otherwise he was minded to refuse the application. He said he would like to defer the decision to get more information from the developers and for councillors to see the area for themselves.

Cllr. Buckwell agreed (2h.04m.30s).

Cllr. Etheridge (2h:05m:00s) said he did not believe anything he had heard around traffic movements and supported deferral and a site meeting.

Cllr. Hubbard (2h:06m.50s) said he had no problem with a wine processing operation in the area but that the development does not respect the villagers of Cuxton because of the traffic. He said that the absence of the “add-ons” (restaurant, visitors centre etc) and an off-site location for the bottling operation would solve the traffic issues and would meet the needs of a wine-making business model. He wanted to know how the developers could achieve that. He favoured a deferral and a site visit, with a more respectful approach to the community from the developer.

Cllr. Curry (2h:12m:50s) asked Cllr. Harris that if permitted development were to proceed would planning permission be needed for access from Bush Road. Cllr, Harris admitted that the developer had never threatened to go down that route, and that access would require planning permission.

It was then agreed to defer the decision to allow further presentations by the developer and a fact-finding site visit (2h:14m:30s). 

Meeting closed.

Backenden Hill...

Some views from up on the hills above Warren Road...

It looks like snow on the fields but it is chalk. Our old friends Vineyard Farms are now renting these fields on a long-term basis and have deep-ploughed them, as they have right the way across Cuxton and Luddesdown.

No more wildflowers or the diversity of arable crops for these fields to look forward to any more, alas, just sterile, boring vines...