Ploughshares To Swords...

Proposed winery site at Barrow Hill, June 2021...

The public inquiry into the Cuxton winery development at Upper Bush begins tomorrow (Thursday 23rd March) at the Corn Exchange in Rochester. It sees the hordes of highly-paid legal and subject matter experts (the best that a billionaire tax-exile’s money can buy, no doubt) pitted against a lonely-looking Medway Council brief and a few determined (if somewhat apprehensive) Cuxton residents.

One thing that has happened is that the Planning Inspector has put Green Belt protection issues back on the agenda. As I noted earlier, Medway Council’s planners had not cited this as a reason for refusal, a move which must have delighted the applicants. 

The problem is, of course, is that Medway's planners, having supported the applicant's plans and indicated that they didn't think traffic or green belts issues were a problem, have now put the Council in a cleft stick. It can hardly be seen to be arguing against what they so very clearly approved of, which is why they are confining their defence to issues around green belt conservation.

One can hardly blame Vineyard Farms for being aggrieved, perhaps.

Maybe the inspector feels he is legally bound to look at all aspects of the appeal scheme however, not just the ones the vineyard folk and Medway Council’s planners want him to.

In a small way, I feel a bit sorry for Vineyard Farms. During the early pre-application phase, it seemed that no-one within their cosy network had tried to inject a bit of local reality into the debate by taking a long, hard and critical look at the compatibility of the proposals with planning guidelines. The emphasis seemed to be all about getting around them, rather that coming up with a scheme that simply complied with them and could gain local support.

VF seems to be a “young” company in terms of its managers and personally, I think they’ve been poorly served by some of their advisors. It would have been nice to have been friends, rather than adversaries.

My own objection to their plans has always been on a point of principle, in that I think they violate the planning protections afforded to Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty and Green Belt.

Foster's Flying Saucer...

I really am not a NIMBY. I have to be honest and and say that I would have loved to have seen that wonderful Lord Foster flying saucer landing near me.

If only Bush Valley wasn’t AONB/Green Belt land. If only it wasn’t surrounded by precious SSSI woodland.

And if only the site of the proposed winery could be easily reached, instead of having to funnel all of its construction, servicing and tourist traffic down the narrow little residential cul-de-sac that is Cuxton’s Bush Road.

But despite what it suits all of the traffic experts to say, Bush Valley is hard to get to and most of all, is a peaceful, beautiful area, one afforded some of the highest levels of protection from development offered by existing national planning guidelines.

What the flying saucer might look like in late evening?  So much for dark skies...

To me, it seems incredible that Medway Council’s planning department have encouraged Vineyard Farms’ schemes since the early days of the pre-application process back at the start of 2021. The planners must have been aware from day one that a development of the proposed scale might just constitute “inappropriate development” under terms of national planning guidelines and that it flew in the face of many of their own guidelines spelt out in Medway’s Local Plan. Yet that key show-stopper didn’t seem to bother them until the very last minute. 

Of course, we don't know what went on in meetings with key stakeholders throughout the first half of 2021. Representatives of the local Cuxton community were not regarded as key stakeholders and they  were not invited to such discussions. We only live here, after all. 

But I suppose our local council planners are only human. After all, they must spend most of their days looking at plans for drab shop conversions, featureless housing developments or people’s garage extensions.

Perhaps you can understand a degree of bedazzlement in the face of Lord Foster’s glittering design. What a wonderful thing to have on “your patch”. And without meaning to impugn the professional judgement of Medway Council’s planners (who I hear are held in high esteem by most local councillors) perhaps, just perhaps, the siren voices of Foster and Partners, along with all of the other slick advisors being paid from the bottomless pockets of Vineyard Farms’ owner, beguiled our beleaguered local planners into just going along with the enchanted flow.

You have to contrast the enthusiasm of Medway planners for the Kentish Wine Vault with the refusal of neighbouring Gravesham Borough Council to support Meopham Vineyard’s plans for a much more modest winery overlooking Happy Valley.

Nope, GBC said. It’s a green belt AONB, and will send too much traffic down narrow residential roads. Does that situation sound familiar?

In the end, Meopham Vineyard withdrew their application. But of course, Meopham Vineyard didn't have the clout of a billionaire owner and the cachet of Lord Foster behind them...

Barrow Hill, July 2022 - "because we can"...

Had Medway Council’s planning advice to Vineyard Farms been perhaps just been a bit more cautious and critical, maybe the winery folk wouldn’t have been encouraged to put so much time, money and effort into grandiose plans that now face a remote but still-possible chance that they may all come to nothing.

If Vineyard Farms get their way, it could have wider implications, possibly setting a precedent for the industrial-scale development of green-belt/AONBs across the UK.

I’m sure that this is something the planning inspector (and his old/new boss, Michael Gove) has to consider. The possibility of such a precedent being set is why I am against these proposals.

Of course, there are no real winners in this situation now.

If Vineyard Farms are successful, the local, vocal supporters of the winery will doubtless be pleased to get an opportunity to take the mickey out of those they call the NIMBY tree-huggers.

Until the construction traffic starts rolling along Bush Road, that is, and they face an interminable wait to get their SUVs out onto the A228. And then when the noise, dust and congestion caused by construction is over after two or three years, things get even worse when the wine factory is turning out far more bottles than any traffic assessment ever allowed for, or the visitor’s centre is attracting five times as many visitors as they said it would. After all, you don’t spend £30m on a winery and not then wring every last drop of financial advantage out of it.

(And perhaps the traffic situation will backfire on Vineyard Farms as well. You can almost imagine the one star TripAdvisor ratings: “Nice place but a ‘mare to get to. Avoid!!!!”).

Cuxton as a nice place to live will be downgraded by all of this, but then that’ll all be the parish council’s fault for not fighting hard enough, won’t it?

And if the winery folk don’t get what they want, then we know what will happen.

We know they aren’t good losers.

After their original planning application was rejected by the councillors of Medway Council’s planning committee, that was when the “keep to the footpaths” signs went up, the soil and spoil started getting piled everywhere and their security patrols started policing the mythically-named “Silverhand Estate”.

“If we can’t have what we want, neither can you,” seemed to be the message. And if their appeal is rejected, they’ve made it clear (in the "Proof Of Evidence" documentation prepared for the inquiry) just what they are going to do as a result...

Drawings taken from Vineyard Farms "Proof of Evidence" appendices...

They’ve threatened to build a series of huge sheds to house their wine factory, 12m high and 1000m2 in area, right on the edge of Bush Road overshadowing residents houses down near the bottom of Tomlins Lane, under “permitted development rights”. They've thrown some scary traffic numbers at us as well, which involves doing stuff that they didn't need to do when they had a swanky winery in the offering. 

Somehow, sheds mean they have to bring their harvest down the road instead of across fields. Why? It also means that apparently, they can't compost their grape waste somewhere on their massive 1200 acre estate and it will have to be taken through the village for composting offsite instead. Seems rather desperate stuff to me. Most farms have compost heaps, after all. And none of this solves infrastructure issues such as water supply or drains, which are restricted.

Of course, Medway Council's planning committee could put a stop to this nonsense by refusing to give planning permission for the access road... 

Sure, they need a factory to make their wine. But for something as important to their business as a manufacturing base is, perhaps they should have made absolutely certain where it could go before planting 700 acres of vines in such a hurry.

Of course, the drawings of their “sheds” show masses of buildings and I'm not sure they could build them all at once under said permitted development rights from what I can see, but then I guess they just want to fire warning shots at the moment.

You just know what some folk will say.

“See what you protesters have done!? We could have had a beautiful winery, now we’ve just got a load of big ugly barns!”, forgetting of course that it’s the winery folk who would actually be doing the building.

They have 1200 acres of land to play with. With a bit of thought, they could put their factory sheds anywhere. And they could make them a lot prettier, too, if they wanted to. 

Chapel Down has no problem with building their new wine factory on a business park 20 miles away from their main vineyards. Traffic and infrastructure issues solved, easy. But VF just won't back off.

So let the appeal inquiries commence.

I’m sure it will be interesting to see how it all pans out.