BRIEFING

Construction Due To Begin Next Year On Ambitious Scheme To Transform Site By A10

It’s all systems go for Brookfield town centre and garden village

Many years in the making, last month Broxbourne Council’s plans for a new town centre for the borough came a step nearer to becoming reality with the agreement to grant planning permission for Brookfield Riverside, a large-scale shopping and leisure development next to the A10 at Cheshunt. Related plans for a new garden village of more than 1,000 homes were also approved at the special meeting of the council’s planning and regulatory committee on Tuesday 20th June.

A third application paved the way for improvements to Cheshunt Park Golf Course which will need to be reconfigured to make way for the other major developments –with plans including a new practice area and two new holes. Brookfield Farm, as most of us know it, has long been a retail destination for people living in the Borough of Broxbourne and beyond. Tesco established its large store there in the 1980s, with Marks and Spencer following in the 90s, when the next-door Brookfield Retail Park was also developed,

What They Say

along Halfhide Lane.

Most of the land alongside the Tesco/M&S development is owned by either Broxbourne Council or Hertfordshire County Council and it is these two councils that have come together to drive forward this new scheme, working with their development partner, Sovereign Centros.

The vision is for a new, integrated town centre for the borough, alongside a garden village suburb. They want Brookfield Riverside to link to the existing retail stores at Brookfield and to regenerate the entire area to create a modern cycle and pedestrian-friendly environment.

To make way for it, the existing New River Trading Estate will be demolished while the household waste recycling centre, allotments and travellers’ site will all be relocated elsewhere.

Construction is expected to begin in 2024. It will generate 2,000 jobs during construction and 2,500 new jobs when fully open.

The council has not put a timescale upon completion yet.

Cllr Lewis Cocking, leader of Broxbourne Council: “This will not only be good for the local economy, but will also have environmental benefits; the new town centre will be fully integrated with the public transport, cycling and walking networks and local people will no longer have to travel outside of the area for their shopping and leisure needs.”

Cllr Richard Roberts, leader of Hertfordshire County Council: “These innovative and important projects will help us make sure that Hertfordshire remains a wonderful place for families to live, work and learn. We are committed to making sure that our county is home to well-designed, sustainable and thriving communities.”

Brookfield Riverside

The £500million Brookfield Riverside, with its striking amphitheatre-style design, will create a new town centre for the borough and is intended to be a high quality retail and leisure development.

The development will include a mix of new shops, leisure venues including a cinema, cafés and restaurants, office space, a hotel, a civic hub, 250 apartments, a care home and a 2,000-space car park. It will feature a new public square while the amphitheatre will straddle the New River. A new road will also lead from the A10 into the development.

Brookfield Garden Village

The garden village will contain up to 1,250 new homes, with up to 40 per cent affordable housing, plus elderly persons accommodation and a three-form entry primary school with nursery facilities, recreation space and a neighbourhood centre with local shops and other facilities including possible community and medical uses. There will also be a network of green open spaces for recreation around the site. The main highway access will be via the A10 Turnford roundabout and a new link road and loop road, both of which would connect with a new north-south spine road which will also serve Brookfield Riverside. It is also possible that the garden village will become home to a ‘blue light hub’ for police, fire and ambulance services.