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Plan to close M26 is turned down amid Brexit fears
Access More than 90 per cent of the freight traffic with the continental mainland goes through the port of Dover and the Channel Tunnel. Communities and businesses across West Kent would have been seriously affected by such a policy disrupting their access by car. The idea behind Operation Brock is similar to the emergency procedure known as Operation Stack, where the M20 motorway can be closed for up to five junctions from Maidstone (eight) to Folkestone (12), forcing locals to find alternative routes. The scheme has been in operation for 10 years and is enforced when services are disturbed by industrial action, weather conditions or electrical failure at the Channel Tunnel. There are officially only 550
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PHOTO: Simon Partington
A PROPOSAL to shut the M26 in order to cope with the fall-out from Brexit on the Kentish frontier with Europe has been shelved. The plan put forward by the government, as part of Operation Brock, would have seen the 10-mile stretch of motorway between Sevenoaks and Wrotham Heath closed to provide a lorry park for freight that was held up on its way across the Channel. But the Freight Transport Association [FTA], which is based in Tunbridge Wells, revealed that it ‘has been discounted by the Highways Agency as a viable option for lorry parking’. Departure from the EU could lead to complications and delays at the all-important trade border.
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Government U-turn helps council to reduce housing target by 3,000 By Andy Tong andy@timesoftonbridge.co.uk TONBRIDGE & Malling Borough Council [TMBC] is set to see its quota for building new houses go down by more than 3,000 over the next two decades. The revised figure comes after the government imposed much higher targets than had been planned for – but later handed councils a get-out clause if they had a good track record on building. Last September the council had worked out it would construct 696 new homes per year until 2031. But the day after TMBC’s Planning and Transportation Advisory Committee revealed its method for meeting that figure, the government increased it to 859. That represented a 23 per cent hike – or 3,260 extra houses over a 20-year period, a figure which council Leader Nicolas Heslop described as ‘undeliverable’.
In contrast Tunbridge Wells faced a rise of 7 per cent and Sevenoaks 13 per cent. There followed a six-month period during which ‘there was a lot of uncertainty’, according to TMBC’s Planning Policy Manager, Ian Bailey. Then the government revised its controversial policy, opening the door to flexibility with a ‘transitional window’.
‘It punished those who had delivered quite a lot of houses up to that point’ Now if TMBC can demonstrate by January 13 that it can meet ‘reasonable expectations’ in its targets over a shorter time frame – known as the ‘five-year housing land supply’ – it will be allowed to pursue its original calculated figures. The council expects to meet that deadline. It has now published its draft Local
Plan, subject to approval on September 12 – with a mandatory six-week public consultation period starting after that. Mr Bailey told the Times: “In 2010 the government said ‘work out your own requirements’. In 2016 we carried out a consultation, then we refined it and took it to our [full council] members.” The draft includes 480 units around Lower Haysden Road and 352 at Coblands Nursery on Trench Road. “Within a day, the government basically said [to all councils]: ‘You’ve taken far too long to sort out your own individual needs, we’re going to give you a formula so you don’t have to worry about that anymore. There won’t be any more arguments, so Bob’s your uncle.’ “That rang a lot of alarm bells for us. It punished local authorities who had been delivering quite a lot of houses up to that point, like Tonbridge & Malling.
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