Arundel Town Council

Arundel-Ford safe cycle path, Flood defences & Airbnb

Edited extracts from draft minutes of the Town Council meeting on 12th January 2023. Campaign - The Arundel-Ford safe cycle path: MP, Andrew Griffith is confident that the Council will secure the funding. The current line of argument is that with all of the current debate about the effect of the A27 bypass on other species like bats, voles and dormice, we should not ignore the risk that the increased traffic on Ford Road represents to Arundel young people travelling to Ford to get the train to their secondary schools. The Mayor concluded by identifying a potential new campaign for 2023, because ADC have advised that due to financial and resource constraints that they could not now proceed to do the repairs to the ‘leak’ in the Jubilee Gardens river wall which was only required for ‘cosmetic’ reasons. The Mayor and the Council Flood Advisor would meet with ADC on 1st March to discuss this. Mayor communications - Flood defences: The Mayor and Flood Advisor had met with the Environment Agency (EA) the previous day to discuss the traffic plan for the Tarrant Wharf works. EA explained they will be using a bigger jack-up barge which means river will be closed for much time between April-October. This will affect the location of Festival Dragon Boat and Duck race and he advised the Festival Committee. EA will send out details of works and amended traffic plan to residents. They currently plan to have a dedicated Communications Officer on site throughout.

River Road Airbnb: The letter to ADC received no response. The Council has over 700 signatures on the petition. They are working on re-booting the campaign. Suggested to look at harnessing the 16,000 followers on Arundel Sussex Facebook. Reminded Council staffing Farmers Market Council stall to seek new signatures.

Residents enlisted support of Tax Payers Alliance (TPA) who were campaigning against the Airbnb project as a waste of Arun rate payers’ money. Five members of TPA had been canvasing in the town and reportedly 200 letters to ADC had been signed. arundeltowncouncil.gov.uk