Issue - meetings

to consider and endorse, or make recommendations to the Cabinet Member for Planning, Highways, Transport and Waste, to take the proposed decisions as indicated below:

i)     to give approval to the revised preferred outline design scheme for the Sturry Link Road Drawing No. 430392/000/71 Rev 0 – Fig 2, updated to incorporate amendments arising from the public consultation, for development control and land charge disclosures.

ii)     to give approval to all acts required to acquire the land and rights for the carrying out and completion of the A28/A291Sturry Link Road scheme, including by means of a compulsory purchase order, and any other necessary statutory orders.

iii)     to accept, if necessary, any blight notice that may be served, on terms to be agreed with the Director of Infrastructure, Strategic and Corporate Services.

iv)     to delegate to the Corporate Director of Growth, Environment & Transport, under the Officer Scheme of Delegations, to take further or other decisions as may be appropriate to deliver the A28/A291 Sturry Link Road scheme in accordance with these recommendations and the earlier overarching decisions given under Record of Decisions 15/00070A and 17/00061, that remain extant.

Tim Read (Interim Director of Highways, Transportation and Waste) and Richard Shelton (Major Capital Programme Project Manager) were in attendance for this item.

1. Mr Whiting (Cabinet Member for Planning, Highways, Transport and Waste) introduced the report which sought the Committee’s approval to endorse the preferred outline design of the Sturry Link Road which would run north and west of the A28 and A291. He welcomed Members questions and comments which would be used to inform the final decision.

2. Mr Shelton said that the Highway Authority had identified congestion issues within the town centre of Sturry; the Link Road would allow all A28/A291 through traffic to avoid the Sturry level crossing and therefore reduce the amount of congestion. Furthermore, in July 2017, Canterbury City Council’s Local District Plan had identified land at Sturry and Broad Oak as a suitable location for a new housing development. This required improved infrastructure, including a Sturry Link Road to relieve the level crossing, road investiture to the new housing and access to the station. The proposal was most recently presented to the Environment and Transport Cabinet Committee in July 2017 which identified the need to go out to public consultation. A public consultation exercise was undertaken for six weeks from 26 July 2017 to 6 September 2017 and following the feedback received, amendments were made to the scheme which included: the widening of shared-use footway and cycle paths, the widening of the existing Shallock Road due to safety concerns of Network Rail, additional signal-controlled crossings, the relocation of a surface water pond; and discussions had taken place with bus operators regarding the location of bus stops. The next stage of the process would be for the Cabinet Member to approve the preferred scheme which would then be submitted as a planning application to the County Council. Mr Shelton assured the Committee that the scheme had been developed by Kent County Council in conjunction with Canterbury City Council, Network Rail and the Environment Agency to achieve the best possible outcome for the Sturry area within the restraints of the allocated funding.

3. In response to concerns regarding the development timetable, Mr Shelton said that the developer for the Sturry site had submitted a planning application in August 2017 which went out to consultation. Work had commenced to review the responses from that consultation and to amend the design proposals where feasible and a re-submission of that planning application was due to take place in four to six weeks’ time. These would then need to go through a formal planning process. Kent County Council needed to ensure that the application for the Sturry Link Road was submitted to support the applications for the housing developments. Mr Shelton advised the Committee that should the scheme be successful in getting consent to progress, the housing development would start to be built in 2019 and the Sturry Link Road would commence 2020/2021.

4. With regard to the level crossing and the impact this would have on journey time, Mr Shelton said that  ...  view the full minutes text for item 91