Medway Local Plan (Regulation 18, 2023)

I am very concerned at any suggestion of development in the metropolitan green belt or AONB. These areas are vitally important and must be protected at all costs. Brownfield development over greenbelt development must be the main consideration. No development should be considered without appropriate investment in infrastructure to ensure local roads and services are not overwhelmed particularly in villages.
No more development along the A228, it is becoming an ever increasing urban sprawl that is coalescing the communities that live along its length.
No development in Cuxton, the Bush Road/A228 junction is overloaded and dangerous to pull out of for villagers. The school was increased in size with no thought as to the effect on the village of the 40+% of children that travel into and out of the village daily. The busses frequently cannot get around the village and the cessation of services is a constant threat by the bus companies. A previous Section 106 Agreement from the St Andrews Park development was meant to improve the Bush Road/A228 junction but no improvements have been made some 15 years later.
I have absolutely no faith that Medway Council will put in infrastructure improvements in the future and think that infrastructure improvements should be made before first occupation of any future development in Medway.
All houses to be built with sustainable features such as solar panels, heat pumps, EV charging points etc regardless of when planning permission was granted.
I disagree with the statement that all ages can find somewhere to live. Affordable housing needs to be actually affordable and within reach of first time buyers living in Medway and earning the average wage for the area. Currently much new housing is brought by people moving out from London, some must be made available for local people and actually affordable.
High streets are not thriving unless you count the proliferation of coffee and charity shops. Very little is done to encourage any other type of shop which reduces options for residents and encourages out of town shopping.
I have not noticed any improvements in infrastructure that have reduced reliance on motor cars or improved my ability to use my bicycle safely instead. Cuxton is not a sustainable location because of the A228 and the large volumes of vehicles including large numbers of HGV's.
Stop triple taxation on new housing developments. Residents on these developments should not be burdened with Council Tax, Parish Precepts and a further developer tax for the maintenance of their community areas. Community assets should be handed to the local authority for management and paid for by existing precepts.

To build on green belt or any of Medway's scarce green spaces is the very opposite of this statement. All development should be on brownfield sites with no other sites considered until these are fully utilised. Many of the proposed sites are on greenfields with no possibility of sustainable travel. These should not be considered. The proposed site in Cuxton has no means of sustainable travel due to the nature of local roads and a previous application for development had issues with water drainage. All sites put forward must be robustly assessed against the green criteria in this statement.

Affordable homes should be priced at the average wage of Medway residents to ensure local people can actually afford them. This is not currently the case leading to local young people being unable to afford homes where they grew up.
Medway does not have enough land to implement increases in green infrastructure and this will be made worse if greenbelt land is built on and not protected.

The first point is a crucial one. When St Andrews Park was built there was a Section 106 Agreement for £125,000 odd to improve the Bush Road/A228 junction in Cuxton. This has never been done some 15 years later. Given the failure to implement this necessary improvement to infrastructure with money provided by a developer I have doubts about the provision of any improvements in infrastructure for future developments.

All Metropolitan green belt land should be preserved and not considered for development. All development should be sustainable with good transport links and not considered unless local roads are suitable and safe for cycle and pedestrian use so that reliance on motor vehicles is reduced. Walking over a mile to the nearest bus stop/train station is not a sustainable option as this is not something most people do.

Very concerned to see how much building is planned on greenfield sites including supposedly protected metropolitan greenbelt.

The current methodology used to determine housing need is flawed and needs revision. Affordable housing prices should be set at either the national average restricted to medway residents that are first time buyers living either with parents or in rented accommodation or based on the mortgage amount available to someone on the average medway wage. This would enable local residents to be able to buy a property in their local area.

No green belt sites should be considered. These are meant to be protected open spaces.

Junction 3 of the M2 is also over capacity. If 2 out of 3 junctions are over capacity already the effect of the Lower Thames Crossing on these junctions and local roads will be terrible. The A228 is already used as a cut through for traffic heading from the M2 to the M20 mostly because J3 is over capacity with long queues at peak times. Once the LTC is built it is likely that J2 will develop capacity issues caused by traffic heading for the M20. Concentrating solely on Junction 1 effects would be short sighted.

This should not be considered. There are no benefits to Medway residents in providing housing for other authorities. There are enough potential problems in meeting our own housing requirements with associated infrastructure. In not considering providing these 2000 homes Medway will be able to protect its valuable green belt and other green spaces currently under consideration for development.