Expansion plans for Climping recycling site are approved

The area, at Northwood Farm, in Burndell Road, currently recycles 9,500 tonnes of waste a year, including tyres, paper and plastic.

The proposed new facility will handle construction and demolition waste, taking the total amount of recycling from 9,500 to 25,000 tonnes a year.

Approving the scheme, recommended by planning officers, the county planning committee agreed a series of planning conditions should be imposed, including extra planting and measures to control noise and dust.

A binding agreement on lorry routing will be insisted on, and working hours will be laid down.

Climping, Ford and Yapton parish councils all opposed the application, with warnings of traffic problems on local roads, and noise and dust nuisance.

Cllr Christina Coleman, representing the local area, said this was the last place to locate yet another materials recycling facility.

"There is a huge state-of-the-art facility at Ford, which was recently opened and is highly successful," she said.

The major opposition to the application was on traffic grounds.

"Country lanes in the area are already subjected to an unacceptable amount of traffic, including commercial vehicles and HGVs," said Cllr Coleman.

"Bitter experience tells me that routing agreements simply don't work."

Cllr Janet Mockridge said more recycling facilities were needed, otherwise the material went to landfill.

She suggested if HGVs contravened the routing agreement, traffic calming measures should be installed in the villages.

Cllr Simon McDougall said his concern was over the local traffic network. He did not think a highway routing agreement would be enforceable on a daily basis, and he was worried about the extra traffic burden on the A259.

Cllr Christine Field said there was already a well-established recycling facility on the site.

"For us to fly in the face of this would result in the application going to appeal, when we would have no control over the planning conditions," she warned.

Cllr Pieter Montyn called for more reassurance the routing agreement would be 'robustly worded', and that certain roads would be specifically excluded from use by HGVs.

He was told this could be covered in the legal agreement.

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