SMASH Your local voice against inappropriate housing development.

SMASH NEWS

LATEST HEADLINES updated 1st June 2025

OPEN LETTER to the Leader of EHDC, Councillors, Planning Committee and Damian Hinds MP

Please find attached an URGENT OPEN letter regarding the ongoing accumulation of major applications that represent a potentially massive onslaught of 1200 dwellings on Four Marks and South Medstead.

Executive Summary

1. 1200 houses are approved or have applications registered within 'South' Medstead and Four Marks.

2. This represents a 40% increase in population, but with no increase in roads, services, utilities, infrastructure for people to use

3. If all these are built out, the two villages face extreme cumulative harm - flooding, traffic, utilities problems, congestion, social cohesion.

4. The village is already being stressed to its infrastructure limits, as acknowledged during the last Local Development Plan analysis by EHDC, so this influx of new development will carry it far beyond any reasonable point.

5. EHDC have not indicated that they recognise the potential for massive cumulative harm outlined in this document or use this to refuse Applications making up the total of 1200 houses. Unplanned, speculative development is a harm, in and of itself.

6. EHDC seem to have no strategy to be confident refusing ANY speculative Application at present, without fear of Appeal. This lack of such a strategy is about to allow the infliction of enormous and irreversible harm on 'South' Medstead and Four Marks.

7. A request is made for EHDC to review and explain their strategies for handling the tilted balance, sustainability and cumulative harm, so that refusals can be robustly defended against Appeals if necessary.

8. The time to act is now.

Dr Arthur Barlow, Chair, Fight4FourMarks

Steve Adams, Chair, SMASH.

Read full letter here Open Letter

CUMULATIVE HARM WARNING

UPDATE ON PLANNING APPLICATION 27000/005 land behind 61 Lymington Bottom Road

CALL TO ACTION - submit your comments please.

27000/005 has been updated. The original proposed 53 houses has now been reduced to 46 and the layout has changed.

SMASH will be making a strong representation to support refusal.

Please consider the points below and submit your own comments to EHDC using this link 27000/005 The closing date has now been extended to 9th June 2025.

Since this application was first submitted an additional 95 + 62 dwellings have been approved, making the total approved now 211 - we simply don't need more housing in 'South Medstead'
It's Not sustainable
We are a Tier 3 settlement with limited facilities - therefore this level of development is not supported under this hierarchy which states 'modest development for local needs'
Wrong type of housing i.e. too many 4 bedroomed houses - contrary to HEDNA requirements 46% vs 10-15%
Outside the Settlement Policy Boundary
Will exacerbate existing flood risk - click FLOODING see photos in this section
Ground instability issues = potential insurance risk
Gateway to future mass development on yet more green fields
Further erodes character of our village/blight on the landscape
Junctions on the A31 at or near capacity - more cars, more congestion, more pollution
Infrastructure strained - GP's, Schools, Dentists etc.
Detrimental to local wildlife fauna and flora
211 dwellings already approved - in isolation, this development presents a risk but cumulatively this mass overdevelopment presents real demonstrable harm to our village and our community, like never before.

ACT NOW

Thank you again for your support.

Team SMASH

See predictions re housing numbers below - sadly they are coming true, our village and green fields are being destroyed.

They're coming for our countryside!

Recent over development in “South Medstead” – The facts

Since 2017, there has been 338 new dwellings built in the southern part of Medstead (an increase in dwellings of 97% w.r.t. the original number of houses in this part of the village).

There is approval for a further 149 and another 115 in 2 speculative applications awaiting a Council decision. This will result in further 264 being built here in the next few years (increasing the number of dwellings by 172% since 2017).

These figures are far in excess of any other village in East Hampshire over such a short space of time.

Our character and wildlife are rapidly being destroyed/displaced and we’re seeing more flooding and hundreds more vehicles on our local village roads adding to congestion and other traffic issues.

Come along to the drop-in session running from 2pm to 5pm at Four Marks Village Hall on Sunday 26th January to learn more and input into the new Medstead and Four Marks Neighbourhood Plan.

STILL STRIVING TO KEEP MEDSTEAD RURAL

The consequences of SPECULATIVE applications - these continue unabated

1. Recent Hampshire Highways traffic monitoring showed that over 15,000 vehicles drive along the A31 through Four Marks from 7am to 7pm. Building hundreds more houses here will simply bring hundreds more cars, worsening air quality (noxious gases & particulates) and increase congestion for local residents.

2. Four Marks/‘South Medstead’ is designated a Tier 3 settlement, i.e. a centre which has a more limited range of services than a Tier 2 but is ‘suitable’ to accommodate some modest development to meet local needs and secure continued vitality. A minimum of 175 houses were allocated as part of the current plan based on local need and sustainability. However, this number has been significantly exceeded, indeed within the first 2 years over 200 dwellings were built (see above graph).

3. Any houses built above the plan of 175 are therefore NOT needed for local needs by definition. This has resulted in hundreds of people from outside the area moving in, but who work outside the villages as there is limited employment locally, reinforcing the label of being 'dormitory' villages.

4. Of the residents that work, most use their cars to travel to their workplace. Additionally, because there are only limited local facilities then residents drive to the bigger settlements for much of their leisure and shopping, therefore these villages are not sustainable.

5. As EHDC did not have a 4/5YHLS then uncontrolled overdevelopment has and is taking place resulting in the current Local Plan allocation being significantly exceeded.

6. Mass development has resulted in some services being stretched such as GP’ surgeries and schools.

7. FM & ‘SM’ have four major junctions onto the A31. These are at Boyneswood Road which is accessed by a single lane road over the railway, Lymington Bottom Road accessed via a single lane road through a railway bridge, Lymington Bottom and Telegraph Lane. Three of the four junctions are at or over capacity at peak times currently. These junctions cannot take any more traffic without incurring further delays, congestion, and possible safety issues. There have actually been 2 accidents on the A31 at Four Marks in the last 12 months.

8. We would suggest that each new development has contributed to a loss of biodiversity. As FM/’SM’ have had so many sites over recent years and more speculative ones proposed then an environmental inventory Study (EIS) should be done collectively to assess this overall impact.

9. The majority of houses currently being built is 3–4-bedroom executive homes. The real requirement is for 1-2 bedroomed dwellings and some 3-bedroomed ‘social housing’ based on the HEDNA.

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