Developer appeals rejection of expanded Woking football stadium and Kingfield housing plans

A government planning inspector is scrutinising Woking planning committee’s rejection of what is described by objectors as “the largest development proposal in Woking in the last 20 years”.

Goldev Woking Limited is appealing the refused permission to build a new 9,000-seat stadium for Woking FC and more than 1,000 neighbouring homes plus a new medical centre.

Director Wayne Gold said he was “in disbelief that the planning committee resolved to refuse the applications”, which included 45 per cent affordable housing.

But the South Woking Action Group (SWAG) that formed to oppose the scheme said it had “generated more opposition than Victoria Square’s town centre skyscrapers”.

The vexed application received 2,351 comments from the public, of which 1,840 (78 per cent) objected and 496 were in support.

The developer’s barrister, Kevin Leigh, told the inquiry there had been over 4,700 letters of support for the scheme, which involves 1,048 flats in five buildings on the football club’s Kingfield site.

But the inspector also heard many of these letters were solely in support of the new stadium, from football fans who were not aware of the surrounding developments.

The inquiry was told the developer and the football club had fallen out and Woking FC withdrew its support for the application after it was refused last June.

Timothy Straker, who represents Woking Borough Council (WBC) which opposes the appeal, said the club would continue regardless of the outcome.

Andy Caulfield, chair of SWAG, said: “This project has lost its way. It’s no longer wanted or needed for its intended purpose and justification to support the club.

“It has now secured a soon-to-be majority shareholder investing in the club.”

Mr Gold said his company had so far spent more than £3 million on the plans, “based on Woking council’s commitment to making this transaction succeed”.

This included £300,000 to the football club and its majority shareholder Peter Jordan, who were still to get a total of £2.05 million.

If GolDev Woking wins the appeal, Mr Gold anticipates getting a return of 20 per cent of the value the new development would fetch on the open market.

According to former council leader David Bittleston, who said he had been involved in every discussion about the football club and its development since 1998: “It’s always been a key ambition of the council to support the club”.

Katie Bowes, one of SWAG’s co-founders, said: “After meeting with council execs, who have since retired, it was abundantly clear to us that the 9,000 plus capacity football stadium vision was a personal ambition.”

Woking council took several steps to try to help the development go ahead. This included offering to lend the developer £250 million it was to borrow from the government’s Public Works Loan Board, which has preferential interest rates compared to commercial lenders.

Mr Gold said the council wanted to provide the loan, “because it would be charging a 2% fee on top of the loan amount, which thereby provided an income to Woking council”.

Mr Bittleston, who retired from WBC in March 2021 so was not speaking on its behalf, said that was not the true reason.

He said it was “to enable things to happen, in this case to enable affordable homes to happen”.

He added: “The council had decided that affordable homes were its number one priority.”

WBC also sought to enable the development by buying land on Egley Road, where it was intended to relocate the David Lloyd health club currently at the Kingfield development site.

The inquiry heard the council did this without any formal written relocation agreement from David Lloyd, and also without having planning permission for the Egley Road site.

Mr Gold said: “This means that Woking Borough Council spent approximately £21 million of taxpayers’ money to help make this development project work, to which should be added SDLT stamp duty land tax and fees.”

According to Mr Gold this was supposed to be recouped by the council through his company constructing 36 two to five-bed affordable houses at Egley Road and transferring ownership to the council.

But the planning committee scuppered that when they also refused to grant permission to build on the green belt land next to Hoe Valley School.

Goldev is appealing this decision as well, saying the land’s designation as green belt is “soon to be defunct”.

Mr Caulfield asked Mr Bittleston at what point the council had changed its intention, from purchasing the land only after planning permission was obtained, to buying it beforehand in October 2019.

Mr Bittleston, who was council leader at the time, said: “I would imagine there was a commercial decision taken that it was advantageous to the council to make sure they had sight of it perhaps, I don’t know.”

He was asked: “Who within Woking council was most involved in leading this project with Mr Gold over many years?”

Mr Bittleston responded: “In terms of the financial considerations and the dealing with what part Woking would play in terms of land and funding, that would have been led by the chief executive then Ray Morgan.”

Should the Westfield Avenue application have been allowed or not?

David Bittleston, who served as a Woking borough councillor for 21 years, gave evidence that he was “surprised and disappointed that the planning committee turned down this application, given that the officer’s recommendation was to grant planning permission”.

He said a 2017 review had “clearly demonstrated” that residents did not want to lose green belt land to housing, but on the other hand building in the town centre and on brownfield sites was expensive in terms of both buying the land and developing it.

“This means that providing the affordable homes which Woking desperately needs is very difficult,” he said.

“Which is why it is hard and puzzling to understand how the planning committee could turn down this application when it offered 45 per cent affordable homes.”

The council’s barrister Mr Straker asked him if there was not a whole other range of matters to also consider.

“Absolutely, indeed,” he replied. “But if you look at what the planning committee has turned down in the town centre, all the major applications in the town centre were turned down for one reason – not enough affordable homes.

“So where you get one which has enough affordable homes you would have thought that people would react in a different way.”

SWAG member Mr Caulfield disagreed, saying town centre developments had been rejected for other reasons such as height, bulk and mass.

Mr Bittleston said that as council leader he had not got involved in the reasons for planning permission being approved or not.

The reasons submitted by the planning committee for refusing the Goldev application were excessive height, bulk, mass and housing density, inappropriate mix of housing types to address local needs, loss of privacy, loss of daylight and insufficient parking to serve the stadium.

SWAG member Mrs Bowes said the “extreme” bulk and mass was “nearly ten times the prevailing density, and 30 per cent denser than Victoria Square”.

Mr Straker noted that the appeal site does not sit within the town centre and said the development would not conserve the existing character of the area and have “a harmful impact” on nearby properties.

“Inevitably, if one seeks to provide 1,048 dwellings in the location one has to go up,” he said. “You need multiple storied buildings.

“One is forced by the numbers, not by design or suitability to neighbourhood, to go up.”

He added: “As night follows day, local residential roads in the vicinity of the stadium will be used for parking.”

Mr Leigh, representing GolDev, said the problem of parking was “overstated” since there would be only 25-30 match days a year.

He said the scheme made “the best use of previously developed land” in a borough that is 63 per cent green belt.

Residential development of between three and 11 storeys high “sits well below the town centre buildings,” he said.

“Kingfield is large enough to create its own character. It is simplistic and wrong to suggest somehow whatever you do here simply has to fit in with what’s there.”

He described the location as “ideally suited for re-development, thereby reducing pressure to develop outside of settlements and especially to remove land from the green belt.”

A scheme including 45% affordable housing was, he said, “a rare beast indeed”.

“The proposal enables more affordable homes on a single site than has been delivered in the entire borough since 2012, virtually for the last decade.”

The design had gone through an independent design review panel and was of “exceptional” quality.

As for the loss of daylight, Mr Leigh said buildings would have separation distances of between 15-39 metres and although he recognised there would be change for residents, he said that “in itself doesn’t amount to harm. Noticeable change to daylight does not mean an unacceptable impact”.

The two-week inquiry resumes on Tuesday (May 25) to hear closing statements before planning inspector David Wildsmith prepares his report.

GolDev Woking has also submitted a planning application for a smaller development, of 168 homes with a maximum height of six storeys – but with no new stadium.

In February Mr Gold promised if it is approved he will proceed with this alternative, even if he was to win the appeal for the larger scheme.