Community group to monitor delivery of 300 home development in Bosham

Members of The Bosham Association, and the Parish Council have come together to form a community liaison group in the hopes of monitoring the delivery of the 300 home Highgrove Farm development by Barratt David Wilson Homes.

The group will report directly to the parish council and members hope it will help establish a close, co-operative working relationship with Chichester District Council, planning officers and the developer itself.

A spokesperson for the group – which calls itself the Highgrove Implementation Monitoring Group – laid out its aims are as follows: “To monitor the delivery of the Highgrove development and the associated plans and schemes submitted to the Local Planning Authority to discharge planning conditions, and to ensure that the development conforms to the design and conditions set out

"To monitor the construction of the buildings and the open spaces and landscaping, with particular reference to ecology, wildlife, and flooding.

"To monitor any adverse impact of the construction on the adjacent neighbourhood.”

The group is currently comprised of two members of The Bosham Association, two members of the Parish Council, and two residents, but members say this composition could change once the development gets underway, and the group foresees calling on different consultees at different stages of the process, including local people and relevant experts.

News of the group’s formation comes several months after a public inquiry about the 300 home development kicked off in October last year, after the council failed to come to a final decision about the plans. Although many inspectors found in favour of the plans, citing the suitable location and a housing shortfall in the Chichester District, members of the Chichester Harbour Trust said the appeal, alongside a recent decision to build 200 homes in Chidham and Hambrook, created a “perfect storm of overdevelopment,” in a sensitive, protected landscape.

“There is no doubt that this over-development, without the provision of proper infrastructure, is leading to an existential crisis for the Harbour, that we seem powerless to stop,” John Nelson, chair of the Trust, told Sussex World shortly after the inquiry.