Your responses to development in Tilehurst

These are the main issues raised by your recent comments on Facebook and our website:

Stonehams Farm development proposals

  • Regret at erosion of countryside.
  • Acknowledgment of need for housing.
  • Inadequate infrastructure.
  • Insufficient parking provision.
  • Heavier impact of care home compared with housing, particularly related to deliveries and traffic problems.

Pincents Hill development proposals

  • Lack of school places.
  • Increase in traffic.
  • Questioning of statistics used regarding traffic flows, provision of schools and healthcare.
  • Insufficient infrastructure at present.
  • Traffic problems in relation to IKEA.
  • Theft of green spaces.
  • Insufficient knowledge of local area by developers.

Please see below for full detail of comments.

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Full comments on recent development proposals in Tilehurst, received via Facebook and our website:

Stonehams Farm: Care home and residential dwellings (was 16/01947/OUTMAJ)

  • So sad.
  • Oh no. That’s awful. Countryside is steadily being eroded away.
  • I lived in Tilehurst for the first seventeen years of my life. I am now in my 89th year and I knew Long Lane well as a youngster. I visited Tilehurst in July from Canada, and apart from the older parts of the village which have remained unchanged the rest is unrecognisable. Housing estates built over the fields and meadows where we played as kids are the reason for that. The aerial photos above illustrate my point. Stonehams Farm was there back in the 30’s and forties, so was Long Lane. I too feel sad about the development, but the people have to live somewhere, and the Population of Reading is increasing. It is a very popular place attracting HighTech industries.
  • Not to mention the other if small development off Theobald Drive on the Oxford Road.
  • The site currently has outline planning permission for 15 homes, but I see no mention in the on-line documents about a care home. Can anyone explain?
  • Link posted to https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-45956792
  • This would undoubtedly have a greater detrimental impact than housing. Apart from constant endless visitors to the care home, there would be much more heavy commercial traffic with daily food deliveries, linen deliveries, refuse collections on a large scale as well as ambulance transfers, maintenance vehicles etc, all accessed off an already busy narrow lane with bends.

Stonehams Farm: Up to 66 residential units (16/01223/OUTMAJ)

Pincents Lane: Housing development (was 09/01432/OUTMAJ)

  • Infrastructure can’t cope with what we have now! Stop stealing our green spaces!!!!!
  • Road can’t always cope with the traffic now, goodness knows what it will be like after development. Infrastructure first before the big build!!!
  • They did have these plans at the Calcot centre last week Along with the Pincents hill development -they did not include this development when advising there would only approx 61 secondary school places needed out of 285 homes in Pincents so with these 2 extra sites as well I’m sure u would be looking at more like 100 or more – so considering most schools are full to bursting where will they go?
  • I read that, I would like to know where they got their figures from. As a large proportion of that proposed development is affordable housing (presumably predominantly young people) I think it would be much higher. Also they quoted a number of schools out of catchment, who wants to travel miles to get their children to school? The same with doctors’ surgeries I don’t think the figures quoted stack up. I understand that people need homes but additional facilities also need to be built.
  • Totally agree they even stated that there would be hardly any increase in traffic from the Pincents estate by IKEA as the kids would walk to the local schools lol – I did point out that as most parents have to work these days their kids would be driven to school as parents would need to travel straight onto work which they had difficulty understanding – they even quoted that their stats said there would only be 1.6 cars per household and that on a Saturday only an average of 30 cars would leave the Pincents hill estate – so they believe the other 255 households won’t go out on a Saturday!
  • I know it is a joke. A lot of households may even have more than 2 cars if they have driving age children at home. All the stats I think have been plucked from the air to suit. No doubt it will go through and because they have carried out a public consultation the boxes have been ticked. They have included a park though which I’m sure will be of great consolation when everyone when the traffic is gridlocked. That’s my rant over as I really don’t think our opinion carries any weight whatsoever.
  • What surprised me was that their reps were so young and didn’t even know Calcot or Tilehurst – myself and several others residents did let them know that their stats weren’t anywhere near reality and they should listen to those that have lived in the area for 40/50 years / but as you say I expect it will go ahead this time – rant over.
  • Exactly right about the school thing. They should be building a new secondary school instead.

1 Response

  1. Michelle says:

    I remember the farm, we used to horse ride around that way, it was beautiful then. Horrendous now. SO sad. I miss seeing the field with the cows in it. Also, why were the Council allowed to tarmac the Bridle Path that goes between Dark Lane & Sulham ??? This should NEVER have been allowed.

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