There has no been no public consultation regarding the preferred site of the new Hythe pool. The decision that this should be Princes Parade was made by the Shepway cabinet in December 2012 based on the Strategic Leisure study. The decision was made before Cabinet had considered the Princes Parade consultation reports.
First Stage
The first set of consultations took place in July 2012. The results are in the two reports below but there was a very clear message that the public wanted to protect wildlife habitats and the natural environment.
In answer to the question “what aspects of the site would you most like to change?” change nothing got more votes than a new pool.
October 2012 Consultation – Results
October 2012 Consultation – Comments
Second Stage
The second stage took place in February & March 2013.
The key messages were strong support for a new pool, a strong voice against any development on Princes Parade and the fact that Princes Parade is viewed as an important green space.
The results for question 2 show 195 people voting for a new pool on the site with 191 voting for do nothing and 69 for no development. However, “do nothing” and “no development” were not options on the questionnaire but were added by members of the public. Had these options been printed on the form they may have had even more votes.
The questionaire was too simplistic and should have asked if people would still support a pool on the site if this required an enabling housing development.
PR Events
Public exhibitions hosted by Shepway’s PR consultants were held on 23 May 2014 (ie before the 28th May Cabinet meeting ) and 5 June 2014. Ostensibly these were to allow the public to choose whether the pool and school should be at the east or west of the site but there were also questions regarding support for the project (as well as trick questions regarding support for a new school in Seabrook and expansion of leisure facilities in the district.)
The results are summarised in this Press release .
At the first event there were 320 visitors who whom only 145 filled out questionnaires. 32 fully supported the project, 24 generally supported it, 88 opposed it and one didn’t know.
At the second event there were 170 visitors, 94 filled out questionnaires. 40 fully supported the project, 34 generally supported the project, 18 didn’t support the project and 2 didn’t know.
So of 239 people filling out forms, just 72 fully support the project.
The Save Princes Parade online petition against any development currently has over 6000 signatures (and a further 500 on the paper version).
https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/no-development-on-prince-s-parade
Local Plan
Shepway’s planners have been looking at the site allocations for the local plan. This was subject to public consultatin in Oct 2016 and Feb 2018. It is now due to be examined by an independent planning inspector in the summer of 2018. It includes proposals for 150 houses and a new leisure centre on Princes Parade. More info here.
There were many objections from members of the public to the allocation of Princes Parade as a development site at both stages of the consultation.
Public Exhibitions
On 29th & 30th November 2016 Shepway DC (as land owner) held 2 pre application public exhibitions at which they displayed the masterplan for the housing and the leisure centre.
You can view the display boards and panels here: http://www.princesparade.co.uk/uploads/images/PressReleases/Exhibition-November2016.pdf
The results were reported back to cabinet on 7 February 2017.
520 attended the events – 199 in Seabrook and 321 in Hythe. 61% of respondents were against the development and only 18% in favour.