Who is putting forward these plans?
Plans for Milton Place are being put forward by Gravesham Community Investment Partnership.
What is the Gravesham Community Investment Partnership?
(GCIP) is a 50:50 partnership between Gravesham Borough Council and The Hill Group, a family owned, award winning housebuilder with a strong track record of delivering high quality homes across London and the South East.
What are the key objectives for GCIP?
GCIP’s overriding objective is to deliver high quality new homes and reduce the Council’s housing register, which is currently at 1,000 households. GCIP seeks to deliver more than just housing through proposed development and is committed to local investment in employment, skills and education, all of which underpin GCIP’s ambitions to deliver meaningful social value across the Borough.
Where is the proposed site located?
The proposed site is situated to the east of Gravesend town centre between the Riverside leisure area to the north, Milton Place to the west, Ordnance Road to the south and Gordon Lodge, a vacant building, to the east.
The site is made up of the former BT depot, an existing car park, an area of open green space and a skate park.
The site is well-connected and is within walking distance of schools, local retail, the library, restaurants, public houses, health care facilities, cultural facilities and supermarkets.
What is the site’s history?
The site has a varied history. It has previously featured a church, a school, a playground and a public swimming pool.
More recently, there was a BT depot on site in the southwestern corner and the car park that is present today. The swimming pool closed in the late 1980s and later a skatepark was created on part of the site in 2012.
What are the current proposals for the site?
Our current proposal, which are yet to be finalised and are subject to this period of consultation, includes:
- Provision of 70 high-quality, purpose-built apartments for the over 55s and 15 houses for home ownership addressing housing need.
- 70 of the 85 new homes (82.35%) would be affordable, significantly exceeding the 30% affordable requirement.
- Making sustainable use of vacant and underutilised brownfield sites.
- Providing high quality landscape and formal play spaces and enhanced landscaping for the skate park, which remains as part of the proposed development.
- Reduction and reconfiguration of the existing car park based on monitoring of peak use, re-providing 80 spaces with improved landscaping.
- An outward looking scheme increasing natural surveillance and improving active travel routes.
- Celebration of the site’s history and context through a considered architectural and landscape approach.
- Providing a key gateway to the town centre and providing a strong focal building on an important junction.
How are you consulting with the public?
A consultation event was held on Wednesday 2 October at The Woodville, Gravesend.
We have sought feedback on early plans and following this, feedback will be considered and used to inform the planning application for Milton Place.
We are currently working to a timeline of submitting a planning application in late autumn 2024.
How can I see more detailed information and plans?
You can view the information that was displayed at the consultation event here.
How can I have my say?
Our feedback survey has now closed. If you have any questions please email info@miltonplaceconsultation.co.uk
How many new homes are planned?
The scheme at Milton Place, if developed as currently proposed, would deliver 85 new homes. It is important to note that this may change as a result of consultation.
What types of homes are being planned?
70 high-quality, purpose-built apartments for the over 55s and 15 houses for home ownership, addressing housing need.
Would the homes be to buy or rent?
Of the homes proposed in our early plans, 70 would be for affordable rent, 15 for private sale.
How do you know we need all these homes for over 55s?
The number of households on the council’s housing register confirms the demand for this type of accommodation.
The council has used information from its Housing Register to inform the proposed development. There are currently 138 households over the age of 55 waiting for a one bedroom property. In addition to this, there will be tenants already in a council owned home that want to downsize but who are not currently on the Housing Register.
Who is going to be responsible for managing the homes?
The affordable housing will be owned and managed by Gravesham Borough Council.
How many of those homes will be affordable?
The current proposal would deliver 70 affordable rent homes, 82% of the overall scheme, all for people over the age of 55. The percentage of affordable housing of 82% is much higher than the minimum 30% required as standard on mixed tenure developments to meet planning policy guidance.
How many homes will be for private sale?
15 homes would be for private sale. The private sale properties help to fund the affordable housing.
Who will be able to apply for affordable homes?
The affordable homes, for those over the age of 55, will be allocated to those on the Council Housing Register needing a home, and those already in a council home that want or need to downsize.
How will you make sure that local people are prioritised for these homes?
Only households accepted onto the council’s housing register will be able to bid or offered these homes.
Any affordable housing owned by Gravesham Borough Council is allocated to households on the Council’s Housing Register, who must be able to demonstrate a local connection to be eligible to join the register.
Why build here when there are other sites available?
The council is committed to delivering new homes. Sites such as M Block, Lord Street, the old Police Station and Albion Waterside are not owned by the council and therefore it has no control over the whether these schemes progress.
Is any action being taken to being those sites forward?
Officers do regularly and robustly liaise with the owners of those privately owned sites to regarding the potential for future housing, but ultimately, it’s a decision for the developer to make.
When is this all going to be built?
Subject to the usual planning process, our ambition is to start on site towards the end of 2025.
Will these homes be sold to other councils to move their housing lists to?
People with demonstrable roots in Gravesham will be prioritised thus reducing the existing housing waiting list for appropriate housing.
Can you explain what you mean about the guns and the sight lines?
We have worked with Historic England to ensure that the lines of sight are respectful to the Fort and Gardens. We have also made sure they’re sympathetic to the surrounding area.
Where will we park if we want to visit the promenade?
Visitors to the promenade will still be able to use Milton Place car park, and other parking within the area.
What is happening to the car park, will there be fewer spaces to park?
Parking provision at the Milton Place Car Park will be less than now, but we have referred to the parking study undertaken by Gravesham in 2022/2023 in consultation with the parking management team at the council to arrive at the right number, and there will be enough spaces to meet current usage and levels of demand.
Why are you planning to reduce available parking?
A car parking study completed by Gravesham in January 2023 indicated that the Milton Place car park wasn’t fully occupied, with a peak occupancy around 50%. We will need to satisfy the council and the Highway Authority that sufficient parking will be retained as part of the future planning application.
The study concluded that 78 spaces were required. This equates to just under 50% of the available spaces.
There is sufficient capacity across the local public car parks to cater for demand.
Where will all the new residents, and their visitors park?
Residents with parking spaces will be able to park on-site, with visitors using existing parking within the area (such as the existing public car parks) or alternate modes of travel.
What’s happening to the skate park?
We intend to retain it within the proposed development. There are no plans for it to be moved under the current proposals.
Who will be responsible for managing the open space, including its upkeep and planted areas?
The open space will be managed by a private management company.
How will the roads cope if these homes are built as proposed? How will the road layout be improved?
A new vehicular access to the development is proposed from Milton Place via a new junction. Our transport consultant, TPA, have produced a preliminary design of the junction and undertaken tracking analysis, including HGV access.
Have you considered drainage systems and potential for the area to flood?
The site sits within Flood zone 1 so the risk of flooding from rivers is low. A draft drainage strategy has been prepared by PTA, our drainage consultant.
An attenuation basin is proposed on site to pick up surface water/storm water run-off from all hardstanding catchments from buildings and roads. The basin is proposed to the east of the existing Milton Place car park and the site’s existing topography lends itself to this location (site generally slopes south to north).
We have had a phase 2 Site Investigation carried out to test the ground conditions which shows the site is suitable for infiltration into the underlying chalk. We will be preferring a Flood Risk Assessment as part of the RMA submission.
All these new residents are going to need things like doctors’ surgeries, have you taken that into account?
We will be working with the council and Kent County Council to prepare a S106 agreement which will set out the contributions made to local infrastructure such as education and health facilities in line with council requirements. These discussions have not yet taken place, but will do before we are able to start developing this scheme.
What are you doing to ensure sustainable development?
Sustainable development is important to us, and we seek to maximise Biodiversity Net Gain through meaningful investment in green infrastructure. Other ways that we will ensure sustainable development are:
- Creation of new homes in a highly sustainable location – a brownfield site in a town centre, offering good transport connectivity.
- Energy efficient design
- Maximising passive cross-ventilation through dual aspect homes.
- Avoiding single-aspect north-facing dwellings.
- Windows sized to maximise daylight while minimising overheating and positioned centrally within the room to maximise daylight.
- ASHP strategy for apartments.
- Specify robust materials for durability.
- Specify local materials and suppliers where possible.
- Encouraging cycling through well designed and plentiful cycle parking.
- SUDs strategy to manage rainwater runoff and reduce flooding.
- New tree planting and landscaping.