Background to the proposals

In c2003, the front page of the local newspaper, East Kent Gazette, published a blurred image showing farmland around Bapchild, Bredgar, Milstead, Rodmersham and Tunstall included within a mass mixed-use development. The consortium of landowners including GH Dean and Kevin Attwood joined forces with the then owners of the industrial estate that was the redundant Shell Research facility, (immediately renamed ‘Kent Science Park’)

This met with immediate hostility during the public consultation process, the proposals were mothballed for several years. Public opposition had not lessened in this time and intensified when the consortium submitted a planning application to Swale Borough Council 2022.