Surbiton Forum

Letter to Stakeholders – thanks to NHS Kingston

Paul and residents presenting the petition o the hospital site.

Dear Stakeholders,

In my email of 18th October I told you about the work that we were doing in response to feedback from the July pre-planning application consultation.

I am now pleased to confirm that as a result of this work, we have made adjustments to our proposals for redeveloping the Surbiton Hospital site, some of which are detailed below.

These changes have been reflected in a planning application that was submitted to Kingston Council on 3 December and registered as valid on

8 December 2010.

I am also please to announce that we have received conditional approval of the Stage 1 business case from NHS London (subject to planning consent).

Some of the changes to our proposals following public feedback include:

• Reduced the size of the buildings and scaled back from the site boundaries (in response to concerns about over-developing the site, and to improve the views from one neighbour’s garden)

• Provided more outdoor space for play areas and parking (including the introduction of 12 car parking spaces for healthcare staff and 6 spaces for the school, plus space for mobility scooters and motorcycle parking)

• Committed to preserving the historic plaques, the lodge and entrance gates and lamp features and other items of historical interest such as the current Surbiton Hospital signage

• Agreed to move the memory garden / friends garden from alongside the lodge to the centre of the healthcare building (unfortunately, due to time constraints, this has yet to be reflected in the planning application, but as the location of the garden would not be a condition of planning we do intend to move it.)

• Continued to work with a Historic Buildings advisor to ensure that we are meeting our responsibilities with regard to the conservation area (this report can be found in the Heritage Statement within the planning application)

• Undertaken more detailed travel planning work that has resulted in:

• more car parking spaces (as above);

• a robust car park management system to prevent unauthorised usage – via a one-way grate-controlled entrance system and payment-free ticket-controlled exit barrier; rigorous traffic modelling work which show that the 70 space patient car park will accommodate the anticipated flow of just over 100 cars per hour at peak times; a robust programme of future school travel planning work to ensure that the school travel target of 10% car usage (as achieved by some other local schools) is achieved, and will not have a negative impact on the neighbouring area.

Please visit www.kingston.nhs.uk to see our news item announcing the planning application submission.  This also links through to a subsequent page ( www.kingstonpct.nhs.uk/have-your-say/Care-closer-to-home.htm ) where you will find a Briefing document and Frequently Asked Questions about our proposals.

For a more detailed account of our consultation work and its outcomes please refer to the Consultation Report (click this link to access the PDF) which forms part of the planning application.  The full planning application can be accessed via www.kingston.gov.uk/surbiton_hospital

(see ‘-> planning and conservation area consent applications’ link towards the bottom of the page, then click the red button under ‘images’).

Next steps:

The Planning Authority is leading the next stage of consultation regarding this project.  As a member of our stakeholder group you should receive information about this planning consultation from them, in the next few days.  This will explain how you can access the planning application and comment on it.  As reference above this can be found at www.kingston.gov.uk/surbiton_hospital

As part of this planning consultation members of the project team are expecting to attend the Surbiton and South of the Borough Neighbourhood Meetings in February, which are open to the public.

The project team will also be contacting those residents closest to the site shortly to discuss proposed highway improvements (relating to our responsibilities under section 106 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990).

A decision on the planning application is expected to be made by Kingston Council’s Development Control Committee in early March 2010. (I suspect the author means 2011 – PJ) We therefore propose holding the next Stakeholder Group meeting in Spring 2010 (2011?), once we know the outcomes of the planning decision and (if appropriate) have started to put together the necessary building development teams to help us through the next stages of the project.

Finally, development proposals for the Oakhill Health Centre and No.3 Oakhill (Newlands) will be the subject of separate planning and conservation area consent applications in due course.