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A picturesque village could have some of the best community facilities of any parish in Kent - if plans for 53 new homes on farmland are approved.
Preston Parish Council currently owns the six-acre plot where the new homes are planned for, but the sale of the land could generate a £1.73 million windfall.
Councillors are harbouring hopes this money will help fund the purchase of the Preston Garden Centre and cafe site, which closed last summer and is on the market for £1.35m.
If all goes ahead, the garden centre would be turned into a new village hall and community facility, as the current one in Mill Lane is showing signs of aging.
The land – known as Six Acres and off Stourmouth Road – was gifted to the authority as part of an agreement for a previous housing development in the village, called the Grange.
Parish council chairman Tommy Gale says the move would offer a unique opportunity to provide the village with some of the best facilities of any parish in Kent, something it could not otherwise afford.
“A lot of parish councils would love to be in a position like ours,” he told KentOnline.
Quinn Estates is behind the planning application for the 53 homes, which includes some affordable and a 1.5-acre biodiversity site.
As part of the deal, the parish council would get to keep three of the homes which it would rent out, providing a regular income stream for the village.
Cllr Gale insists the new development is sensitive to its surroundings and will offer “enormous benefits” for the village.
“It will provide much-needed affordable housing and I hope this will allow people who grew up in the village to stay here, like I have,” he says.
“It will also provide the funds that we need to buy a community centre for the village - something that we have been trying to achieve for nearly 25 years.”
But the proposal has sparked more than 25 objections from villagers – as well as 17 in support – concerned about the impact on the countryside, loss of farmland, traffic safety, sewage infrastructure, access onto Grove Road and its affect on the existing Grange housing development.
Mark Sqillaci accuses the parish council of trying to rush the development through “purely based on greed as it is desperate to benefit from gifted land”.
“I don't disagree it may benefit some villagers, but at the cost of daily living for others,” he writes on Dover District Council (DDC) planning portal.
Another resident, Jamie Swales, says: “Houses are being built in Preston all the time already. Adding another 53 is overkill.”
He also questions the affordability of the new homes and says the roads cannot take any more traffic.
Sophie McClean added: “It’ll ruin our lovely area. Why build in the countryside where farmers grow their crops?”
But resident Matt Radbourne believes the project is a “fantastic opportunity” for the village to build an innovative, sustainable housing project.
The parish council also hopes to change a section 106 legal agreement, which provided a £250,000 donation from the Grange development, so the money can be redirected to its bid to buy the garden centre site and create new facilities, which could include a sports hall.
At a lively public meeting in the village this month, it was revealed that a survey showed 83 in favour of the village hall proposal while 24 were against.
A spokesman for Quinn Estates said: “This development will deliver real benefits to the village including funding for new community facilities - now and into the future, space for nature and much needed affordable homes.”
It comes as proposals for a five-home scheme on land adjoining the garden centre were recently rejected by DDC.
Fresh plans for the site, which is a separate plot but also belongs to the garden centre’s owners, were submitted last February.
It saw the number of proposed homes halved from the 10 proposed in an earlier application from 2023 which was rejected by DDC last year.
The planning authority refused the revised bid after flagging several potential issues.
“The proposed development is outside of the settlement confines,” a planning officer wrote in a report.
“It would result in harm to the character and appearance of the countryside and not respond well to the verdant nature in which it sits.”