Decision on controversial 100-home development on former Aylesbury sports field deferred by council

A plan to bulldoze a sports club in Aylesbury to build new homes has been slammed due to the green space that will be “lost forever”.

Buckinghamshire Council is seeking planning permission to build 100 new homes on the vacant County Council Sports and Social Club, Lower Road, Stoke Mandeville on the outskirts of Aylesbury, which closed in 2017.

David Wilding, who coaches an under-14s girls’ football team, said the sports club would be badly missed if the site was redeveloped for housing and praised the “fantastic” facilities of other areas.

He warned that green space should not be concreted over amid a “healthcare crisis” with “obesity levels rising”.

In a letter of objection, he wrote: “What Aylesbury has to offer is a disgrace: Fairford Leys, grotty toilets and a burger van if you are lucky. This is a resource which once lost will never return.”

Many other people shared his concerns about the loss of green space, including Councillor Kirsty Shanahan, who spoke on behalf of Stoke Mandeville Parish Council at a meeting of the council’s Strategic Sites Committee last week.

She said: “It removes an important public amenity which has been designated as an asset of community value and a local green space in the Stoke Mandeville Parish Neighbourhood Plan.”

She said the parish council had offered a “credible alternative” to fund the purchase and development of the site to provide “much-needed” sports facilities.

One neighbour said: “[The club] should be reopened as a sports club as we’re already struggling for facilities of this kind which has resulted in the rise in knife crime and violence in Bucks.”

Despite the objections, the council said application 22/03709/AOP includes at least 40 per cent affordable housing and does provide green space to replace that which is lost.

The Strategic Sites Committee has deferred the proposals to the Housing Secretary Michael Gove for approval.

Councillors voted by a majority to approve the council’s application, which include widened access to the site via 149-151 Lower Road and an internal link road to Booker Park School.

However, the plans must be deferred to the Housing Secretary due to the objection of Sport England, whose concerns over the loss of sporting facilities were reflected those of residents.

Sport England has opposed the scheme due to the “lack of proposed appropriate replacement provision for the loss of playing field and facilities” it provides.

The public body’s policy is to oppose the granting of planning permission for any development which would lead to the loss of a playing field, albeit with occasional exceptions.

Since its closure, the sports club has been used for informal sporting activities and by dog walkers, however the site has been fenced off apart from the car park.

The council said the club had 56 council staff at the time of its closure and offered a northern field for football and cricket, a southern field for football, tennis courts, a pavilion (now demolished) and a clubhouse containing a bar, function room and committee room.