Verge Reinstatement

No official specification for verge reinstatement was provided as the work is not a typical HCC Highways job, so no detailed surveys done, only visual. Hardcore spec. was given by HCC.

HCC identified approx. 6 miles of verge repairs and recommended 4” of topsoil and grass seed. The topsoil is to British standard specification. No roadside protection was discussed/approved.

HCC Highways agreed the extent of the repairs with Conholt Nominees, RW Armstrong (Conholt Nominees Contractor) and RW Langley (RW Armstrongs Sub-contractor, who are highways approved contractors) who undertook the work. Payments are made from Conholt Nominees via RW Armstong.  Nobody from HCC Highways inspects or signs the work off before payment is made.

Conholt employed a Quantity Surveyor to calculate the cost of the job and this was estimated at £275k. To date Conholt has paid KW Langley over £300k with two small areas still to finish. Conholt has no legal obligation to pay for this work and the contribution towards verge restoration is entirely voluntary by the owner.

Ross van Ot said his company has been involved in 8 similar large-scale projects and not one of them has made any donation or contribution to local infrastructure or facilities.

The advice is to now leave the verges until next Spring to give them time to settle and establish. Any further depth of topsoil would be rapidly eroded. Roadside banks on many stretches of road were never banked up prior to the development. Conholt will re-visit the situation next Spring.

5 planning applications were submitted instead of one for the entire project to ensure work could start on each section of the restoration once planning was obtained. One main planning application would have overwhelmed WCC and smaller applications allowed work to progress more quickly.  More stringent due diligence is carried out for smaller planning applications than larger ones. The planning applications were scheduled to facilitate work at the right time of the year. Quite often permission was then granted in the wrong season to do the work – i.e. landscaping/planting. Due process has therefore been carried out 5 times. There are no major projects left to undertake.

The project was estimated to take six and a half years but has been completed in three years.

A consultation with residents took place in Chute Village Hall prior to the project starting as the planning applications went to Chute Parish Council for approval. Kit Malthouse, MP was informed.

Tottenham House in Wiltshire is estimated to take 12 years to complete.

Conholt is primarily a working farm and sporting estate. No agricultural subsidies have been applied for or taken by the estate and no grants applied for or used for planting trees/hedges. Everything has been paid for by the owner.

The farm has a 5-year plan with a crop rotation schedule. It employs 45 people locally who mainly live in estate owned properties or properties rented locally by the estate. Therefore, traffic in an out the estate on a daily basis by employees is minimal. In the shooting season an extra 20 people are employed.

Any tradesmen who were originally working for the estate prior to the development are back working on the estate. The estate has therefore provided employment for many local people.