Sir, – The 25 per cent reduction in the new East Street development proposals, claimed by councillor Scrivens and reported on your front page last week, needs to be thought about very carefully before its effect on Farnham can be judged. Now that Sainsbury's has decided to stay put in South Street, the hotel, some offices and some flats which were to be built on its site will certainly go. The underground excavations that were intended beneath it for car parking, a fitness centre and a nightclub will also not be possible. However, the building of a large multiplex cinema on the ground previously allocated to a new Sainsbury's store is not a reduction in development, nor is the digging up of the whole of Brightwells gardens to provide compensating underground car parking It must also be borne in mind that Crest Nicholson's target of 290-odd flats is still part of the new plan. Careful accounting needs to be done before a percentage reduction can be established. The new plans show no perceptible change in the scale of development. Rushing ahead with a planning application in July or August is fraught with danger for a number of reasons. 1. Developing the Riverside site for extra car parking is still a Waverley responsibility, and the cost and environmental acceptability of clearing and preventing the recurrence of serious underground contamination has not yet been resolved. 2. Vital land not currently owned by Waverley has still to be procured. 3. No fundamental road improvements to compensate for the pedestrianisation of East Street have been presented to Waverley. Does Crest Nicholson have plans to convert the back of Woolmead and the whole of South Street into a fast-track main road such as has been done in Woking and Kingston? If so, does Surrey Highways know about them? 4. Will Farnham people be given the chance to comment on the plans for the revised underground car park? The drawing submitted so far, but withheld from the public, shows that two out of three of the 698-odd parking spaces will still be hard up against a substantial concrete column. I was sitting very near to Waverley officer Miller Stevenson in 2002 when he said that any planning application submitted would be appeal-proof. There is a lot of work to be done between now and the school summer holidays for such an objective to be achieved. The pressure now being applied by some councillors to "get on with it" seems to be highly irresponsible in these circumstances. Farnham's gates are being rushed, and some tricks are already being played. Eric Boyle, Old Compton Lane, Farnham
