Plans to remove sewage from new estate with tankers sparks controversy

A developer has dropped controversial plans for an on-site sewage system at a housing estate.

Barratt David Wilson Homes had applied to alter planning conditions for its Highgrove Farm site in Bosham, near Chichester, to enable residents to move in to the homes, despite the site not being connected to the public sewer network.

The developer originally told Chichester District Council it could not finish permanent drainage connections because statutory works from Southern Gas Network were taking priority nearby.

To avoid delaying handovers originally planned for March, Barratt had proposed using installed underground pipes and manholes to hold the waste.

Planning documents suggested the site had capacity for 51,857 litres, enough to hold one day of anticipated waste from the 31 plots that would be occupied.

The total daily flows from these houses was estimated to be 51,300 litres, just shy of the maximum capacity.

Under the plans, tankers would then have visited the site to pump out the system, which would have seen up to seven visits a week by mid-May.

The Highgrove Farm site, north of the A259 (Image: Google)

However, the plans had prompted wide backlash from residents, who labelled them a public health risk.

Alan Taylor said: “Infrastructure first is a fundamental tenet of development.”

He added: “The use of road tankers to remove raw sewage is not a reasonable or safe option.

“Road tankers should be used for the removal of untreated sewage in emergency situations only.”

Ruth Sweet said: “These drains are not designed to hold foul water but only for foul water to flow through them.”

She added that the storage could potentially cause blockages and leaks, and labelled the proposals “a huge pollution, environmental and human health hazard concern”.

A protest against the temporary storage plans on March 14 was attended by hundreds of people.

Barratt had previously said plans to connect the development to permanent infrastructure would not be changed, and would instead be delivered “slightly later due to unforeseen circumstances”.

A spokesperson for the developer’s Southampton division said: “The application has been withdrawn as we have worked proactively with third parties to accelerate works, making such significant progress at our Highgrove site that any tankering solution will not be needed.

“Construction work can now be completed in line with our original planning application and we look forward to delivering much-needed high quality homes to the Bosham community.”

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Original plans for the 300-home Highgrove Farm site received more than 250 objections and were rejected by the district council, but this decision was later overturned by the Planning Inspectorate in 2023 after Barratt lodged an appeal.

The development is not Barratt’s only site that has been subject to sewer issues recently.

The developer previously stopped work at its Fossil Bay site in Earnley last month, after the district council rejected plans for a similar on-site sewage storage system.

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