What’s happening?
West Malling Parish Council is preparing a Neighbourhood Plan for the parish. The Neighbourhood Plan is a document that contains planning policies that are used to help inform and determine planning applications for development within our parish. It sits alongside the Tonbridge and Malling Local Plan, carrying equal weight in planning decisions.

Why are we doing this?
Neighbourhood planning gives us an opportunity to shape how our parish develops in the future. We can explore topics such as the type of housing needed, green spaces we wish to safeguard, community facility priorities and improvements to the promote walking, cycling and horse riding. Tonbridge and Malling Borough Council preparing a new Local Plan. This could include a need for additional housing sites in our parish. The Parish Council's Neighbourhood Plan is the best way to influence what happens here.

How you can get involved
This survey is one way that we will be gathering information over the coming months about your views on what we should be focusing on in the Neighbourhood Plan. The questions are largely open-ended, giving you an opportunity to share fully your views on a range of topics. Some have a series of questions to inspire your responses.
You can complete all the questions or some of the questions. You are also welcome to complete the survey individually or jointly, for instance, with other members of your family.

You can visit our website, which will be updated as we progress the project.


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* 1. What do you like most about living in West Malling parish? What could be improved?

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* 2. Types of development – Would you support any of the following and, if so, where? Please use the comments box to expand on your answers

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* 3. Homes - What type of homes do you think are needed in the parish? For instance homes suited to young families or couples, for those wishing to downsize, for those with additional needs, for older people (e.g. care homes, independent living, bungalows), more affordable homes, homes to rent or to buy. Are there any other requirements in relation to housing that you think we should be prioritising?

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* 4. Design of Development: We have an opportunity to influence the design of any new development. How would you describe the character of West Malling in terms of, for example, typical materials used, features of buildings, styles of architecture that fit in well locally? Are there good examples of well-designed developments you could tell us about? What sort of environmental features could we be supporting?

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* 5. Local heritage - Are there any buildings or other structures that are important to you and which you think we should be protecting?

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* 6. The natural environment – We have an opportunity to protect valued green spaces locally. Which areas of green space in the parish are important to you and what makes them special? Are there any special views (landscape/within the settlements) that you think are important to safeguard from development impacts?

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* 7. Wildlife and habitats – How could we support biodiversity in the parish? Are there areas of the parish that you think could be improved for wildlife (animals / plants)?

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* 8. Jobs – What sort of employment opportunities do you think we need to support and is any additional infrastructure needed to do this (e.g. faster broadband, shared workspace, additional retail provision etc.)

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* 9. Tourism - Should we be promoting the parish to visitors? What are the two most important developments required within the parish as regards to tourism?

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* 10. Public spaces – What do you consider to be the important public spaces here and what you do use them for? Should more space be provided? How could we improve the town centre? Should we provide eco-friendly facilities such as recycling bins? How else could we improve the public realm?

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* 11. Getting around – Whilst we have limited influence over the provision and improvement of roads (which is the responsibility of Kent County Council), we can encourage more walking, cycling and horse-riding locally. What could we do to improve provision for walking, cycling and/or horse-riding locally? How could public transport links be improved?

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* 12. Local facilities – In terms of actual facilities, are there any community facilities that you think we need or existing ones that should be improved? Do we have adequate facilities for children and teenagers? What about older people? What sort of sports/arts facilities would you like to see? What else could be provided?

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* 13. Anything else - Is there anything else you’d like to tell us?

About You

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* 14. Please tell us your location:

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* 15. Please tell us your age

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* 16. Would you like to:

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* 17. If you have answered yes, please provide your contact details

Please note that we will only contact you in relation to the West Malling Neighbourhood Plan and let us know if you wish to be removed from the contact list.
Thank you for taking the time to complete the survey. Please press 'Submit' to send us your responses

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