“Surrey County Council is planning to relocate Cranleigh CoE Primary School to the playing fields behind the houses on the Common and build over 70 houses on the existing school site opposite Glebelands. Â Â Parents of very young children will have to access the school via two long narrow passageways, one running up from the Common opposite the Curry Inn, and the other from the corner of Parsonage Road. There is no parking provision nearby so busy parents will probably park on the Common, in the driveways or simply stop in the High Street and allow their children to run across the green sward to the entrance of the footpath. Â This would lead to traffic chaos and is very unsafe for the children. Â The police will not be able to prevent parents from parking on the Common.
The new school should be built on its present site, in the heart of the village with safe access via the post office to the High Street. Â The playing fields should be retained for use by the school for sport, especially as the pupil numbers will increase to over 600.
The idea of funding a new school by selling its land to build houses whilst disposing of a playing field is totally unacceptable – it’s certainly not in the children’s or village’s best interests.  This application is driven by financial considerations and housing targets.  Surely, with all the new houses being built around Cranleigh the developers should be made to contribute towards building a new school on its present site??”
The planning and regulatory committee is due to consider this application in June. Â If you wish to comment go to
planning360.waverley.gov.ukÂ
Ref WA/2018/2044Â
I’m totally against this proposed re-siting if our primary school when they already have a perfectly good site. We have our quota of houses and don’t need any more. The chaos this would bring would lead to accidents particularly where young children are concerned – is it worth having our children hurt or killed in order to rake up some more money by even more development.
I work on the common and at school pick drop off / pick up the village is already a nightmare with traffic without adding complicated no parking to it .
It will affect local business’ s and will be numerous accidents waiting to happen.
Also the amount of general traffic chaos from the lorries that are already going through because of all the new houses that are being built at the same time it’s madness to add to it.
The present site is perfectly acceptable to have a new school built on and already has the utilities in place .
My children went to Cranleigh Primary and knocking the horsa huts down and building a double storey building would immediately double the size of the school.
Stop with causing chaos in cranleigh .
Spend a week in this village at peak times and see what an absolute nightmare has been created in what was once a lovely village .
You won’t listen because houses bring you money not common sense.
I can only agree with the Cranleigh Society’s members concerns and just hope another 70 homes are not built in Cranleigh!
Cranleigh is fast becoming a dormitory town for people that work away from Cranleigh in order to earn the huge salaries required to be able to afford the expensive homes being built
locally.
This development will not help Cranleigh in its present situation. We have had hundreds of houses inflicted on us with no provision for upgrading the infrastructure. Surely the best idea for a new primary school is to use the present site. The access to the new site is not acceptable, which seems to be along under developed footpaths not wide enough for a pushchair and small children. Please urgently reconsider this development as NOT suitable for Cranleigh and redevelope only on the existing site.
This is typical SCC unjoined thinking, a la Nanhurst Recycling Centre.
There is no way their current plan will help the Village, it will only lead to the dangerous practice of halting the flow of traffic, in an already congested High Street,by parents dropping children to walk the final distance along a totally unsuitable foot path.
The present site offers a more practical solution,the land is more than suitable, for purpose.
If funding is required dispose of that Ivory Tower that is County Hall in Kingston, and relocate to a new efficient building say in Guildford, then the developers can build all over the old site to their hearts content, and no doubt make an absolute fortune in the process.
Relocation of the School bad idea, sell County Hall good idea.
I am very unhappy about the proposal. I cannot see why the current site cannot be used. We do not need more new housing on top of that already in progress, and the proposed new position for the larger replacement school would cause many unnacceptable issues regarding safety and parking issues, especially around The Common which is an area already overloaded with cars. The issues raised here by Cranleigh Society are all very important and relevant in my opinion, and I sincerely hope that when the planning and regulatory committee consider this application in June, they take these points on board.