Normandy Housing Plan Reignites Concerns Over ‘Damage To Our Community’

Published on: 13 Jul, 2025
Updated on: 14 Jul, 2025

Open land in the Normandy area that could soon be the subject of a planning application

By David Reading

Development company Taylor Wimpey has reintroduced plans to build housing on land at Normandy and Flexford – a scheme that caused outrage among local people when it was first put forward just under ten years ago.

The site comprises a series of grass and agricultural fields between Westwood Lane and Glaziers Lane, with the railway to the south, and Guildford Road properties to the north.

In 2016 Taylor Wimpey put forward a proposal to build 1,100 houses on the site. There was huge public opposition and in the end it did not feature in Guildford Borough’s revised Local Plan.

Residents were concerned that such a development would destroy the open nature of the Green Belt between Flexford and Normandy and severely harm the nature of their community,

Taylor Wimpey are also the developers behind the controversial former Wisley Airfield site, granted planning permission on appeal in May 2024 despite a long campaign by local residents.

A spokesperson for the company told The Guildford Dragon NEWS: “We are in the early stages of seeking feedback on our initial plans and community priorities for the development of land at Normandy and Flexford.

“Our proposed development has been brought forward to help address the need for new homes and community facilities in the area. It will be set within new public green spaces that are integrated within the existing community.

“Throughout the consultation period, we will be welcoming feedback from the local community via our public consultation event and website. All feedback from members of the community will be carefully considered to help inform the design details.”

The site in question, marked by a red line. Taylor Wimpey (click on image to enlarge)

The company describes the scheme as “a residential-led proposal which will be supported by accompanying infrastructure, which may include sporting, community, local retail and educational facilities”.

A public consultation event is being held on Friday (July 18) between 2pm and 7pm at St Mark’s Hall, Guildford Road, Wyke, Normandy GU3 2DA.

The company statement said: “A second consultation period is planned for autumn 2025, at which point housing numbers and design details will be published.”

The Normandy Action Group is again strongly opposing the scheme.

The action group’s chairman, Sir Mike Aaronson, said: “If the development goes ahead, it will cause irreparable harm to our community.”

So far there are no details about the reintroduced scheme in terms of numbers but Sir Mike told The Dragon: “Taylor Wimpey’s own publicity refers to the 2016 ‘draft allocation’ and we must assume that the 2025 version will be of a similar scale and cause a similar amount of damage as the 2016 version would have done.”

The action group fears that recent changes to national planning regulations make it easier for volume builders to put forward proposals on highly sensitive Green Belt land.

Sir Mike said: “Almost any area in the Green Belt can now be classed as ‘Grey Belt’. Applications do then have to pass further tests, but developers already have a foot in the door.

“Alongside this, the new regulations have resulted in a doubling of the housing target for Guildford Borough as a whole, and as a result, despite having a Local Plan in place, GBC cannot now demonstrate a five-year housing supply. It is already updating its Local Plan, but the pressure on it to yield to the volume builders is immense.

“The Normandy site is not an appropriate place to build such a large number of houses. Crossed by an ancient public footpath, it has been identified as a Surrey Biodiversity Opportunity Area, is completely unspoilt, contains parcels of Ancient Woodland, and lies directly in the path of a key pollinator B-Line migration route.”

“The Taylor Wimpey proposal, if confirmed, would obliterate the core natural greenspace at the heart of our community. Filling it in with buildings would transform Normandy from a distributed network of five distinct settlements into an urban agglomeration, fundamentally and irrevocably changing the nature of our community and our environment.”

More information:

www.normandyag.org.uk

www.normandyandflexford.co.uk

Responses to Normandy Housing Plan Reignites Concerns Over ‘Damage To Our Community’

Peta Malthouse Reply

July 14, 2025 at 7:43 pm

Normandy was the home before he died of soldier, journalist and politician William Cobbett (1763-1835), author of Rural Rides.

The proposed land is adjacent to a number of Grade II listed buildings the rural setting of which form part of their listed status.

It also hosts bats and other important wildlife, is adjacent to areas of Special Nature Conservancy and within a kilometre of what used to be a SSSI (Site of Special Scientific Interest), a protected nesting site. I’m a Nimby for a very good reason.

Normandy has welcomed infilling in our village and other developments but housebuilding continues.

I see Taylor Wimpey are suggesting they build shops. Our village shop doesn’t need competition and we are home to a bowls club, a cricket club, Guildford archery and others, so we don’t really need sporting facilities. This proposal would double the population of our “village” which is actually a group of five hamlets. Our main problem is road traffic. This will just exacerbate the problem.
Roshan Bailey Reply

July 18, 2025 at 11:01 pm

I quite agree with Peta Malthouse’s comments but much more besides – the road issue isn’t just extra traffic on the A323 but the proposed site is set within huge physical constraints, including Glaziers Lane having a narrow humpback bridge over the railway and Westwood Lane having a narrow S bend under a low railway bridge, neither of which is suited to construction traffic or a doubling of residential traffic.

Furthermore, the sewage and surface water drainage systems in Normandy are still not coping despite huge works undertaken by Thames Water a few years ago. Filling in all the “gaps” might look attractive to a developer on a map but it is Toytown thinking and will lead to misery for existing residents and to the optimistic families purchasing these thousands of new homes when the reality of natural constraints sets in.