“The proposal to build a ‘last mile delivery’ hub on the former Pfizer site in New Lane, Havant, will generate 2,500 new daily truck movements past residential properties and schools. Almost all of that traffic will be heading out to the A27 and A3(M) to deliver to addresses in Hampshire, Sussex and Surrey adding to existing traffic hot-spots, two thirds of it at peak times.
Havant needs jobs, but this planning application brings none. It is for the relocation and consolidation of the unnamed company’s existing operations. Instead, it will waste the precious land resources the town needs for the kind of sustainable net-zero employment that our children deserve.
Sixty years ago, New Lane led Havant’s growth with the likes of Kenwood, Goodmans, Colt, Scalextrix and Britax. The quality and reliability of the West Leigh workforce with their famous ‘We’re backing Britain’ campaign encouraged IBM, Plessey, BAe and Siemens to invest in the Borough.
The world has changed and Havant Borough Council’s Regeneration strategy must aim higher. The New Lane employment area, now surrounded by housing after sixty years of residential growth, is ideally placed for 21st century science and technology based employment. The right business profile will lift educational standards across the Borough, just as the high tech businesses which followed New Lane’s first wave in the sixties did.
A ‘last mile delivery’ hub would be nothing more than a high volume traffic generator that makes its revenue by driving other companies’ profits through the town’s constrained streets, leaving nothing of value to the Borough from its exhaust.“
Havant Civic Society 