Spencer Close Sheerwater: 18 Flats to Go for a Road

A three-storey block of 18 flats in Sheerwater, boarded up since June 2022, is recommended for demolition to make way for an 83-metre road. Woking Borough Council’s Planning Committee decides on Tuesday 15 September at an extraordinary meeting called for the purpose (agenda).

The block is numbers 2 to 12 Spencer Close. The road would run between Towpath Crescent and Devonshire Avenue, meeting Devonshire Avenue at a priority T junction with tactile crossings on both sides, and would have footways on either side. The existing connection through Spencer Close would be closed off with a verge and footway (officer report, PLAN/2026/0537).

Officers recommend approval. The report calls the loss of the 18 homes “a significant material consideration”, then sets out why it thinks the road wins.

Why a road, and why now

This is a consequence of the council pulling out of its own regeneration scheme.

The Sheerwater estate has been redeveloped in phases since permissions granted in 2015 and 2019. Under the original plan, the permanent access road for the phase called Copper was to be built as part of a later phase, called Blue. Blue ran through the ground where 2 to 12 Spencer Close stands, and those flats were always marked for demolition to make way for it.

Then, in the report’s words, “following the Council’s decision to bring the wider Sheerwater regeneration programme to an end, the remaining phases of the scheme were reduced to those which the Council determined should be completed”. Copper is one of the survivors. Blue is not.

So the permanent road cannot be delivered the way it was meant to be. Copper’s 88 homes are currently reached through Spencer Close, which the report describes as an interim arrangement and the phase’s “sole access point”.

The applicant is Thameswey Developments Limited. Companies House records its controlling shareholder as Thameswey Limited, which in turn is controlled by Woking Borough Council. The application went to committee rather than being decided by officers because the land belongs to the council.

Eighteen homes lost, four gained

The arithmetic in the report is stark. Demolishing 18 flats would, among other things, “facilitate the completion of four further approved dwellings within Copper phase”.

The council’s own Core Strategy says it “will not permit the loss of family homes on sites capable of accommodating a mix of residential units unless there are overriding policy considerations justifying this loss”. Officers argue three things reduce the weight of that loss:

• the flats have been vacant and boarded up since June 2022, over four years, and the applicant says there is no realistic prospect of bringing them back into use
• their demolition was already approved in principle, as part of the Blue phase, for this exact purpose
• the road is not clearing residential land for an unrelated use, but serving homes that are already permitted and partly built

“On balance”, the report concludes, “these considerations are considered to outweigh the adverse effect arising from the loss of the 18no residential units.”

The report gives the road’s length as approximately 83 metres in one section and 82 in another, and its width as about 6 metres throughout.

What the consultees said

No consultee objects. Surrey County Council as highway authority raised no objection subject to a condition. Surrey Wildlife Trust has no objection in principle, subject to conditions and further ecological detail. The council’s arboricultural officer accepted the revised landscaping. The lead local flood authority said the scheme falls below its consultation thresholds.

One member of the public wrote in. The letter largely supports the scheme but asks for speed restraint measures on the new link road and further highway assessment.

The bat surveys are the most contested part of the file. Surveyors recorded Common Pipistrelle, Soprano Pipistrelle, Brown Long-eared, Noctule and Leisler’s bats using the area to commute and forage, and the buildings were rated as having moderate roosting suitability. A bat report dated 25 August 2026 concluded roosts are likely to be absent. Surrey Wildlife Trust accepted that conclusion but raised concerns about the extent of the survey information, noting that an internal inspection had not been possible. Officers recommend demolition proceed under a precautionary method agreed with an ecologist, with works stopping if a bat or a roost is found.

On biodiversity, the site’s baseline is measured at 0.21 habitat units. The scheme would deliver 0.59 habitat units and 0.46 hedgerow units, which the report puts at a net gain of 178.93% against a statutory minimum of 10%.

What it means for you

If you live on Spencer Close, the retained houses would look out on an open landscaped street rather than a three-storey block, and the report says the carriageway would sit further from your frontage than the present road does. If you live in Copper, the access you use every day becomes a permanent adopted road rather than a temporary one.

Nobody is being displaced. The flats have stood empty for more than four years.

The number worth holding on to is the one the report states plainly: this demolition unlocks four more homes. Set against 18 lost, that is the shape of what is left of the Sheerwater regeneration.

The rest of the agenda

Two other applications are listed for the same meeting, both in the Heathlands ward, both in the Green Belt, and both referred to committee by a councillor:

• a section 73 application at a bungalow on Maybourne Rise, Mayford, seeking changes to dormers, rooflights and windows on an extension permitted in October 2024, recommended for approval
• a section 73 application at Three J’s Nursery, Smarts Heath Road, seeking to keep a commercial building extension as it was actually built, 6.5 metres longer than approved and with a higher eaves line, recommended for approval

The meeting starts at 7pm in the Council Chamber at the Civic Offices and is webcast. Our Woking planning applications page explains how to search the register and how to comment on a live case.