Hoads Wood in Ashford has long been a victim of illegal dumping of waste, creating 35 thousand tonnes of landfill and bad smells.
But now, the Environment Agency will be starting work this spring to remove it, but it will take a long time...
Kristin Hawthorne reports...
But now, the Environment Agency will be starting work this spring to remove it, but it will take a long time...
Kristin Hawthorne reports...
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00:00For far too long, holds wood in Ashford has been used to illegally dump tonnes of waste,
00:0535,000 to be exact. But this could soon change.
00:09In a letter sent to locals this week, the Environment Agency shared their plans to
00:13close roads in the area on March 25th to gather equipment.
00:17They will then start removing the waste in spring.
00:20Despite plans to have 20 vehicles moving the waste daily through Hothfield,
00:24they say this project won't end until late summer 2026.
00:28There's actually 35,000 tonnes of treated waste on that site.
00:34It's covering several acres and it stands around 12 feet high.
00:39It's enormous what's been done there. The lorries will come in day and night.
00:44It's a massive operation to get that site filled with that level of waste.
00:48And it's going to take time to clear it as well.
00:51So what kind of waste has been piling up here?
00:54It's really difficult to be able to describe exactly what's there.
00:58But from the images and the drain images that we've seen, it looks like shredded and treated waste.
01:02Although the removal may cause disruption due to closed roads and moving smells,
01:07the outcome will be positive, giving residents access to fresh air.
01:11The smell from the site already is quite strong.
01:15I was talking to a reporter and a camera crew who've been up there filming on site,
01:20and the cameraman told me that he actually threw away the shoes he'd been wearing
01:24because he couldn't get the stench out of them after being on site.
01:28So taking it away probably will cause that level of disruption.
01:32But at the moment, if you go to Hodes Woods, you can't get away from it.
01:35So by taking that away, hopefully in the long term,
01:38the community will be able to breathe clean air once again.
01:41But despite the clean-up effort, the future of Hodes Woods remains uncertain,
01:46as years of fly-tipping have left permanent scars on the land.
01:50Nature does have the most remarkable power to heal itself.
01:53Unfortunately for Hodes Woods, that site will never be restored.
01:56Ancient woodlands and the soils and the way the woodland works,
02:00that will never be how it once was again.
02:04But we can restore it to some extent for nature.
02:07And what we'd like to see is for the Environment Agency
02:10to put a nature restoration plan in place for the woodland
02:13so we can get some kind of normality back for the location.
02:17In a statement, the Environment Agency said that a criminal investigation continues.
02:22In order to bring before the courts more waste criminals
02:24using Kent as a dumping ground for waste for profit.
02:28The steps following the removal will be efforts to regenerate the site
02:31so that both residents and wildlife can breathe fresher air.
02:34Kristen Hawthorne for CAMTV.