In a county shaped by massive housing development in recent years, Kent residents have been using a law passed 18 years ago to protect open spaces from the bulldozer.

Securing village green status for a patch of land can be a long, involved process and there is no guarantee of success. Simon Finlay reviews the five most recent cases…

As dry as it sounds, the Commons Act 2006 has turned out to be something of a people’s friend.

It replaced the ancient 1285 law and allows residents, pressure groups and parish councils - anyone, really - to seek protection for land against any development in the future.

It is known as “town or village green status” and in the latest batch of five cases, it was a victory for the community in three.

Applicants must be able to demonstrate the plot has been used for recreational purposes for 20 consecutive years with unfettered access.

Three campaigns in Kent won ratification by Kent County Council’s (KCC) regulation committee, the final stage of the process, yesterday (Tuesday).

One of the victorious is land at Upper Castle Field, opposite Slade Primary School, in Tonbridge, which was granted village green status.

Applicants were able to prove the nondescript 1.1 acre site had been used for recreational purposes for at least two decades.

Two Green Party county councillors, Mark Hood and Paul Stepto, backed the application saying it was well-used and a vital green “lung” for local people.

The land is owned by Tonbridge and Malling council, which made no meaningful objection to the proposal and allowed village green status to go through.

But for Cllr Hood, it still represents a victory for local people.

He said: “The land is a green lung in the middle of the town and needs to be protected and be used by school children and residents.

“What this does is demonstrate that land can be prevented from being concreted over by this or any future council.”

That Tonbridge and Malling council did not object, does not automatically mean that the county council will agree, as all requisite legal tests - such as usage - must be met. If one test fails, the application for village green status will fail.

But other cases are far from simple, especially when the burden of proof threshold is high and if the other side has much to lose.

That was shown when a group of residents set about applying for village green status which ended up at a full public inquiry earlier this year.

The Commons Act became central to the fight to save Bunyards Farm at Allington, near Maidstone, from the bulldozer.

Locals wanted to stop the 37 acre site being turned into housing, in an area already transformed in recent years by new homes.

On paper the value of the site with hundreds of new houses on it, is arguably millions of pounds.

For Chris Passmore it was the culmination of three years’ work and emotional energy but, ultimately, it ended in failure. Despite his disappointment, he remains quite philosophical about the outcome.

His campaign group, Medway Ecological Riverine Link (MERlin), could demonstrate locals had used it for decades and for the most part had free access to it.

It all came down to a hole in a fence and the applicants’ inability to prove when it was made.

Not only that, the landowners’ legal counsel claimed that although it stopped being a working farm in the late 1990s, it had been subsequently used for occasional grazing and haymaking - that is, for an agricultural purpose.

Mr Passmore says: “It was incredibly disappointing for the team, having worked so hard to make the case. The landowner got away with not losing, in my view.

“But the law sets a very high threshold and in the end we couldn’t quite reach it. When it came to the hole in the fence, on the balance of probability it was unlikely to have been breached before the critical time frame. In the end, we weren’t able to produce the evidence that could have convinced the inspector.”

That the land is the “subject of a separate outline planning application for a residential development comprising some 400 homes” had no bearing on the inspector’s decision, said paperwork before the KCC committee this week.

The government inspector, Annabel Graham Paul, ruled in favour of the landowners - a decision which leaves the path clear for developer Barrett David Wilson Ltd to press ahead with the housing scheme.

The campaigners were concerned that the last parcel of unbuilt land on the border of the Maidstone and Tonbridge and Malling boroughs would be lost.

A 2.8 acre plot which once used by a local tennis and hockey club in Herne Bay was also rejected for village green status. The council, on this occasion, opposed the application.

The site at Beacon Road has been fenced off and locked, demonstrating Canterbury City Council had taken steps to prevent public use within the permitted time frame. According to the papers, locals do not believe the area is suitable for housing but might enjoy a better future with a recreational purpose.

The application had statements of support, although it was felt they were pre-drafted and essentially the same.

The papers state: “One of the criticisms made by the city council of the user evidence is that it largely comprises a standardised format that requires the users only to complete the occasional blank.

“Whilst no doubt making it easier for local residents to contribute to the evidence-gathering process, the disadvantage of this method is that it makes it difficult to fully assess the quality of the evidence.”

Almost five acres at Burton Down Park, Thundersland Road, Herne Bay, has now received protection from future development. The owner, Canterbury City Council, was the applicant.

Conservative county councillor Dan Watkins said the 4.9 acre space of grass and a children’s play area is a “hugely valued community space…used for a range of recreational activities”.

The smallest parcel of land in the latest batch to go before the county council was 0.8 acres of Marley Fields at Hoath, near Canterbury, opposite Hoath Primary School. Recently gifted to the local parish council which became the applicant.

The papers state: “DEFRA’s view is that once land is registered as a village green, only the residents of the locality have the legal right to use the land for the purposes of lawful sports and pastimes.”

The committee passed the application.