A noisy music festival site is to follow a new sound management plan after several hundred complaints were made against it.

Colebrook Park in Tunbridge Wells has hosted festivals ranging from Al Fresco electronic music to funk and soul.

However disturbance to people living nearby caused an outcry, with 55 formal objections complaining of excessive noise sent to Tunbridge Wells Borough Council.

This sparked a review of the event's licence by the council’s Environmental Protection team, citing loud noise from the venue causing sleep deprivation and public nuisance.

The park, also referred to as Colebrook Lakes, has so far held six small events this year spread over 13 days.

Complainants claim that the noise resembled that of a larger event.

Cllr Lance Goodship, who represents the Sherwood district where the lakes are located, said he wanted the licence to be revoked.

'I had to arrange last-minute accommodation outside of Tunbridge Wells to avoid sleep deprivation...'

“Late night events at Colebrook Lakes are by far the largest escalated issue I’ve seen as a councillor," he said.

“Relating to this year’s events I’ve received over 700 complaints via email, Facebook, and other forums. This has included neighbouring districts. A petition was even handed to me with over 300 signatures so far.

“In summary there are three types of complaints, first are hospital workers who have morning shifts at the nearby Pembury hospital that have experienced severe sleep deprivation.

“The second will be young children impacted by sleep deprivation at 3am. The third would be bank holiday weekends being ruined, with residents having to keep their windows closed for the whole weekend and not being able to enjoy their gardens."

Cllr Goodship also claimed the events had forced him away from his home.

“I was directly impacted to the point where I had to arrange last-minute accommodation outside of Tunbridge Wells to avoid sleep deprivation for what was a key week for me at work,” he added.

While council officers explained the petition had previously been submitted to the council, solicitor Steven Thomas, representing the owner Iain Love, said he was sorry for any excessive noise: “He wishes to apologise most profusely for the problems you encountered over some weeks earlier this year.

“We accept mistakes were made, we can see where those mistakes were made and we have a positive solution to move forward.

“The music industry almost died. In February 2021 there was talk of a reopening during lockdown, and it’s well known in June the public just went nuts, wanting to book festival tickets and being prepared to pay silly prices not knowing if they’d take place.

“Some organisers, not Mr Love, faced possible bankruptcy if the events didn’t proceed.

'Late night events at Colebrook Lakes are by far the largest escalated issue I’ve seen as a councillor...'

“To minimise any impact to residents, although it didn’t work I accept that, for the whole year he decided to hold just six events.

“An unintended consequence of this compression of activities in a short time scale is that a lot of things had to be done at short notice, so the usual level of planning didn’t occur.”

He also said Mr Love had tried to buy hay bales from farmers around Kent to disrupt noise pollution, but was unable to get any due to short supply.

One particular issue Mr Thomas referred to was the sound systems, which were provided by external promoters and couldn’t be controlled by Mr Love.

To avert this in future Mr Love suggested a new noise management plan for small events, including installing an in-house sound system and to set a sound limit in cooperation with the Environmental Protection team.

This was accepted by the licensing committee, which also decided that the plan would be reviewed annually and that revoking the licence would be unnecessary.