Center Parcs pulls out of plans to build £350 million holiday village near Crawley

It had planned to build up to 900 lodges, a range of indoor and outdoor leisure facilities, a ‘subtropical swimming pool’, a variety of restaurants, shops and a spa on 553 acres of privately-owned woodland at Oldhouse Warren off Balcombe Road, Worth.

But a flood of objections were raised over the proposals and concerns raised over the destruction of ancient woodland. And in a statement today Center Parcs said it would not be progressing its proposals for a forest holiday village at the site.

The company said: “In July 2021, the business secured an option agreement to acquire the privately owned woodland.

“We have a longstanding record of enhancing the habitats in which we build our villages and at the very heart of this is choosing a site that meets our specific environmental and social requirements.

“As part of our usual pre-planning process, we have undertaken rigorous environmental and ecological site surveys and, having analysed all the detail from these surveys, we have concluded that the site at Oldhouse Warren is not a suitable location for a Center Parcs village.”

And chief executive Colin McKinlay said: “We have always been committed to only building our villages in areas where we can improve the biodiversity of the site. Whilst it is obviously disappointing that we will not be able to bring Center Parcs to this part of West Sussex, this decision demonstrates how seriously we take our responsibility to the environment, as well as our ongoing commitment to enhancing the natural habitats in which our villages are located.

"Through our customer insights we are confident that there is strong demand in the UK market for a sixth Center Parcs village and, with this in mind, we will continue our search for a suitable site.”

Center Parcs operates six short break villages across the UK and Ireland: Sherwood Forest in Nottinghamshire; Elveden Forest in Suffolk; Longleat Forest in Wiltshire; Whinfell Forest in Cumbria; Woburn Forest in Bedfordshire; and Longford Forest in County Longford, Ireland.

Objections to a holiday village being built on the Sussex site were made by Crawley Borough Council and a number of environmental groups.

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A campaign group known as Protect Oldhouse Warren – POW – maintained the proposals would “rip the heart out of Worth Forest” and “would drive out rare species which need intact blocks of ancient woodland to survive.”

It had planned to hold a protest meeting in Turners Hill on Saturday.

Other organisations including the Woodland Trust, CPRE Sussex, the RSPB, Sussex Wildlife Trust, and Sussex Ornithological Society had also voiced objections.