'Better roads needed to make hospital site viable'

Infrastructure upgrades will be needed in order to make sure the preferred site for a new 800-bed hospital in Surrey is suitable, a councillor has said.

Part of Pine Ridge Golf Club near Camberley has been eyed up as the site for a new hospital to replace Frimley Park Hospital, due to it being built with Raac concrete.

Councillor Jonny Cope, who represents St Paul's Ward in Camberley on Surrey Heath Borough Council, said while it was "overall good news" that the project was progressing, there was "a lot of mitigation needed" for the site to work.

A petition calling for the site to be reconsidered has amassed more than 14,000 signatures.

Cope said: "I think it is fair to say that there has been significant backlash from the local community.

"The main thing that will need to be dealt with is the road capacity. They are already very congested, so clearly putting an 800-bed hospital on those same roads will be a challenge.

"But the fact is that sometimes you have to listen to the experts, and according to the experts this is the viable site that we have."

Land on Pine Ridge Golf Club had long been rumoured as the site for the new hospital, which former Health Secretary Wes Streeting previously said work would begin on in either 2028 or 2029.

Frimley Health NHS Foundation Trust, which runs the current hospital, said it had not purchased the land and no final decisions had been made, but more work would now be carried out to look at how plans for the new hospital could progress.

The petition calling for the site to be reconsidered said that developing the land, either through a hospital or housing, would "permanently destroy this irreplaceable green space and ecological habitat".

The trust was approached for comment regarding the petition.

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