The Top Gear Test Track Could Still Be Saved

It looks like there’s a chance that the globally famous Top Gear Test Track might not be destroyed, after all – and it’s nothing to do with petrolhead memories of cars like the Ferrari FXX pounding around its asphalt.

Residents near the circuit have begun making big noise over the plans, which emerged to the media more or less out of the blue at the end of last year. Developers want to bulldoze the site where Top Gear has been filmed for over 15 years, but following local people’s objections to the 1800-home site, which would also have at least one pub and a number of industrial units, the project is set for parliamentary scrutiny.

That doesn’t mean Theresa May will be talking Top Gear in Prime Minister’s Questions, but it does mean that an independent committee appointed by the government will take a look at the application and decide whether to ‘save Dunsfold’ (we can see hashtag potential right there) or give the green light for its destruction.

Waverley Borough Council had approved plans in December to redevelop the Dunsfold site, once an airfield used in WWII, but local residents have since kicked off, claiming that such a large site would introduce far too much traffic to the local area.

Anyone who has spent any time on the roads outside Dunsfold is likely to agree, and the nearest large towns simply don’t have the roads infrastructure to cope with potentially thousands of other cars passing through at rush hour.

Bob Lees, Chairman of residents’ campaign group Protect Our Waverley, told The Telegraph that he was delighted with the latest bump in the road for the plans to destroy the old airfield.

“We, and the thousands who protested against this proposal, are delighted.

“It is absolutely right that an independent view be taken of this application.

“The site was found to be unsustainable in 2008 and is still unsustainable.”

Well, then. With filming continuing at Dunsfold - for now - and the latest series of Top Gear already looking way better than the last one, things have just gotten interesting…

Via: The Sun