Major new country park for the Horsham district edges closer

Sandgate Conservation Society has been battling for more than 50 years to get land between Storrington and Washington protected and connected in a bid to create a new country park for the area.

Sandgate Country Park - as it is set to be known - will join together many of the country spaces in the area that are open to the public. It will then be possible to walk by footpath between the two villages using only a very short length of country lane.

However, the society says getting the whole area connected will be a long term project as both the country park and the footpath won’t be completed until the Sandgate sand quarries finish operations in a few years time. The footpath is set to be the ‘glue’ that binds it all together.

Bill Cutting, of the Sandgate Conservation society, said: “Creating a country park around, and including, two very large sand quarries was the idea of the founders of Sandgate Conservation Society.

“Fifty or so years ago, Roy Armstrong (founder of The Weald and Downland Museum at Singleton), and two other local residents, Peter Bazire and Bernard Johnson, got wind of proposals to build a large number of houses in the Sandgate area.

“They called a meeting to form a Society with the aim of ‘protecting our beautiful countryside from inappropriate development’.

“Once formed, the Society was successful in its campaign, only a few houses were built and the remaining land was donated to Horsham District Council. Roy also generously donated part of his garden to the Council and the area is now known as Sandgate Woods - a popular spot for walkers.”

Roy and the Society then proposed the formation of a much bigger country park, which would include as many of the areas of land open to the public as possible.

“The area, known today as Sandgate, was part of the Sandgate Country House Estate,” Bill continued. “This estate was started in the middle of the 19th Century and was eventually so large it stretched as far as Billingshurst. But, like most large country estates throughout the UK, the cost of running it became too high and gradually bits were sold off until eventually all that was left was Sandgate House itself and the immediate area.”