A CHRISTCHURCH theme park’s plans to offer cheaper parking than neighbouring Bournemouth Airport have been grounded.
Hurn-based Adventure Wonderland had applied for retrospective permission to turn land into a commercial car park, offering cheaper long-stay parking than the airport’s facility.
The 800-bay parking site was set up in May 2023 on land formerly used by the theme park, which shut down its outside rides in 2023 saying it was “struggling” with running costs.
Adventure Wonderland closed its outside rides in 2023, but will reopen new attractions this year (picture: Google)
Wonderland Park LLP wanted retrospective permission for the change of use along with the installation of two ANPR cameras, two columns, a cabinet, cabling and signage poles, along with 49 non-illuminated signs at the site on Merritown Road.
Bournemouth Airport objected to the plans, branding the proposal as representing “the latest unfortunate stage in endeavours to persist in inappropriate activity”.
Phill Gadd, estates manager at Regional and City Airports, which owns Bournemouth Airport, said any additional car parking needed could be provided at the airport. He added that this would have “no impact on the greenbelt” while the site at Adventure Wonderland does.
He said the Adventure Wonderland car park also “encourages” pedestrians to walk between the two sites which was “unsafe and unacceptable” as there is “no proper infrastructure”. He said the 49 signs were “excessive and associated with unauthorised activity”.
The theme park was allowed to create a 75-bay car park in 2016 but Regional and City Airports said the latest application related to one “10 times as big”.
Hurn Parish Council also objected to the application, noting that: “There are no benefits whatsoever to the locality with the only gain being financial, and to the car park operator/landowner from exploiting the greenbelt by commercialisation.”
It said parking for the adventure park was “seasonal” whereas “this proposal will result in vehicles being parked in each space on an almost permanent basis”. The council added: “Any grants of permission for a commercial car park will set a dangerous precedent.”
In a statement, planning consultancy Tanner & Tilley said Adventure Wonderland would reopen its outside area this year after restructuring.
The new attractions, it added, will be on “a smaller scale and of a different nature” and that the car park would then be used by its visitors.
Tanner & Tilly claimed customers currently using the car park for the airport were doing so instead of taking a taxi or using the “kiss and fly drop-off”.
Bournemouth Airport terminal
The majority lived within a half-hour radius of the airport and parked their vehicles for a short time, the consultancy added. People who did use it as an airport alternative said it was because car parking was difficult to find at peak holiday season.
In its reasons for refusing the application, BCP said that the “proposed use is unrelated to any existing lawful use of the site and is one that does not fall within any exception uses for the greenbelt. It is considered that the intensification of the car parking would erode the openness of the greenbelt.”
It also added that Wonderland Park had “failed to demonstrate safe pedestrian access arrangements to/from the site”. The lack of a safe crossing, lighting and footways results in an unacceptable impact on highway safety, said BCP planners. Furthermore, the applicant had “failed to provide data to demonstrate that the theme park use can operate with the loss of 50% of its car park”.