DETAILS of up to 300 HGV movements a day to and from a proposed new quarry in the east of the borough are outlined in a raft of new documents submitted to a planning  application this month.

The proposed extension to Orsett Quarry on Buckingham Hill Road would devour a huge swath of land across an area from Linford to the edge of Stanford-le-Hope and has been widely opposed by residents.

More than 1,000 comments of objection are on the application - which was first submitted in 2019.

The application remains under consideration by the council and is likely to be considered by its planning committee at some point in the future.

The applicants, Ingrebourne Valley Limited, have submitted 28 new documents including a detailed travel statement – which notes a number of accidents involving HGVs and other vehicles on Buckingham Hill Road and Walton's Hall Road, but dismisses the likelihood of an increase in the number of incidents when the new quarry would be operational.

The report says that over the past three years, since the application was first submitted, vehicle movements on both roads have decreased. It says on an average weekday now there are 7,835 vehicles north and south on Buckingham Hill Road and 3,256 on Walton's Hall Road. Nine per cent of the vehicles using Buckingham Hill Road are HGVs.

It adds that HGV lorry movements on both roads have also dropped – which is possibly as a result of the closure of Walsh's site in East Tilbury.

The report says the excavation rate of minerals from the new quarry is likely to be up to a maximum of 150,000 tonnes of aggregate and sands per year to mostly be transported by 20 tonne rigid lorries.

It proposes that over the next 20 years of mineral extraction and reclamation there will be  maximum of up to 300 movements per day of HGVs at its peak operation, when importation and extraction are occurring at the same time, although this peak could reduce after 2032 when all the minerals from the proposed extension have been processed and sold.