Petition demanding Fort Gilkicker fencing is taken down to be presented to council

Campaigners say that Fort Gilkicker in Military Road, Gosport, has fallen into disrepair, with fencing falling over and wildlife coming back onto the site.

The petition, which has already gathered hundreds of signatures, is demanding that Andrew Temperton of Wild Boar Properties Ltd takes down all fencing that is not currently in use for the proposed building works.

The area is being turned into 26 exclusive beachside homes in a £20m restoration project by Wild Boar Properties.

But Caroline Simpson from Brockhurst, who started the petition, says that the work is not only falling behind schedule, but will be set back even further as wildlife starts to return to the area.

She said: '˜We've got about 400 signatures having campaigned around the town '“ and hope to have a few hundred more by the time we present the petition to Gosport Borough Council.

'˜Everybody feels the same about it.

'˜The state of the site is getting worse all the time, because the fences are now falling down and it just feels like a ghost town down there.

'˜To an outsider it would look like it has just been abandoned.

'˜I went down on Monday and everything just looks like it is falling apart.'

Caroline claims that the security has disappeared from the site '“ and that residents are being kept in the dark about the state of the development.

She added: '˜The security staff has been pulled from the fort and we have absolutely no idea what is going on down there.

'˜The wildlife has started to come back and while some might think that's a good thing, it's actually bad news because the site was supposed to have been cleared.

'˜There are birds nesting inside the fort and that is going to cause more disruption to the development '“ these are meant to be areas that are for work vehicles but with the state of the fences nobody knows what's what anymore.'

The petition will be presented to the mayor of Gosport, Cllr Diane Furlong, at Gosport Town Hall on August 23.

Caroline says that her main concern is that the development work will have to start all over again.

She said: '˜The site is being left to rot and I honestly think that the work is going to have to start over again.

'˜Mr Temperton is the fourth person to come in on this site and I do wonder if he's starting to see how difficult this area is to develop.

'˜Nothing has really been done for the past seven months and it actually makes me quite angry '“ I doubt there's much chance of anything significant happening before the end of the year and so I think it's only right that the fencing there is taken down until work on the fort actually begins.'

Wild Boar Properties was contacted by The News for a response.