Jobbo wrote: ↑Wed Oct 11, 2023 1:57 pm
Swervin_Mervin wrote: ↑Wed Oct 11, 2023 11:18 am
It makes no sense that people that live in other non-Green Belt rural towns and villages have relatively less protection from development than those that are well off enough to afford to live on the outskirts of urban areas (i.e. in the Green Belt) with the economic and infrastructure benefits that they enjoy.
And, just to be clear, undeveloped rural land is not necessarily geen belt. The amount of land in the UK that is Green Belt is relatively limited:
I was intrigued to find that the place we're moving to isn't in greenbelt because it's in the middle of the countryside, unlike where we currently live which is just outside Cheltenham. However the planning restrictions seem to be greater at the new place because the hurdle developers have to cross to have land removed from the greenbelt seem to be easier than the hurdles they have to cross to develop a field in the middle of nowhere - the infrastructure isn't there in the sticks, so a housing estate is a no-go, whereas greenbelt tends to be developable in practice because it's around a big settlement.
To respond to Mito, it is not easier to put a decent quality road and other infrastructure to a field miles from the nearest town. It is easier to build on the edge of the town. And that land is more likely to be designated as greenbelt.
You're absolutely right Simon - I was being fairly simplistic with what I said. And your latter point is absolutely on the money. That said, we've had a few sites which have fallen flat just fundamentally on the grounds of the green belt issue, despite sitting on the edge of an area that has seen recent development, including a couple of sites which arguably lie within any perceived development boundary. And whilst the issue can be overcome, a lot of the time there's a good chance that decision will ultimately lie in the hands of a planning inspector at Appeal, because it's easier for local planning committee members to object to save political face, even if they know an Inspector will decide against them.
The problem with Green Belt is that it's held up as some sort of sacrosanct land (which was, tbf, the point) and any arguments based in logic can often go out of the window when the GB issue is waved. The Greater Manchester Spatial Framework or Places for Everyone as it now is has been in development for so many years I can't recall when it actually started, and it's been hobbled by the GB issue throughout - areas taken out of the GB, >public outcry and political drum banging > areas back in the GB and so on - even Boroughs pointing fingers at each other if one perceives that another is copping for less GB removal. The consequence for areas like GM is where do you go next? These areas should be the focus of population expansion and economic growth, so should you really be artificially constraining them based on the decision of politicians 60 years ago when the UK was a very, very different place?
The usual response of course is "brownfield land should be developed first" which is, in theory, absolutely correct. But who foots the bill for remediation of brownfield land? If it sits with the developer, and that site no longer stacks up economically, then the site will sit vacant. The only way to shift that blockage is for some sort of local or national brownfield land remediation fund to be setup, with the Country just accepting that if we want to minimise development on GB or open countryside, we have to stump up to ensure brownfield sites can be redeveloped. But there'd be a public outcry if it was seen that texpayer's money was in any way being used to facilitate development.
The other aspect is that there is a lot of GB land out there that's very low quality, and in that regard Starmer's proposal makes complete sense. There's a site near us that forms part of the Timperley Wedge GB area (surrounded ironically by development on all sides) which was home to a garden centre and other light commercial uses for years - but the prospective redevelopers have nevertheless still had to make the case for exceptional circumstances as, at a basic policy level, it would still represent development in the GB. That's exactly the sort of site that should be earmarked in land use policy terms for development.
