To be sad about houses being built on Greenfield sites

[Orangemochafrappacino]

Its rife in my village at the moment. There are a few brownfield sites but these seem to be being ignored and farmland is being snapped up for development instead.

The rulebook for this seems to be slowly being torn up by this current government and I'm now hearing stories of developers being able to purchase land on a forceful basis and even proceed building giant housing estates without proper planning permission.

Has anyone else noticed this in their local area? I understand houses need to be built but it seems completely nuts, we are going to have no farmland or trees left at this rate.

Yes, I live in a village in Bedfordshire and we are currently fighting a 4000 house development around 200m from the village which will take 17 years to complete and a 600 house appendage to the village. We have lost the second one. All on farmland

Same here - brownfields sat on by the "developers" for years, plans to build over 1000 houses on fields, with no thought for infrastructure. How the council think the current hospitals (already struggling) schools, roads, non existant public transport system will cope I have no idea. To say nothing of the local crem, already with a month backlog, which is normal in the best of times. When asked a meeting about this "all has been taken into consideration" - and ignored

Same here - Scotland- our green spaces are shrinking, but thousands of older properties remain empty - could be redeveloped and are closer to amenities.
I get there is a housing crisis , but parking people in new boxes on the outer edges does not truly address the needs.

It really boils my blood OP, the way they’re going there won’t be any nice quiet villages left to live in and it really makes me sad as I chose to live in a small village not a town or city. They also just throw houses up without thinking about the infrastructure or people already living there, the next town from me has built 300 social housing houses which I have no problem with it was a brownfield site but then another developer has permission to build 200 more houses on a green piece of land. The Gp can’t cope with the amount of patients already, the school is bursting at the seams and the roads infrastructure just isn’t there for another 200 houses with potentially 2+ Cars per house

It has a lot to do with this

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2021/jul/12/tories-have-unhealthy-financial-reliance-on-property-developers-says-report?CMP=ShareiOSAppp_Other

Rather than tackling the complicated process of housing through community building and place making they have gone down the route of profitability
New houses on greenfield sites have the best profit margins and that is all there is to it. Community building, infrastructure, sustainability all reduced profits.

Yet, when I want to build a eco-friendly house on the outer edge of our village, I am not allowed. I’m not allowed to self build because it’s green belt etc. But builders can build !

I don’t object to house being built but I do object to the way the squash them in, how small they build them and how much they charge and the lack of environmentally friendly features and the lack of decent landscaping. It could be so much better than what we have.
We also need to restrict more houses to local occupation and turn disused shops and offices into really good housing.
That’s my housing rant over for the day and I do understand how you feel.

Its infuriating. The council have let entire estates run into disrepair around here, but don't mind cutting the limited amount of green space we have to shreds (city) instead of dealing with abandoned houses and factories. Some that have been empty so long that they now effectively qualify as their own green bloody space

@mayblossominapril absolutely they should be looking at developing what we already have, empty houses and shops before building new

Yes, we have this in our area. We have a great leader who I call "Kief'.
When we moved to our village 15 years ago it was lovely and had everything a large village needed. Kief has spent the last 10 years building on everything. We currently have three huge estates being built around us but no increase in facilities unless you count a Lidl's.
Everyone hates Kief but he still keeps getting voted in and has been our glorious leader for over 20 years but our access to the countryside keeps getting further away as every site is greenfield. Kief will not stop and what is worse is that he and his minions are borrowing more and more to achieve Kiefs dream of Kiefdom.

Yes 81 houses being currently being built in my area, on farm land . The actual farm is almost opposite my house and the new housing on land further up the road . Everyone in the area put in a concern when planning went in due to where the access to the new housing will become an accident hot spot as cars coming up the hill won't see other cars coming out .

My parents live on the outskirts of London. They are squeezing houses in wherever they can. There can't be room to swing a hamster, let alone a cat in some of the houses.

When house buying last year, we saw a new build estate by a river (in Yorkshire). We asked about flooding .. apparently it only got as far as the edge of the gardens the winter before...

The place we moved from is an army camp, being sold for development. Counts as brownfield. Only a few of the old buildings staying. They are having to build a new Primary school, and maybe a new secondary... but the issue with that is there is a struggling secondary at the other end of town not full (because no one wants to send their kids there) so it counts as surplus school places.

Same here, it’s appealing. I’m not against building more houses - I understand it needs to be done. But just make sure it’s considered and appropriate! They just get permission for anything here and whack them up, meanwhile no parking, roads in disrepair, local schools/dentists/Drs overrun. The thing that’s realy pissed me off is the development on my road has squeezed too many houses in a small plot so no access for bin lorries or emergency services, meaning they have created communal bins on the boundary. It’s going to be horrendous!

Should have said appalling

It’s the banging on about climate change yet they build on green sites, the sites that absorb the carbon dioxide! Then a lot of people change their real garden for plastic grass and concrete the rest, I absolutely despair

And building in flood plains, they keep doing this in the city near me then everyone wonders why their house floods!

There are 500 houses being built down the road from me. The schools are already over subscribed. Where are they going to go?

Yes, we live in an area where there is a national park. Our district lies partly within and partly outside the NP, so the areas outside the park (including us) are taking the entire housing quota as they aren't allowed to build apart from very small new developments within the park boundaries. Our small town has had several thousand new houses built in the last 5 years with another huge development in the pipeline. We endure what seems like permanent roadworks everywhere while they upgrade water and sewers to support them. Beautiful countryside lost forever. No new schools or GP surgeries. Similar towns inside the NP are untouched. And the developments are shoehorned in, inadequate parking, cramped boxy houses and flats, tiny overlooked gardens.

Yup. We’re having 300 houses built on farmland/woodland. Not going to be wide enough roads for a pavement on the estate, and the main access will down a single track lane (but apparently it’s ok, they’re improving the passing places).

A “rough” field closer to amenities and on a main road which wasn’t used for anything until it was ruled out, was bypassed in favour of this and other pure farming land. The farming land being flogged off belongs to the very big local manor/estate.

We are told again and again that building houses is the way to solve the housing crisis. it is a mantra trotted out so often it seems self evident. but is it?

We need a total rethink about the whole state of housing. The seemingly uncontrolled rise of short term lets, the issue of second home ownership, lack of good social housing, the utter shite quality and ugliness of new cheaply made housing, building on greenfield land, use of brownfield sites, empty homes, owner occupies with 2+spare bedrooms, government policies that inflate house prices such as stamp duty holidays. ...I have probably left loads out. suffice to say it's a fecking mess and as usual the poorest pay a disproportionate price.

I agree, it's sad.
We are surrounded by new housing estates being built. Some are on farm land, others are on land that has (had??) standing water during the winter months.

Meanwhile, our town centre is dead and there is a new "recreationl park" with shopping, chain restaurants, cinema and a boating lake built about 10 miles down the road. This is also on flood plains for the nearby river. Sometimes I think, they are really banking on climate change - hotter & dryer all round.

@EverythingDelegated this is why I can’t stand town/city living, it’s the proximity to other people, over looked gardens etc. Constant feeling of no privacy etc. I tried living in a city when I was 18, I lasted 6 months and wanted back home to the village I grew up, I always felt in edge, it’s hard to explain

@tootingbeclido unfortunately the social housing they built in the next town to me is the horrible, poorly built cramped kind. It’s a housing associate new to the area, their head office is further up scotland maybe 100 miles away? They are throwing these houses up in every town near me and everyone that’s got one has had problems. Not to mention their rents are closer to private rental prices, they pay service charges and have inspections!

A planning application is being submitted for 3,000 houses on prime agricultural land just outside the South Downs national park.

The site is on the edge of a tiny hamlet of a couple of dozen houses (and a church and a pub). It doesn't have a school, and the nearest primaries and secondary are oversubscribed. It will require a new road, as it only has a single track lane with passing places. The nearest A-road is narrow, windy and already very busy.

The landowner is Eton College, so even if the council refuse permission, the minister will probably call it in and grant permission, given the number of Old Etonians in government. It's bloody absurd.

Meanwhile, in the nearest town a few miles away, a brownfield site was granted permission for several hundred homes back in 2013. Construction has yet to start, and the site has changed hands a couple of times. Local rumour is that the cost of decontaminating the site is proving prohibitive. Part of the development includes road improvements, a new health centre and much-needed expansion of a supermarket. As the town has grown, the 3 small supermarkets are struggling to meet demand (and were, even pre-Covid). These are stalled until the development starts.

There is also a massive empty site, where there used to be a school, that would be ideal for residential development. It's owned by the county council who have been sitting on it for years, for reasons best known to themselves.

We need real incentives to encourage use of brownfield sites in existing urban areas and measures to force councils who are hanging to unused sites to sell or develop them.

And, please, at least 10% of small developments and 20% of larger developments to be social housing. These developers make a damn fortune, they can afford it.

@AlaskaThunderfuckHiiiiiiiii. yes I should have said good quality social housing. ...sadly it just seems to be about throwing up houses with no thought process at all