To find the extent of planned housebuilding terrifying?

[IRememberWhenThisWasFields]

NM for this as I don't want my previous posts to be too outing of where I live. Hope that's okay.

The background is that I live in a semi-rural area in England, in a village of approximately 2,000 people. It doesn't even have a shop. Our nearest town is about 10-15 mins walk away, population already around 20k. In recent years the town has increasingly encroached on our village.

Currently, the local council is having a consultation of where future housebuilding should take place, and I'm honestly so shocked at the amount of land that has been offered up.

Farmland on what feels like all directions has been earmarked for largescale future development. I know that we have a housing crisis in this country, but I feel like I could cry.

Many of the areas are where I've spent countless happy hours walking and where I regularly see owls, hares, deer and foxes. It's well known that access to nature and green spaces is hugely beneficial to one's mental health, and to think that these wonderful quiet, peaceful, green areas could be lost for more houses, traffic, pollution, noise, likely crime...it's just so sad.

And of course, it all comes from the national government and their target of wanting to build over one million more houses this government, no matter where they're placed, and seemingly with very little thought for infrastructure or how small communities are changing almost beyond all recognition. How people who've lived in these communities for generations are increasingly turning to anti-immigration rhetoric from parties like Reform, in part due to their areas changing so rapidly.

All anyone can say is "we need more houses"...yes, but is the only solution the increased destruction of our countryside? When will it end?

I know people currently searching for a house or who are used to living in built up areas will have no sympathy with this. I know I'll already get the predictable response of "well, your house probably used to be a field", ignoring the simple fact that we now have far less space than we did 50 or 100 years ago.

But AIBU, or does anyone else feel a similar way to me?

he background is that I live in a semi-rural area in England, in a village of approximately 2,000 people. It doesn't even have a shop. Our nearest town is about 10-15 mins walk away, population already around 20k.

This baffles me, what do you mean by walk to town?

I mean a village is a self contained area with a break between it and the next area. Towns sprawl out from a center point sometime going miles in networks of streets and estates. The 'town' is in the center of these fringing.

I actually live in my 'town' quite close to it (only 2 length way streets from the center and its still more than a 10-15 minute walk to 'town', the villages on the outskirts would be over an hours walk into town, really they wouldn't my friend in the village has to drive to town.

I mean from the edge of the village up to the very first house on the furthest outreach of the town sprawling estates might be 15 minutes but whats the point of that, thats still 45-hour walk into the actual town where everything is.

Every time a million people (net)

How many times are a million people net arriving?

Why? There are 12 available in the town I live in which is not a tourist destination available in October this year, that's 12 properties that could be people's homes. In a town with 2 large hotels and at least 3 b and bs.

There are 12 in.the much smaller town of st Ives Cornwall at the same time. An area where local people cannot afford to buy. The tax would fund building of social properties

Try not to worry too much OP. Get involved with your Parish Council. Contribute to your Neighbourhood Plan. Include rules that all houses must have solar panels and EV charging points (makes them less profitable). Make planning consent as difficult as possible. Force the borough council to carry out all the ecological and flooding surveys that are legally required but are so often skipped. Make sure agricultural land is correctly graded in planning applications. We cannot afford to build on BVM. Question who will pay for the electricity substation or the sewage plant or the roads to be upgraded. S106 monies are never sufficient.

The mortgage rates are still high. Only one house has been completed in our village this year. It hasn't sold and has had to be let, so the developer hasn't been paid.

Skills and materials are in short supply, prices are high and people can't afford the houses they are building. Councils can't afford to build them. Labour doesn't have a hope of building 1.5 million houses before they are replaced at the next election. So delay, delay, delay.

All those involved up and down the country are thick as pig shit but one person typing on mumsnet has all the answers. If it was that easy I'm sure it would be happening.

@Byebyechicken Apologies in advance for my naivety on the subject, but why don't we build entire new towns, new railway links, new hospitals, schools, doctors, shopping centres?

Because developers can make much more money by building houses on roads that already have sewers and drainage and gas mains etc. Then they don't have to pay for those utilities to be connected, sometimes miles. Because they can argue that there is already a school and a sewage plant, so they don't need to contribute to those either. And there is a road that the council has already adopted.

Developer profit !!

No I am saying almost the opposite. Action on empty houses recorded 264,000 empty/second homes last year. Sparsely populated areas like Northumberland had over 1000. Encouraging people to release properties to the market, improve the run down parts of the country (like my Bristol example) and there is less need to build.

My point 're building was not to build big houses with large plots using tracks of the green belt, but to build smaller, more densely grouped housing/ flats

I think you completely miss read me

I agree. We need to be building nice flats like they do in the continent, with plenty of amenity space and facilities like a crèche, pharmacy, etc in them.

Slobberchops1 · Today 16:57
"Oh look a NIMBY that doesn’t want the poor people to have a home near CV their exclusive village"

Whoa there—let's pump the brakes on the pitchfork parade! 🏡🔍 Just because someone raises concerns about how and where housing developments happen doesn’t automatically mean they're anti-poor or anti-progress. Not all critiques of new builds are driven by snobbery or snobbery-adjacent vibes.
Here’s the thing:

• People aren't against housing; they're against bad planning.
• Wanting affordable housing doesn't mean we should rubber-stamp every development proposal. Concerns about infrastructure, traffic, school capacity, environmental impact, or even just preserving the character of a small village aren’t illegitimate. They’re part of responsible community stewardship.
• Labelling someone a NIMBY shuts down dialogue.
• It's the grown-up version of sticking your fingers in your ears and yelling "LA-LA-LA." Productive solutions come from listening, not dismissing.
• Many locals support affordable housing—just not token gestures or developer cash grabs.
• There's a huge difference between truly inclusive development and those quick-fix "affordable" units that cost 80% of market value and vanish in five years. If we want homes for key workers, young families, and the vulnerable, let’s demand quality, sustainable housing with access to services, not just an estate plonked in a field because it’s cheaper.
• Not every village is a secret billionaire bunker.
• Some rural communities face genuine affordability issues themselves, often with younger generations priced out by second homes and London overflow. The idea that villagers are all gatekeeping golden castles isn’t just inaccurate—it’s unhelpful.

Let’s be honest: most of the so-called 'affordable' homes won’t actually be affordable to the people who need them most—unless they’ve somehow struck gold on State benefits!

If the Labour government is truly as compassionate and humanitarian as it loves to portray itself, then why not go all the way? Why not gift houses to all legal and illegal immigrants? Why not make utilities free for them as well?
After all, we’re already paying state benefits on their behalf—without ever being formally asked for our consent. So why not just cover all their expenses too?

@housethatbuiltme But many towns are small and not as you describe. Villages are not that much further out. I live in a village of about 400 people. By footpath across the common, it takes 40 mins to walk into town, but by road it's much further.

It only takes about 20 mins to walk from one side of the town to the other.

Well if the computer says so who am I to argue

Same. Just objected to a proposal to build an estate of nearly 400 houses on green belt just behind us. This on top of two other recent new build developments in our town, many of which remain unsold.

There ARE entire new towns in my part of the UK - at least three, all vile soulless places made of rows and rows of boxlike houses. But hey ho.

Ah yes, you've caught me red-handed! How dare I respond with well-structured sentences, punctuation, and (gasp!) coherent thoughts? Clearly, no mere mortal could pull that off without summoning the forbidden powers of Artificial Intelligence.
I mean, heaven forbid someone just be articulate, right? We must be entering a dystopia where if you use a semi-colon correctly or form a nuanced argument, people just assume you're chatting with Skynet.
But hey—if you think my replies are too sharp, too logical, or too grammatically sound to be human... I’ll just take that as a deeply confusing compliment.
(Though for the record, if I were using AI, maybe it’s because I’m tired of debating people who jump to conclusions faster than ChatGPT finishes a sentence.)

I have to apologise for my naivety on the subject too, but why would we need to build more schools when the birth rate is dropping? When I last lived in London there was talk of some schools closing / being merged in some areas because there weren’t enough children. Doctors, nurses, dentists etc. I can understand - we need more as the population grows, especially as the UK’s is both a growing and ageing population. Shopping centres I don’t see as essential, especially with the rise of e-commerce. So it looks to me like we should be building more houses in existing villages, towns and cities and trying to increase numbers of clinicians at the same time. Is that the Labour government’s plan?

@ThisTicklishFatball Does the daily mail have its own version of chatgpt now? It may need some fact checking, I never knew all immigrants got benefits.

Population is sky rocketing due to the Boris wave of immigration. 5 out of 8 new houses are needed for those guys.

This isn’t reality though, where are
you getting this? The facts are new builds aren’t huge homes on huge plots.

Less than 1/5 of new homes are 4 bed or more and this has been decreasing for years, not increasing.

The average number of new build bedrooms is 2.95 which is down from 3.6 all through the 30s-80s.
Housing is generally smaller and more dense than ever.

Ah, I see we’ve reached the “compare someone to the Daily Mail” stage of the discussion—truly the intellectual equivalent of throwing glitter at a bonfire.
But don’t worry, I don’t actually work for the Daily Mail (I have a functioning sense of shame and a basic respect for nuance). And unlike some tabloid columns, I do welcome fact-checking—just make sure you bring some sources stronger than you.
Also, if I were their version of ChatGPT, I imagine I’d be yelling about house prices, Meghan Markle, and how the youth are ruining everything. So far I’ve only done one of those today, so we’re safe.
But hey—if something I said rattled you enough to imagine I’m backed by a sensationalist media empire, I must be doing something right.

I feel the same OP. I live in a town with green belt between us and a large village. They are building on every single bit of green belt that they can. And now we can say this is to solve the housing crisis, but all these homes are £700k+! Sure they may throw in the odd housing association one where they have to but the housing crisis is not going to be solved by £700k houses. Meanwhile on the other side of our town towards a large conurbation there are acres of industrial land sat empty. It's absolutely ridiculous. My one comfort is I do wonder where all these trades people to actually build them are going to come from?!

A tiny proportion of homes could be made from converting empty shops/banks in towns.

We have two banks next to each other which had parking and could have been converted into flats. Nope Dominoes have gone in, in a town that has every fast food outlet available.

There are shops still in business but with empty flats above, you can see by the filthy net curtains they are not lived in. Although I accept that not every property will be suitable to be a home.

Office buildings can be converted into flats. There is a massive Debenhams standing empty in a nearby larger town that could be converted into apartments - right in the centre of a town - it's a beautiful building

Thinking needs to go outside the box

A small office block not far from where I live has eventually been converted into flats - makes me happy when I drive by

And most importantly, when large estates are being built if the builder reneges on their promise to build shops/and or schools then they should be heavily fined and not allowed to build in the area

@ToilichteTotally agree. It’s the same here. New build developments with houses standing empty and two new developments starting within a 1 mile radius.

You’re largely calling for slums. Converting offices or shops will create terrible quality housing. It’s an architectural nightmare, it would come with huge cost and only ever produce a low quality outcome.

Housing above shops is notoriously low quality already due to the security risks, fire risks etc from fast food outlets below or near. They will be empty because it’s nearly impossible to get a mortgage on these flats so they are very hard to sell.

Interesting. Although doesn’t explain your reference to immigrants on benefits, and what that has to do with building more houses.

Only a minority of the houses being built as affordable housing, and I doubt many people on benefits can afford to buy a house due to the limits on savings prohibiting them being able to get together a deposit.

But @Jennpsyou are aware of the work underway by the Labour government’s New Towns Taskforce to identify sites for a fresh generation of new towns? Just as you describe? Funny you don’t mention it between hurling mud about - who was it? - ‘The ruling classes, MPs, civil servants…as thick as pig shit.’

Have schools broken up already?