Thanet District Council has launched a new call for brownfield sites that may help meet the district’s housing needs.
The council is inviting landowners, developers, and residents to submit details of suitable brownfield land that could accommodate five or more dwellings1.
Brownfield land2 is land that has previously been built on or has had a hard surface on it.
There are already brownfield sites identified and allocated in Thanet’s current Local Plan, and more have been submitted for potential allocation in the next Local Plan. It is hoped that the call out will identify additional suitable sites that the council is not yet aware of.
Cllr Rick Everitt, Leader of Thanet District Council commented “When the last Local Plan was developed a lot of work was done to identify possible brownfield sites but things change. We want to make sure that we’ve explored all the options.
“This is a chance for anyone in the local community to put forward additional ideas for locations for the council to look into. We want residents to have confidence that we have considered every opportunity to use such sites.
“There is no silver bullet for the current level of housing demand and the requirement to allocate land to meet it has been mandated by successive governments. However, identifying brownfield sites, where we might be able to allow development, will help. It’s just the first step and all sites taken forward will go through a full statutory consultation process.”
Local residents and other people who are interested are encouraged to submit details of potential sites using the council’s online engagement platform, Your Voice Thanet. Submissions should include an address or pin dropped on the site’s location on the map, as much detail as possible about the site and its boundaries, and ideally, an uploaded map showing the site boundary. Site owners are also asked to declare their ownership.
It should be emphasised that submitting a site does not guarantee its allocation, as all submissions will be assessed in line with current government guidelines.
There is more information about the Local Plan on the council’s website.
It is also possible to see the sites that have already been submitted to the council online.
Footnotes
1 Dwellings can include houses, flats and other forms of residential accommodation.
2 Defined by the government as “land which has been lawfully developed and is or was occupied by a permanent structure and any fixed surface infrastructure associated with it, including the curtilage of the developed land… It also includes land comprising large areas of fixed surface infrastructure such as large areas of hardstanding which have been lawfully developed.”
This excludes:
- Land that is or was last occupied by agricultural or forestry buildings.
- Land developed for minerals extraction or waste disposal by landfill where restoration provision has been made.
- Land in built-up areas such as residential gardens, parks, recreation grounds, and allotments.
- Land previously developed where the remains of permanent or fixed surface structures have blended into the landscape.
