OXFORD has been left off a shortlist of areas where it could become quicker and easier to build on brownfield sites.

A shortlist of 29 areas outside London was announced on Thursday, and this will be narrowed down to 10 areas which will become so-called ‘housing zones’.

The Government will make it quicker and easier to gain planning permission for houses built on brownfield land in these zones, in an attempt to build 200,000 new homes and protect green belt land.

Last year Oxford City Council singled out Green Belt land as suitable for development, and think tank Centre for Cities said Green Belt building might be the only solution to the city’s housing shortage.

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City council deputy leader Ed Turner said he did not believe the ‘housing zone’ scheme would have been right for Oxford.

He said :”Oxford has one of the highest levels of development on brownfield sites in the country. However, this initiative is mainly focused on areas where there are old industrial sites ripe for development and we don’t really have any like that in Oxford. In Oxford people want high-quality development which fits in with the character of local areas, and not a free-for-all for developers.”


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