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Plans for 1,500-home Cheshire garden approved

Plans to deliver ‘The Garden Village at Handforth’ have moved a step closer.

The Garden Village at Handforth will create a bespoke new village that will include 1,500 new high-quality design homes and extensive ‘green infrastructure’ – more than 40 per cent of the site will be open space, public amenity space or protected habitat for both residents and the wider public to enjoy.

It will also include a new school, up to 30 acres of employment land creating local jobs, a village centre with shops, restaurants, a hotel, and a village pub, new footpaths and cycleways, up to 175 housing units for older people who need care, and a children’s nursery.

At a meeting of Cheshire East Council’s strategic planning board, committee members resolved to be minded to approve a hybrid planning application for the scheme, subject to conditions and legal agreements.

Councillor Nick Mannion, chair of Cheshire East Council’s economy and growth committee, said: “This development has all the ingredients to create a truly wonderful new Cheshire village for the benefit of those living in, working in, and visiting the Garden Village for generations to come.

“Today’s decision by members of the strategic planning board is a fantastic step forward for this development and officers can continue to progress and deliver an exemplar scheme.

“The Garden Village will not only provide a range of new homes, but will encourage healthier and more active lifestyles, and support biodiversity – delivering a net gain through planned on and off-site measures.”

The development is one of 14 Government designated Garden Villages through Homes England’s locally-led Garden Village Programme, which gives the scheme national recognition.

The council is the lead developer and owns around 70 per cent of the land allocated for the garden village, while the remaining 30 per cent is owned by third parties.

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The site – allocated as a strategic development site in the council’s adopted Local Plan Strategy – is around 300 acres and is east of the A34, south of the A555 and will be accessed via the A34 bypass.

At the heart of the village will be an ‘all-through school’, providing both primary and secondary education, with a community hall and sports pitches located alongside it.

Of the 1,500 new homes, 30 per cent will be affordable, 5 per cent will be self-build and there will also be starter homes for young people, family homes, and accommodation for older people. This mix will help to meet local housing needs.

Employment space such as studios and offices will be available, as well as shared workspace facilities, and the village will have electric vehicle charging points and its own heat network, using sustainable energy.

There will be new wildflower grassland and playing fields, arts and heritage trails, community orchards and allotments, new trees and hedges, and new habitats which will be created by incorporating green roofs and green walls as a way of greening the village centre, residential and employment areas.

All existing ponds will be retained and improved, while new ponds will be created that will be specifically designed and maintained to maximise their biodiversity value.

Cllr Craig Browne, chair of Cheshire East Council’s highways and transport committee, said: “The Garden Village also supports the council’s long-term ambitions to increase active travel and will take the pressure off other towns and villages through investment in local infrastructure.

“As the lead developer, the council will provide the primary infrastructure to the site and the plans include making improvements to the A34, creating a new access road to the garden village, a park-and-ride facility near the train station, and new cycling and walking routes – including a pedestrian and cycle bridge over the A34.”

This new infrastructure will enable people to travel in a greener and more sustainable way and provide easy access to essential local retail, leisure, healthcare, education, and wider community facilities.

An application for a park and ride scheme at Handforth railway station was previously approved.

A separate application relating to Dairy House Farm, which forms part of the Garden Village site, was previously approved and grants listed building consent for essential stabilisation and repair works of the former farmhouse and outbuildings.

This will enable the restoration and conversion of the buildings, which are Grade II-listed.

Source: Built Environment Networking

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Keep calm and carry on: development sector remains robust

Only a little while ago, the Bank of England base rate was at a record low, ultra-cheap mortgages were in abundance and property prices were climbing strongly on the back of soaring demand.

Fast-forward to today and the market looks like a very different place, indeed.

In an article I wrote a few months ago, I warned of an impending slowdown in the UK’s property market. However, the pace at which conditions have changed has taken us all by surprise.

In those few months, the Bank of England has hiked rates to a high of 3.5%, the economy is heading for recession and, according to surveyors, demand for property is falling. That has had a knock-on effect on house prices, which fell on a monthly basis in October for the first time since July 2021, according to Nationwide’s House Price Index. On top of that, some have predicted a sharp fall in house prices next year, as households grapple with rising mortgage rates and soaring inflation.

But while the outlook may seem gloomy, let’s not forget the fundamentals that underpin the housing market in this country.

The UK is property-obsessed and therefore, while transactions may dip in the short-term, history suggests that the market will recover.

It’s also worth remembering that we, as a country, do not build enough houses. Experts often say we need to build 300,000 new homes a year to keep up with household formation, but we haven’t done that since the 1970s. Until that happens, house prices will continue to be supported by the imbalance between supply and demand.

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Another thing to note is that we’ve seen foreign investment in the UK’s property market hold up well, proving that the asset class remains attractive to investors. Softening house prices and a weak pound will actually boost the attractiveness of UK property to foreign investors even further, which might offset lower activity from domestic investors.

If anything, then, I expect the specialist end of the market, such as bridging and development finance, to remain fairly robust, even if activity tails off in the mainstream market. However, that is not to say conditions will remain the same for investors and developers as they had been.

Specialist lenders retain an appetite to lend despite the worsening economic outlook, but it’s clear that developers will have to pay more for finance in the future than they did in the past.

Truth be told, development finance has arguably been artificially cheap for too long, so a correction was due at some point. The rates developers pay have gone up, but with most of the expected increases now priced in, we should see them begin to settle.

Lenders may also want to see proof that developers are controlling costs in a high-inflation environment. That means not overpaying for land and developing good relationships with builders’ merchants to ensure you can lock-in your long-term costs.

However, like I said, I am confident that lenders will not turn off the taps. While they will want to manage the increased risk that comes with a challenging economic environment, they will also want to compete hard for the business that is left.

Although conditions do look challenging, I do believe that the development sector will hold up relatively well in the coming months.

By Guy Murray

Source: Development Finance Today