Final SHLAA Report (December 2009) - The Royal Borough of ...

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Final SHLAA Report (December 2009)
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Introduction
1 Introduction
1.1 The Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead has prepared a Strategic Housing Land Availability
Assessment (SHLAA). The SHLAA is not a policy setting document nor does it indicate or determine whether
a site could be allocated for development. It includes sites promoted by landowners as being available for
development and is one part of an evidence source to inform the development plan making process and provide
background evidence. It will be used to inform both the Core Strategy and the subsequent Delivery and
Development Principles DPD’s which together will consider the appropriate policy approach to deliver housing
for the Royal Borough set out by the published South East Plan.
The SHLAA does not allocate land for development. It will list and map the sites within the Royal Borough
of Windsor and Maidenhead that have been promoted by the landowner as having the potential for housing
development. The decision regarding which sites will actually be selected will be made in the Local
Development Framework documents that will be subject to full public consultation before any decision is
made.
1.2 PPS3 requires Local Planning Authorities to identify sufficient specific deliverable sites to enable the
delivery of a rolling 5 year supply of deliverable land for housing. In addition Local Authorities are required to
identify a further supply of specific developable sites for years 6 to 10 and, where possible, for years 11 to 15.
This will be drawn from information contained within the SHLAA.
1.3 The published South East Plan sets a target for the delivery of 6920 dwellings for the Royal Borough
between 2006 and 2026, which equates to 346 dwellings per annum. The SHLAA will provide the details of the
sites available to help deliver this target.
1.4 The first SHLAA for the Royal Borough was published in January 2009 and the current document is the
first annual update and reflects changes to the availability of promoted sites. New sites that have come forward
for potential development have been included together with new housing commitments. Those sites on which
development has been completed have been removed.
Background
1.5 In the past, local planning authorities have undertaken Urban Potential Studies to identify land suitable
for housing. However these previous studies did not involve the rigorous assessment of the sites, particularly
in terms of their deliverability or developability.
1.6 The requirement to undertake a SHLAA has been set out by PPS3 Housing (November 2006). More
detailed guidance is contained within The Strategic Housing Land Availability Assessment Practice Guidance
(July 2007). Work commenced on the SHLAA for the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead during
September 2007 and the methodology for undertaking the study was written to meet the requirements of the
guidance issued by Government. Following the publication and consultation on the SHLAA methodology during
late 2007 / early 2008 work was undertaken to prepare the SHLAA. The first SHLAA report was published by
the Royal Borough in January 2009.