Strategic Housing Land Availability Assessment
(SHLAA)
The SHLAA is a joint study being carried out by West
Lancs Council in partnership with neighbouring
authorities (external link) and led by Sefton Council. It
looks at how much land could potentially be available for housing
over the coming years.
Potential sites came from two sources: sites identified by
Council officers, and sites submitted by members of the public
through a “Call for Sites” exercise. We passed details
of all these sites to consultants, White Young Green, for an
independent assessment.
The consultants produced a draft report in June 2009, which
we consulted on for six weeks. To find out more about the
draft report, please follow the links below:
What happens next?
We have forwarded all
the comments made on the draft study to the consultants for them to
take into account as they prepare their final report. The
consultants have told us we will receive the final report by the
end of February 2010. We hope to have the document checked and
approved by the end of March 2010.
We will use the results of the SHLAA as we prepare our
LDF. It will provide us with important background information
for our Local Development Framework, in particular the Core Strategy and Site Allocations documents.
If a site receives a good score in the SHLAA, this does not
necessarily mean that it would receive planning permission for
housing. For example, a field close to a village may score
well, as it would be easy to build on, but Green Belt policy would
prevent such a site from being developed. Planning
applications for residential development are assessed against the
Local Plan and other policies.
Contact us
If you have any queries, please contact the Planning Policy
team.
Tel: 01695 585274 or 01695 585171
Email: ldf@westlancs.gov.uk
Related information
In addition to the SHLAA, we have been working on other related
studies. This includes a Strategic Housing Market Assessment
(SHMA) and a joint study looking at land for business and
industrial uses.