Green Belt should be abolished

[TheNorm]

Originally Posted by Incognitas

..If you give up a few acres here or there in an emergency then how many times will there be an emergency.If we don't have a means of protecting our countryside then ever increasing numbers of 'just this once emergencies' will eat away at such areas whilst leaving ever increasing unused brownfield sites that will still need decontaminating whether they are built on or not....

What we are in desperate need of is a plan. A plan for the whole country. Very few people want to "live on top of each other" in an inner city, but many have little choice. A reasonably sized home with a bit of garden is achievable for all, but this has to be integrated with public transport, schools, etc. Only government has the power to plan on this scale. Unfortunately such a plan would take more than five years to implement, so politicians will shy away from it.

[Maggy J]

Originally Posted by TheNorm

What we are in desperate need of is a plan. A plan for the whole country. Very few people want to "live on top of each other" in an inner city, but many have little choice. A reasonably sized home with a bit of garden is achievable for all, but this has to be integrated with public transport, schools, etc. Only government has the power to plan on this scale. Unfortunately such a plan would take more than five years to implement, so politicians will shy away from it.

Agreed and one change should be that anyone buying land in inner city boundaries for development should have a certain amount of time to apply for planning permission and build their development before penalties are applied in the form of a tax for leaving such sites undeveloped.That should stop large organisations earmarking all the free space and preventing any kind of local council planning from taking place.

[TheNorm]

Originally Posted by Incognitas

Agreed and one change should be that anyone buying land in inner city boundaries for development should have a certain amount of time to apply for planning permission and build their development before penalties are applied ....

Or, they have to convert the land to "green space" if they do nothing with it for, say, six months or so. At least people will then be able to make some use of the land, and it won't be such an eyesore.

[Maggy J]

Originally Posted by TheNorm

Or, they have to convert the land to "green space" if they do nothing with it for, say, six months or so. At least people will then be able to make some use of the land, and it won't be such an eyesore.

Agreed.Trouble is as you said previously with government both central and local vieing for votes and re-election short termism is the only result we get.Changing things long term seems to be out of the question.

[Chrysalis]

Originally Posted by TheNorm

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/24012007/34...abolished.html

It would certainly ease congestion in our towns and cities, and allow the building of affordable homes. And if you want to enjoy nature, you could still go to the Lake District, Dartmoor, etc.

What do you think?

yes, I think the issue of lack of affordable homes is certianly more important then enjoying local scenery, if scenery is essential to you then move to a small town or village.

The solution certianly isnt to pack towns even more by converting houses to flats etc.

---------- Post added at 06:15 ---------- Previous post was at 06:13 ----------

Originally Posted by Rob

It's a balancing act. We have to accept that if everyone want's to live in the south east of England, it will get crowded, conjested, and whatever we do we won't be able to meet demand thus housing (and other costs will be too high). Releasing green belt land wouldn't stop that, it would just mean even more areas get concreted over.

What is needed somehow, and I really thought the technology revolution could have helped this, is to spread our population about a bit. With modern communications why do we all need to live and work in one small area. Those face to face meetings aren't really necessary, so lets spread out a bit.

I have been saying this also, this is not easy to do but it would help if incentives were given for companies to locate themselves outside of london and the south east making jobs elsewhere and incetives for people to live there, not things like factory work but rather jobs that are considered rewarding and a good career.

---------- Post added at 06:18 ---------- Previous post was at 06:15 ----------

Originally Posted by Stuart C

Part of the problem is that we are encouraged to think of property as an investment rather than just mere buildings. This has created a situation where people are increasingly buying up a few houses just to convert them into flats, and sell/rent the flats to other people. Interestingly, they said in the Standard the other day (the day they featured a flat the size of a cupboard that was up for sale at £170,000) that the market for Flats is in the process of collapsing because of oversupply.

There is also the problem that people in Central London (I'm talking about City Executives and rich people here- your average nurse or teacher is unlikely to be able to do this) are increasingly buying up second (or third) homes around the country, which is increasing prices in those areas, and possibly pricing some locals out of the market

Seen an program on this, small seaside village in south west where the locals are unable to get their fishing docks changed to improve their business because the city dwellers who have brought vast parts of the village as summer homes dont want to wreck the pleasantries for scenery purposes. Apperently in winter its a ghost town because about 80% of the homes are owned by city people.

---------- Post added at 06:22 ---------- Previous post was at 06:18 ----------

Originally Posted by TheNorm

Apart from the occasional "blip", property prices have been rising steadily for decades.

to be fair tho the last decade is more then steady rise its a boom, things have to even up at some point, these blips you mention are when it balances itself out. Either we will get a wages boom (wont happen) or a property crash. They will crash to a level higher then the early 1990s of course as in general over the long term they do increase, the mistake people make is they think another crash wont occur and it will never drop, these people are going to be the most dissapointed when it happens.

---------- Post added at 06:24 ---------- Previous post was at 06:22 ----------

Originally Posted by Jules

I see too many places empty and getting more and more grotty, fill these before you start building even more

Are these by any chance in low emplyment areas? there is a reason they empty and I think it goes beyond people not wanting to do houses up. Are they perhaps overpriced? bad area?

---------- Post added at 06:29 ---------- Previous post was at 06:24 ----------

Originally Posted by TheDaddy

That would make you one of the first on the boat wouldn't it Rammy

I take your point though, we have just had a couple of new drivers start, apparently there is a shortage of HGV drivers, so we have imported a few from Hungry and Slovakia, they had been driving a week when their agency phoned to say one of them didn't have a driving licence and was using false documents, it's not like we don't have enough crooks here to drive illegally without importing more, over a million unemployed and four million on the sick and we have a skills shortage

Which region are you located, the mistake many people make is they may live in a affluent area and have worker shortages they then start looking at the national unemployment figures and think these people should all be in work because the jobs are there when the problem is the jobs are often congregated in certian regions.

Another problem is the government isnt doing what it should to help people into skilled work, the hgv driver shortage has been going on years if I remember right? so why doesnt the DWP hand out hgv training courses for free to the unemployed so they can get licenses etc. simple things like this would solve that kind of problem as well as hgv firms locating themselves in areas of high unemployment to solve staff shortages.

---------- Post added at 06:32 ---------- Previous post was at 06:29 ----------

Originally Posted by Stuart C

Capitalism. Why spend money on inner city land, when you can get greenbelt land cheaply, and make possibly 7 times the orginal cost instead of 6?

Of course no developer would ever consider a reasonable profit margin (by reasonable, I mean 30-40%).

Actually the fact that that report is suggesting the cheapest option as the right answer to a percieved "problem" rather than really investigating other solutions suggests it was funded by developers.

You are correct and the solution to this problem is the private developers need a competitor who is willing to undercut them probably a developer who does it for a not for profit purpose. ie. the government which I think should stop selling their council houses and go on a new mass build program. This will reduce the demand and the private developers will have to reduce their pricing accordingly. The problem with this idea is the housing crash that would happen and the government doesnt want a price crash they are probably happy with high housing costs as it fuels the economy.

---------- Post added at 06:35 ---------- Previous post was at 06:32 ----------

Originally Posted by Incognitas

Maybe but practically every square inch of Scotland is owned by someone who ISN'T about to let anyone build on their land.Geographically some of it is pretty inaccessable too.

No the green parts of the united Kingdom are becoming less and less and building more housing in the Green belt whilst there are empty properties going empty seems absolutely wasteful and stupid as well as criminal.Perhaps we need to realise that there are parts of this country that are for the benefit of the majority not the minority.

I wonder how much property is vacant at this particular moment?.

The local estate agents can't be making much at the moment because I keep getting flyers asking me to sell my house..and I live at the crap end of the village.I'm rather bemused as well because they have built a brand new estate on the outskirts in the last 3 years of 900 houses and they have plenty more space for more houses if and when the council give the go ahead.They have built the last three estates(over 25 years on agricultural land and a filled in gravel pit.Can't see how they need to build on the green belt myself when there are lots of such potential spaces which are not green belt.Just about every bit of greenery is being built on and houses slotted in between others.Which is what has happened to me. .Our old policehouse and station is now flats.The old Nissan garage is a block of MCCarthy and Stone flats for the elderly and they knocked down an Art Deco building to complete that.I could go on and on.However many of the new flats on the front are just empty most of the time because they are holiday homes.Locally we have had old sea fronts in Southampton and Portsmouth turned into marinas with mostly empty holiday homes attached.In deed Portsmouth has turned the old MOD's minehunters docks into a marina and holiday homes the other side of GunWharf and Spinnikar tower.If they weren't building so mant holiday homes maybe we wouldn't have to encroach on the Green belt.

Maybe a special second home owners tax for adding to the housing meltdown should be introduced?A sort of 'non residential tax' perhaps.

Second homes is a part of the problem certianly a recent trend from the more affluent and I would agree with a second home tax.

---------- Post added at 06:36 ---------- Previous post was at 06:35 ----------

Originally Posted by Ramrod

.......and the bubble has been created by estate agents

and the banks breaking the 3.5 x wages rule.

---------- Post added at 06:42 ---------- Previous post was at 06:36 ----------

Originally Posted by Ramrod

lol, I'm not blaming it on immigrants (I'm an immigrant of sorts). It just seems self evident to me that this country is pretty full up so it's reasonable to perhaps limit further immigration (rather than the open door to everyone policy that we seem to have here) if there is a problem finding housing for those who are already here.

Immigrants are part of the problem but not the whole problem, I would defenitly agree the uk is over populated and there is a few reasons I can think off that are very obvious as to why.

Open door policy on immigration, remember its not just the legit immigrant figures there is also illegal immigrants and all their offspring. I am not suggesting we simply stop immigration but it defenitly needs controlling. I think the BTL market which happens to be fuelling the housing market as well is largely fulled by immigrants, my 2 neighbours are both immigrants in the other 2 flats, my old flat which was a 7flat building about 4 of the other tenants were immigrants my landlord tells me his business has never been so good and a lot of his tenants are polish, he used to primarily rent to students but has now moved to the more profitable renting to non students which is more profitable and always has been but before there was little demand and now there is.

Policies promoting child birth, unconditional housing and child benefit is a too easy option for young women now days and is promoting families that have no taxpayers simply having kids without a care as its paid for.

No limit on number of children per family, this is a issue that will be touchy to address but will have to be at some point and probably not during my lifetime. I expect we may need to adopt a simliar policy to china at some point limiting the number of children people can have.

Reducing the population is not liked by the older generation most probably because the initial impact will be worker shortages and less workers funding pensions and the benefits will take a generation to start showing, with governments not seeing past the next election this is an issue that will take a brave government to address.

---------- Post added at 06:49 ---------- Previous post was at 06:42 ----------

Originally Posted by Incognitas

The problem is as we encroach onto such areas how much closer we get to the jewels of the countryside.How close do we want development to the New Forest?How much of the Sussex Downs will we subvert to develpoment? As it is I feel like I am already living in Solent City as each city and town on the south coast gets larger each decade.

Humans need spaces and all life needs plants and trees.If you give up a few acres here or there in an emergency then how many times will there be an emergency.If we don't have a means of protecting our countryside then ever increasing numbers of 'just this once emergencies' will eat away at such areas whilst leaving ever increasing unused brownfield sites that will still need decontaminating whether they are built on or not.

Environmentaly it makes no sense not to clean and re-use these areas.Global warming is not the only environmental issue we have to face.We should also be looking to be more careful about how energy concious we are in any future building projects and to just keep moving on to pastures new and commit the same mistakes over and over is no longer good enough.

I think this is an over reaction, if I go somewhere outside of my city I can see the vast bulk of the uk is still countryside, sure the borders on towns villages are increasing meaning if 10 years ago you was at the edge of it looking at fields that wont be the case now but you can easily travel for hundreds of miles in the uk without going in a city.

---------- Post added at 06:50 ---------- Previous post was at 06:49 ----------

Originally Posted by Incognitas

Agreed and one change should be that anyone buying land in inner city boundaries for development should have a certain amount of time to apply for planning permission and build their development before penalties are applied in the form of a tax for leaving such sites undeveloped.That should stop large organisations earmarking all the free space and preventing any kind of local council planning from taking place.

do you think all new houses should only be in inner cities? it does need to be balanced going into villages etc. as well.

[Stuart C]

Originally Posted by Ramrod

.......and the bubble has been created by estate agents

Actuallly, IIRC, it was created when Margeret Thatcher relaxed the rules on who could issue mortgages. Before the mid 80s, IIRC, you had to go to a building society for a mortgage, banks could not issue them.

[King Of Fools]

Originally Posted by Stuart C

Actuallly, IIRC, it was created when Margeret Thatcher relaxed the rules on who could issue mortgages. Before the mid 80s, IIRC, you had to go to a building society for a mortgage, banks could not issue them.

There were housing bubbles and crashes long before the 1980s.

[TheDaddy]

Originally Posted by Chrysalis

Which region are you located, the mistake many people make is they may live in a affluent area and have worker shortages they then start looking at the national unemployment figures and think these people should all be in work because the jobs are there when the problem is the jobs are often congregated in certian regions.

Another problem is the government isnt doing what it should to help people into skilled work, the hgv driver shortage has been going on years if I remember right? so why doesnt the DWP hand out hgv training courses for free to the unemployed so they can get licenses etc. simple things like this would solve that kind of problem as well as hgv firms locating themselves in areas of high unemployment to solve staff shortages.

The big haulage companies have depots in the North, South, East and West, most of our foreign drivers are based in Bristol and Haydock, hardly the most affluent areas, we had just two in the South East, whilst I agree about the training courses, the job centre wont fund them because they are so expensive

[Maggy J]

Originally Posted by Chrysalis

do you think all new houses should only be in inner cities? it does need to be balanced going into villages etc. as well.

And how many villages have the increased infrastructure to deal with new housing estates?The jobs certainly won't be available and transport will be another obstacle.

Frankly many villages are becoming weekend villages because many of them are second homes for those ensconced in the cities Mon-Friday.Very little new affordable housing is being built for the youngsters born in villages and many are moving away to the cities in search of more affordable accomodation and jobs.

[Chrysalis]

Originally Posted by TheDaddy

The big haulage companies have depots in the North, South, East and West, most of our foreign drivers are based in Bristol and Haydock, hardly the most affluent areas, we had just two in the South East, whilst I agree about the training courses, the job centre wont fund them because they are so expensive

yep agreed, if they thought ahead long term tho they would soon claw the money back from these courses by not paying out JSA and collecting taxes of them.

---------- Post added at 04:10 ---------- Previous post was at 04:09 ----------

Yeah I meant small amounts of housing of course, say for every 2000 built in a town 20 built in a village. About town/city expansion, the expansion should occur on the edge of the town tho which will ultimately mean going into fields etc. The problem with expanding within the town is town areas lose park areas etc. which should stay for recreational purposes, and another problem is they tend to do it by converting houses to flats.

The buying of secondary housing defenitly needs to be taxed so there is a incentive against it.