Your views sought on housing in Huntingdonshire

THE views of communities in Huntingdonshire are being sought on arrangements to enable people growing up in villages to afford their own homes. Huntingdonshire District Council s consultation on what are called rural exception sites – meeting local comm

THE views of communities in Huntingdonshire are being sought on arrangements to enable people growing up in villages to afford their own homes.

Huntingdonshire District Council's consultation on what are called 'rural exception sites' - meeting local community needs in places where commercial development would not be allowed - begins on Friday, May 14 and goes on until June 11.

The idea is that, if a community can find a suitable site for affordable housing and can demonstrate the need for it, development may be allowed in places where it would normally not be permitted.

In Huntingdonshire, such housing would normally be built by a registered social landlord, such as Luminus, Muir or Accent Nene, but the homes would be reserved for all time for people brought up in the community.

"It's very much a community-driven thing," said HDC's head of planning Steve Ingram. "We would react only if the community found a landowner willing to provide land and was able to identify the need for affordable housing."

Some parish councils have put their land assets into 'community land trusts' to meet such needs. In other cases, landowners will provide to land.

The principle is included in the council's planning strategy, which was approved by the Government last year. Apart from such rural exceptions, significant future development is mostly restricted to the market towns and larger villages, such as Sawtry and Fenstanton.