Lack of transparency regarding government assets prevents us from conducting a full analysis of all public sector land. However, using e-Pims, the Government’s Property and Land asset database, we have been able to analyse a part of central government land holdings in England.

The data we used includes the holdings of DEFRA, MoD, DCLG, and HCA among others, but excludes the NHS and Local Authority assets.

Using existing information, we plotted the location of the sites and estimated the number of sites suitable for residential development according to the typology of the site.

The analysed land amounts to 250,000 ha, but there is limited potential for residential development on much of this, given that 12% are National Parks, 44% are Natural Heritage Designations and 4% is in the Greenbelt.

This leaves 112,000 ha of potentially developable land. Of this, we have excluded 25,000 ha as the sites are too isolated to be considered viable residential development land.

The remaining land has been categorised into four broad types: new settlements, urban extensions, urban fringe and sites in an urban area. We then considered the viability of delivering the sites based on local sales values and how likely it is for the site types to come forward based on location, market demand and complexity of delivery.

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We concluded that previously developed sites in urban areas would be the quickest and easiest to develop, while the cost and complexity of developing a new settlement means a smaller proportion of the land sitting in this category is likely to be suitable for development. This analysis has produced a figure of 13,000 ha of “most developable land”. We then applied a typical housing density for each site type, resulting in potential delivery from the most developable land of 600,000 homes.

We have mapped out the assets listed in the government database which add up to 250,000 ha of land. Each of the dots represent land holdings of different government bodies.

These sites are operational so departments have to have development potential in mind when reviewing operational strategies. The highest concentration of central government land listed on the database is in the East of England and in the South West but there are over 20,000 ha in each region outside London. The vast majority, 97%, falls outside urban areas, due mainly to the major rural holdings of DEFRA and location of MoD bases.

We expect the spread would be different had we been able to include NHS ` and Local Authority land holdings as most of these estates are in urban locations.

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Taken from:
Spotlight: Public Land - unearthing potential