State of brownfield 2018

We’ve long campaigned for prioritising the use of brownfield land for housing because we believe it stops the waste of the countryside.

This research examines new brownfield registers, published by 320 local planning authorities in England.

It follows previous work from CPRE, including “From Wasted Space to Living Spaces” in 2014 and brownfield housing capacity research in 2016, which has consistently demonstrated that there is sufficient suitable brownfield land currently available for more than 1 million homes.

This report shows that local planning authorities have identified more brownfield land with space for more than 1 million homes, and that there is brownfield land in places where people want to live.

If this land is used more efficiently, the sites could deliver even more homes – preventing the unnecessary loss of countryside and green spaces.