Government announces its support for development of garden town in Aylesbury

On Monday 2nd January 2017 the Government announced its support for the development of a new garden town in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire.

Other locations chose for garden towns include Taunton in Somerset and Harlow & Gilston in Essex and Hertfordshire). £1.4 million of funding will be made available to support their delivery.

Together with the seven garden towns already announced the new garden settlements have the combined potential to provide almost 200,000 new homes across the country.

Housing and Planning Minister Gavin Barwell said: ‘Locally-led garden towns and villages have enormous potential to deliver the homes that communities need.

New communities not only deliver homes, they also bring new jobs and facilities and a big boost to local economies. These places combined could provide almost 200,000 homes.‘

Besides funding, the government will also provide support in terms of expertise, brokerage and offer of new planning freedoms.

A garden town is a development of more than 10,000 homes. Garden villages are smaller settlements of between 1,500 and 10,000 homes.

More than 25,000 housing starts are expected in garden villages, towns and cities supported by the government by 2020. Homes are already being built in several locations, including Bicester, Basingstoke, Didcot, Ebbsfleet, Aylesbury, Taunton and North Northants.

The new garden projects will also have access to infrastructure funding programmes across government, such as the new £2.3 billion Housing Infrastructure Fund announced in the 2016 Autumn Statement.