One of the aims of the Council Plan is to provide ‘Homes for All’ and the Government has also made it very clear that it wants to boost the supply of new homes, to about 300,000 homes per annum nationally. Local plans are required to be based on evidence and to identify and plan for the various housing needs arising. It is also very important to deliver the right types and sizes of homes, including affordable homes, in locations that are sustainable. A significant amount of development is already planned in Winchester District and the minimum amount of additional housing that is required in the future will be set by the Government.

The Government identifies how much housing we need to accommodate in our Local Plans. Over the 20-year new Local Plan period (2019 – 2039) we need to plan for approximately 15,600 dwellings. Some of this requirement has already been planned in the current Local Plan but devising a strategy to achieve the additional housing, and allocating sites, are some of the main tasks for the new Local Plan.

The Local Plan also needs to plan for various types of specialist housing and a range of housing for all sectors of the community (e.g. ‘self and custom build’, student accommodation, older persons’ housing and gypsy and traveller and travelling showpersons accommodation).

The Local Plan needs evidence about which types of housing should be provided to meet the future needs of the community. Therefore, we have completed a ‘Strategic Housing Market Assessment’ (which is referred to as a “SHMA”) which contains evidence about the District’s housing stock, the need for different types of housing and the various forms of affordable and other housing provision.

The Council has produced the ‘Strategic Housing and Employment Land Availability Assessment (or ‘SHELAA’) which is a list of sites that potentially can be allocated for housing (or employment/other purposes). Inclusion of a site in the SHELAA list does not necessarily imply the Council would allocate the site for development or grant planning permission for development, with only a small proportion of the SHELAA sites proposed for allocation in the draft Local Plan.

Various other key evidence studies have been undertaken in relation to housing issues affecting the district:

• Future Local Housing Need and Population Profile Assessment (2020)

• Winchester District Strategic Housing Market Assessment (2020)

• Settlement Hierarchy Review 

• Assessment of Windfall Trends and Potential (2021)

• Strategic Housing and Employment Land Availability Assessment (2021)

• Interim Position Statement on Student Accommodation in Winchester (2018)

• Winchester Local Plan Interim Viability Assessment (2022)

• Gypsy and Traveller Accommodation Assessment (2022)

• Brownfield Register (2021)

Please find the link to the Regulation 18 draft Local Plan ^{(pdf, 24.7mb)}