Selling Land in Cheshire East

When the Local Plan Strategy was adopted, it set aside some land for possible growth beyond the plan period, without putting it in the Green Belt. Policy PG 4 lists eight parcels, about 186 hectares in all, and says they should not be developed until a review of the plan allocates them:

• Macclesfield: South West Macclesfield (LPS 19), 95.7 hectares.
• Handforth: an extension to the North Cheshire Growth Village (LPS 35), 14 hectares.
• Knutsford: land south and north of Tabley Road (LPS 39 and 40), 11 hectares each, and land next to Booths Hall (LPS 41), 8.7 hectares.
• Poynton: Woodford Aerodrome (LPS 52), 22 hectares.
• Wilmslow: Heathfield Farm (LPS 58), 9 hectares, and Upcast Lane and Cumber Lane (LPS 59), 15 hectares.

Both Wilmslow parcels are now the subject of full applications. Officers recommended approval of both, and on 16 September 2026 the Strategic Planning Board resolved to approve them, subject to section 106 agreements and conditions: Cumber Lane by 7 votes to 4, and Dean Row Road by 8 to 1 with two abstentions. A resolution is not yet a permission; the decision notices follow once the section 106 agreements are signed. The officers' reports set out the two schemes:

Each scheme conflicts with policy PG 4, the open countryside policy PG 6 and its own site policy, and officers said so plainly. Both reports then applied policy S5 of the August 2026 framework and treated the supply shortfall in the monitoring update, 8,780 deliverable homes against a five-year need of 13,162, as evidence of unmet need. The council's strong delivery test result did not change that, because S5 names a supply short of five years and a result below 75% as separate examples. The Cumber Lane report went further: Annex A of the framework gives very limited weight to plan policies that are materially inconsistent with the national decision-making policies, and officers found PG 4, PG 6 and LPS 59 to be exactly that when set against S5. They also noted that Wilmslow lies immediately next to the site. Neither site is in the Green Belt, so grey belt and the Golden Rules did not arise.

The balance still had to be struck. At Cumber Lane officers gave moderate weight against the scheme to the greenhouse gas released by digging out peat, even though it is to be reused on site, and to parts of the layout, and still found that the harm did not substantially outweigh the case for approval. At Dean Row Road, first reported in July under the old framework, officers wrote in September that the case for approval, if anything, was now even stronger. A further application, 26/2452/FUL, covers the land next to the Cumber Lane site and had not been decided when the reports were written.

That tells a landowner two things. Safeguarded land sits outside the Green Belt, so S5 can reach it while the shortfall lasts. And the council's officers and its own planning board have shown how much weight they now give a shortfall of this size, even against a plan policy written to hold land back for later.

Beyond each settlement boundary in the south of the borough, policy PG 6 treats land as open countryside, allowing only the types of development and the exceptions it lists, and the same policy applies to safeguarded land. It is the second of the policies the Cumber Lane report gave very limited weight against S5.

The Local Plan Strategy released no Green Belt land at Crewe, Nantwich, Sandbach or Middlewich, and towns like these are where S5 can do most of its work in Cheshire East. A field that shares a boundary with the edge of one of them, outside the Green Belt and the green gaps, is judged on how well it relates to the settlement and whether the services can take it, rather than on the old open countryside line alone.

The Four Strategic Green Gaps

Crewe and Nantwich are kept apart from their neighbours by a different tool. Policy PG 5 protects four gaps: between Willaston, Wistaston, Nantwich and Crewe; between Willaston, Rope, Shavington and Crewe; between Crewe, Shavington, Basford and Weston; and between Crewe and Haslington. New buildings that would erode the gap or lead to settlements merging are refused, with an exception only where no suitable alternative location exists. The scoping document says evidence on the gaps will be revisited for the new plan. Land inside a gap is harder to bring forward under S5 than land beside it, so the gap line is one of the first things we check on a Crewe site. Our farmland page explains how we look at larger holdings here.

The New Plan's Timetable

Cheshire East published its notice of intention on 12 June 2026 and ran a scoping consultation from 21 July to 1 September 2026. The council's timetable, which it reviews monthly, sets out the stages from there:

Sites: Closed for Now, Reopening With the Plan

Calls for sites ran from April to July 2024 and again in February and March 2026, and every site put forward is assessed for its suitability, availability and achievability before any is chosen. The call is closed today, but the council's call for sites FAQs say there will be further chances to submit land, most likely at the plan content and evidence stage in summer 2027. Our guide to call for sites and local plans explains what the council looks for at each step.

The Next Supply Update and Delivery Test

The council reviews supply each year in its Housing Monitoring Update, and the one at 31 March 2025 was published in April 2026. Before each is finalised, the council contacts agents, landowners and housebuilders about progress on their sites and circulates the draft forecast to the development industry for comment. We make no forecast of the next, but until the new plan allocates land, any figure short of five years keeps S5 in play outside the Green Belt and keeps the need test met for grey belt. The Housing Delivery Test 2025 came out on 17 August 2026; at 213% none of its consequences applies, and the test is repeated annually.

What This Means for Timing

• Land well related to a town or village outside the Green Belt can be assessed for an application now, while the shortfall carries weight.
• Green Belt land that may be grey belt is worth assessing now too, on its own boundaries, with the Golden Rules built in from the start.
• Larger or more open holdings are better prepared for the 2027 consultation, when the council expects to take sites again.
• Small sites of up to nine homes on less than half a hectare will be decided by officers rather than a committee from 31 October 2026, under the national scheme of delegation the board was briefed on in September 2026.