Green belt should be developed to solve housing pressures, report says

New housing should be built on London’s green belt in order to alleviate development pressure in the south east, a new report argues.

A 21st Century Metropolitan Green Belt, a study published today by the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), makes the case for stopping the piecemeal development of the metropolitan green belt and replacing it with a strategic approach.

The report proposed the development of a limited number of corridors, surrounded by ‘green wedges’, into green belt areas. These would be made up of a chain of centres along public transport links, with extra housing and commercial and industrial space.

The first such corridor, the report suggested, could run out to Cambridge to test the feasibility of this approach.

Alan Mace, assistant professor of urban planning studies at LSE and