Sheffield City Council will be consulting on the final draft of their emerging Local Plan from 9th January 2023 for a six-week period. The emerging plan will replace the currently adopted and outdated Local Plan, which comprises the 2009 Core Strategy and 1998 Unitary Development Plan.

The emerging Local Plan will set out how and where development will take place up to 2038, through both strategic and local policies. On the 3rd November 2022, the Draft Local Plan Proposal and Policy Maps were approved for public consultation by Sheffield City Council’s Transport, Regeneration and Climate Policy Committee. The emerging Local Plan places focus on:

• Climate change including air quality, carbon zero objectives, and air quality;
• Protection of the Greenbelt, with only few release sites identified, and no further review of the boundaries proposed; and
• Housing provision, with proposals for 35,700 homes proposed over the plan period (2,100 dpa). It is proposed that these housing targets will be met through urban area intensification and brownfield development, with acknowledgement that some former employment sites will shift to potential housing sites. It is also proposed that affordable housing will be sought on sites >10 dwellings at a rate of between 10-30%. Such emphasis on brownfield development and climate change mitigation whilst still meeting the development needs across the city may have numerous implications, and potential viability challenges.

As this is the final stage of the Local Plan’s public consultation, it is important that your comments are made now to be considered by the Planning Inspectorate. 

If you have land which has not yet been considered by the Council, or any sites which have been previously rejected, this is your last opportunity to put these forward to the Council, and also scrutinise why it has not been included for development. We can help to review your site and its planning merits, and understand whether the Council’s proposed housing and employment land supplies, meet the required need. We would be able to review the Council’s application of the standard housing methodology, including the required 35% urban city uplift, to understand if a sufficient housing supply has been calculated for the Plan period. 

Our advice and experience covers strategic planning, through to consideration of planning obligations placed on a variety of developments, including residential (both market sale and build-to-rent) and commercial schemes, aiming to ensure your development is viable and deliverable.  

Specific consideration should be given to the viability of future development sites, if some of the proposed policies are adopted in their current format, they could create significant further financial costs for applications to meet planning policy requirements. Our Development Consultancy team has vast experience in providing development viability advice on site-specific and policy-level planning viability.

The final consultation on Sheffield’s emerging Local Plan opens on 9th January 2023 and closes on 20th February 2023, with submission of the final draft of the Plan expected to the Planning Inspectorate in spring 2023, and adoption of the Plan anticipated in December 2024. 

If you have a site for development located in the Sheffield Local Plan area and would like us to put your site forward, or provide insight on any potential implications of the proposed policies in the emerging plan, we can prepare or advise on potential consultation submissions. We would review your site, the Council’s proposed planning strategy, and if required, propose modifications to currently worded draft policies, please contact us to discuss further.