Identifying, assessing and selecting sites
Identifying sites is an essential part of plan preparation and delivering a spatial strategy. In March 2026 the government updated draft guidance on the process of identifying, assessing and selecting sites for development as part of the local plan making process. The guidance sets out a recommended process to follow to identify and assess sites that could be used for housing or employment (and other land uses), and how to select sites to include a draft local plan.
The site selection process consists of four stages:
- Stage 1: Identifying sites
- Stage 2: Assessing sites
- Stage 3: Determining draft allocations
- Stage 4: Confirming draft allocations
The Council has already collated a significant amount of information on potential development sites through previous consultations, call for sites, and stage one of the Land Availability Assessment. More information on this work can be found at Land Availability Assessment | Cheshire West Planning Policy
Stage 1: Identifying sites
Finding potential sites
The Council's Land Availability Assessment (Stage One) 2026 (LAA 2026) provides the baseline information for this stage (Stage 1) of the site selection process, under the new plan making system. It includes a wide range of size, type, proposed use and location of sites across the borough, and includes both previously developed land (brownfield), greenfield sites, and land in the Green Belt.
A significant amount of information on potential development sites has been collated through the previous consultations, call for sites, and the preparation of the LAA 2026. This information has been reviewed, and updated where applicable, following completion of the 2025-2026 annual housing and employment land monitoring.
Site criteria
Spatial geography: the site identification is borough-wide and includes the city of Chester; mains towns of Ellesmere Port, Northwich, and Winsford; market towns of Neston, Frodsham and Helsby; and the borough's key villages, smaller settlements and the wider countryside.
Based on the size of the borough, and the need to identify a broad range of sites of various sizes, the following site thresholds have been applied:
- Housing sites: a capacity of five or more dwellings, or a net size of 0.2ha
- Employment sites: over 0.25ha, or in town centres 500sqm floorspace.
- Mixed use sites: applying housing and employment site thresholds as listed above, and applying a 50:50 (or even) split of uses that can be adjusted to take account of local circumstances where further information is available.
- Other uses: Alternative uses may be identified (for example, retail, leisure, minerals extraction, green space etc).
Stage 1: Outcomes
The map below shows the baseline data on potential sites to be used for the new Local Plan. Selecting a site, by clicking on the map, will display the following information:
- Site reference (an individual reference to help to identify a site through the assessment process)
- Location
- Site area (in hectares)
- Land type (previously developed land or greenfield)
- Source (how the site was identified)
- Potential proposed use eg housing or employment
It is important to note that sites that are included on this map have not yet been assessed and no decisions have been made on which sites may or may not be taken forward into the draft local plan.