Why building homes around railway stations is ‘far from an assault on the countryside’

Publication of the government’s latest National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) –  revealed in a blaze of publicity last week – was simultaneously long-awaited and out of the blue.

The NPPF is a crucial document which sets out the government’s rules for how all planning applications should be decided, and how local authorities should plan for the future of their areas. In theory, all regional and local planning policies should be compliant with it. Having been published on 17 August, it takes immediate effect.

The contents were not entirely a surprise: building around railway stations had been a key tenet of the Labour government’s push to build more homes, and a consultation draft of the policy had been released in the dying days of 2025. Earlier this year Steve Reed, then housing secretary, promised the final version before the summer recess. When it had failed to arrive, those of us who follow these things assumed it wouldn’t then appear until MPs’ returned in September; perhaps so that it would be seen as a Burnham project rather than a Starmer one – 0r because the government would be reluctant to publish such an important piece of policy during the silly season.

So, its sudden appearance in the middle of August came as a surprise.

The headline-grabbing announcement that accompanied the launch is also the most controversial. Under this policy, automatic planning permission will be granted for new homes around well-connected railway stations – an idea much to the chagrin of rural voters who have quickly mobilised to oppose the idea. Battle lines have been swiftly drawn, and the usual lazy tropes about “concreting over the countryside” have been deployed.

According to the new policy, well-connected stations (which means those already served, or capable of being served, by frequent trains) that are also in areas of high productivity should have new homes built around them. The document goes as far as determining minimum density requirements, set at 35 or 45 homes per hectare depending on the number of services per hour. For reference, a typical edge-of-town housing estate might achieve 20 homes per hectare; tight terraced streets as much as 50. Sitting somewhere in between, the NPPF targets feel about right, having been reduced from 50 since the December draft.

Of course, “automatic” permission in this context doesn’t literally mean permission is automatic. Developers won’t be able to construct 20-storey residential towers in the middle of nowhere. They won’t be allowed to build houses without windows. Nor can they chop down ancient woodland to make way for homes. Local and national planning policies will still apply, setting minimum standards for internal areas, car parking and daylight; but councils will no longer be able to turn down such applications simply because they’re in open countryside or within the green belt. In all likelihood, some redundant fields, unproductive farmland, golf courses, and quite a few car parks will go.

Planning consultancy Lichfields helpfully calculated where these new home could be located. As you’d expect, given that well-connected stations tend to be close to major population centres, most are in the South East. The home counties have capacity for nearly 250,000 homes; Birmingham, 95,000; Merseyside, 168,000, and the Ridings, 78,000. There’s a handful in Cornwall and around Tyneside, too. All in all, Lichfields estimates between 530,000 and 570,000 homes could be enabled by this policy. And while it’s inevitable that this is being seen as a partisan assault on the countryside, in actual fact Labour-voting constituencies are more likely to see homes built around their stations than Conservative ones – potentially up to a third.

Read more:

• Can Labour really build 1.5m new homes? Not without ‘bold’ and urgent planning reform, experts say
• How Reeves’ autumn budget dealt a brutal blow to Labour’s 1.5 million new homes pledge
• Labour urged to come up with plan to fill 300,000 empty homes to tackle homelessness

My own research calculated that the country’s stations have the capacity for as many as 1.2m homes around them; others‘, as many as 2.1m. These numbers were calculated using a different set of assumptions and constraints, but whichever way you look at it: the potential is huge.

Arguments against the policy are numerous, including accusations that we will irrecoverably destroy productive farmland or precious natural habitats. The loss of green belt is a cause for concern in some quarters, particularly as many of the stations that are close to major cities are also located within the green belt that surrounds them. But remember that the green belt covers a total area of more than 6,300 square miles, and even if we were to build every single one of the government’s entire housing target on the green belt (which we’re not) less than 2.5% of it would be lost. It’s a similar story with farmland: just under 20,000 square miles of our countryside is in productive agricultural use: less than one percent of this would be needed to meet Labour’s manifesto commitment, and the reality is that the total required is far less than even this. However you look at it, it’s a drop in the ocean.

Whether the building 1.5m homes would have a meaningful effect on housing affordability is the subject of endless debate, even if this were still achievable within the remaining three years of this parliamentary term. Given that this new NPPF is the second of the Labour administration (a first was rushed out within the first six months), and the length of time it still takes for major planning applications to be determined – let alone the length of time it takes for the resulting homes to be built – the chances of this new policy making any kind of meaningful dent in the government’s manifesto commitment looks vanishingly slim.

But that doesn’t mean it isn’t worth a try. The purpose of national planning policy is to set the direction of travel for the coming decades, not the remaining term of parliament. Our inability to build the homes we need – or, for that matter, build anything much of consequence – is a product of policy being buffeted by the five-yearly electoral cycle. The ambitions set out in the NPPF are undoubtably bold, but potentially transformative, too. It deserves our support.

Russell Curtis is founding director of RCKa

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