How green is Oxford's Green Belt?

The debate about finding new areas for building houses in and around Oxford is hotting up. Proponents of extending Oxford’s boundaries to build more homes for people working in the city are considering developing land that is currently in Oxford’s Green Belt.

Organisations that want to protect Oxford’s historic character and setting, as well as the green landscape of woodlands and fields around the city, vehemently disagree.

How does the local Wildlife Trust feel about Green Belt?

The Green Belt has a role to play in preserving the landscape setting of important historic cities. But it’s wrong to assume that Green Belt and an area rich in wildlife are synonymous; in fact wildlife protection has never been a reason for designating Green Belt. A review in 2007 found that Green Belt is less likely to be considered of national importance for wildlife than land elsewhere, and only 5.5 per cent of Green Belt in the South-East is designated as Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs), compared with about eight per cent of general countryside.

But some areas, such as parts of the Chilterns, are where the protection of wildlife habitats and the Green Belt coincide and this is also where a lot of people come into contact with wildlife.

Current Government policy gives five reasons for designating Green Belt: avoiding sprawl, preventing towns merging, avoiding encroachment into countryside, protecting historic town settings, and assisting urban regeneration.

Subsequently it was recognised that, if the land was to be preserved from development, there could be opportunities to make that land more useful. Government policy proposes that possible benefits, including the ‘securing of nature conservation interests’, could be considered for land in the Green Belt.

Creating green networks could be more important for people and wildlife in the long term than protecting all of the Green Belt. Local Wildlife Sites, nature reserves and Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs) could be linked by restored hedgerows and wildflower meadows.

Planners and developers in Oxfordshire are identifying where networks of wildlife habitats could be improved with links between countryside and housing, without detrimental effects on nature.

Wildlife still needs better protection to survive the planning process.

Development, whether for housing, employment or transport, can be a major issue for wildlife and the future of species, such as nightingales, that rely on specific habitats for survival. However, if development is located in the right places, and wildlife is taken into account seriously, there are examples of positive benefits for wildlife. The eco-town proposals are a good illustration of this.

The original plan for a new town at Weston Otmoor involved building on top of one of Oxfordshire’s most wildlife-rich grasslands. The revised proposals, to the north-west of Bicester, show every sign of improving the amount of wildlife habitat in and around the development when it’s completed.

City sanctuary: Cutteslowe Park on Oxford’s north edge 

Infrastructure development, including new housing, is the major threat to key wildlife species, leading to isolated pockets of small and fragmented wildlife-rich habitats. Genuine change in land use can be a driver for reconnecting habitats such as woodlands and meadows, and can provide better networks for wildlife and people, whether in the Green Belt or not.

This work could be extended throughout England if the Nature and Wellbeing Act, created by the Wildlife Trusts with organisations such as the RSPB to be a strategic plan for wildlife and people, is implemented in the next parliament. The Berks, Bucks & Oxon Wildlife Trust has worked with partners for many years to highlight where the key pressures, and opportunities, lie for development in our region.

It’s challenging work, because wildlife is competing with the value of land for everything from agricultural use to shopping centres. It’s also work that often goes unseen by the public, but is vitally important if we are to reverse the declines in wildlife.

Find out more at bbowt.org.uk/what-we-do/planningadvice