Bristol build shortlisted for housing kickstart programme
A stalled housing scheme in north Bristol could see up to 149 new homes, a community centre and primary school shortly being built on land neighboring Patchway.
The houses would be a mixture of properties for sale, social rent and low cost home ownership.
The scheme has been shortlisted as part of a government investment of £925 million into a national build.
This could see 22,400 more homes being build across the country.
Each individual project has been identified by the Homes and Communities Agency through the Kickstart programme, an initiative to keep building mixed tenure homes through the recession and potentially create an estimated 20,000 new jobs.
Across the South West, a total of 25 projects have been identified with a £65,792 investment that could provide up to 2,121 more new homes across the region.
All projects have to go through a financial assessment to join the scheme with half the money to repaid within five years.
Housing Minister John Healey said: “We’ve pledged to use the power of Government investment to help Britain through the recession. This billion pound Kickstart programme will get stalled building work back on track, create jobs and help build the quality homes we need.
“Today I’m announcing that 270 housing projects across the country are shortlisted line for a share of £925m. This could kickstart work on up to 22,400 homes and create 20,000 jobs on housebuilding sites that have been mothballed in the recession. Around 8,600 of these homes would be for low cost rent or low cost ownership and two thirds will be built to some of the toughest ever standards helping to reduce CO2 emissions.
“This is not a handout to developers. There are tough terms to this deal including repayment of loans within five years. And only builders who accept a realistic current market price for their land are eligible.
“I want to see builders back on these sites within weeks. So I will be calling on successful developers to pull out all the stops so construction can restart as quickly as possible.”