Housing growth
Significant housing growth is taking place in and around Cambridge. This includes large-scale developments on the urban fringes as well as smaller sites. Read our urban growth web page for more details.
Development of affordable housing
We are aiming to:
- increase the supply of housing which is affordable to local people
- build social housing that will have improved standards to help reduce poverty
- support development of sustainable new communities in major developments
- increase the overall supply of housing in the city – with a better mix of dwelling type
- make best use of planning policies which require developers to provide affordable housing when they build market housing
- develop a close partnership with other local authorities for planning and delivering new housing around the edge of Cambridge
- increase the housing choices available to people with disabilities - including an increased supply of wheelchair accessible housing
Our Housing Strategy gives more information on our approach to housing development in Cambridge.
Council house building programme
316 new council homes were built in Cambridge in the five years from 2013/14 to 2017/18.
£70m was awarded through the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Devolution Deal to deliver 500 new council homes in the City. Delivery of these homes is being managed through the Greater Cambridge Housing Development Agency.
Promoting development of other affordable housing
We work with partners to promote the provision of new affordable housing schemes in the city. In addition to our own house-building programme, 1,506 new affordable homes were built by other providers between 2013 and 2018.
We ensure that the affordable housing required by our planning policies and our housing strategy are delivered. We work with registered social landlords, private developers, local authority partners and other interested parties to achieve this.
We require at least 40% of all new built homes across the city, on developments that attract section 106 contributions, to be affordable homes. We also require a good mix of sizes, types and tenures of affordable housing.
Our charter for new affordable housing [PDF, 0.2MB] outlines how to gain our support in proposing new affordable housing schemes.
As well as promoting delivery of new homes, we also work with partners to help create attractive and sustainable neighbourhoods.
More information on our approach, through our Local Plan and our Affordable Housing Supplementary Planning Document, is available through our Cambridge Local Plan pages.
Community led housing
We have been awarded a government grant to support communities who wish to bring their own affordable housing schemes forward.
This is in partnership with South Cambridgeshire District Council.
Contact us
For further information on affordable housing development contact us at housingdevelopment@cambridge.gov.uk.
