North Northamptonshire Strategic Plan

We are required to prepare a local plan to guide development and growth in our area – everything from homes and jobs to schools and infrastructure. It must also support conservation and enhancement of the natural, built and historic environment and include measures to address climate change.

The current Local Plan for North Northamptonshire includes the Joint Core Strategy and supporting area-based plans. The Joint Core Strategy adopted in July 2016 provides the strategic planning policies for the future development of the area from 2016 to 2031.

It outlines a big picture to be developed in more detail through the Part 2 Local Plans and by Neighbourhood Plans prepared by Neighbourhood Planning Groups.

These are supported by a number of Supplementary Planning Documents. Progress on the local plan and the implementation of the policies within it are reported annually through our Authority's Monitoring Reports.

We are reviewing our strategic planning policies as part of this work to take into account changes since 2016, and extend the plan period to 2041.

Scope and issues

Consultation on the Scope and Issues was the first stage of preparing our Strategic Plan.

We asked for comments on the key planning issues facing the area, and the proposed scope and contents of the new Strategic Plan from 28 March to 23 May 2022.

A report was taken to the Planning Policy Executive Advisory Panel on 14 December 2022 summarising the consultation responses and the next steps to creating our Strategic Plan and other relevant issues.

Next steps

The feedback from the consultation will help us develop the next stages of the Strategic Plan.

The Local Development Scheme (LDS) is a project plan that sets out the future stages in preparing the plan. The latest LDS was agreed in March 2022, however the dates set out in this document are currently under review. The next stage will be to consult on options on planning for future growth. 

You can email us at [email protected] to be notified of future planning consultations.

Sustainability Appraisal Scoping

The Sustainability Appraisal Scoping report proposes a framework that includes objectives and indicators to measure progress against. We can then use this to assess our draft policies and proposals as part of the plan making process.

The report was subject to consultation at the same time as the Scope and Issues document.

A summary of responses to this consultation was taken to the Planning Policy Executive Advisory Panel on 14 December 2022.

Call for Sites

A Call for Sites consultation took place from 12 January to 25 April 2022. This allowed interested parties to submit potential sites for consideration in the Strategic Plan and other relevant work (such as registers of brownfield sites). An interactive map of sites received through the Call for Sites will be published here when available.

Please email us at [email protected] if you want to submit a site for consideration.

Last updated 24 March 2023