§ Mr. Edward DaveyTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions what estimates he has made, by county, of the number of derelict sites in England; and how many of these sites were formerly used for (i) sport and (ii) recreation. [15155]
§ Mr. RaynsfordThe latest information is from a survey of derelict land undertaken in 1993, which provides estimates of the area of derelict land by type of dereliction at county and district level. This information486W is included in Table 5 of "Survey of Derelict Land in England 1993 Volume 2-Reference Tables", a copy of which is in the House of Commons Library. There is no information available on the number of derelict sites at county level.
Derelict land is defined as
land so damaged by industrial or other development that it is incapable of beneficial use without treatment".It is unlikely that sites formerly used for sport and recreation would fall under this definition, and such sites were not separately classified within the types of dereliction recorded.
The Department's Land Use Change Statistics for England show that from 1985 to 1992, some 640 hectares of land previously used for outdoor recreation, or leisure and recreational buildings, became vacant or derelict. However, in some cases this will have been an intermediate stage before redevelopment.