The government's figure for the borough is now 1,098 homes a year, 62% above the plan adopted in December. Land can be put forward until 28 September.

Tunbridge Wells Borough Council has extended its call for sites to midnight on 28 September, and the number it is now planning against is a great deal larger than the one in the Local Plan it adopted nine months ago.

Under the government’s revised standard method, the council says the housing need figure for the borough is about 1,098 homes a year. The Local Plan adopted in December 2025 was built on 678 a year. That is 420 more homes every year, an increase of 62%. (Tunbridge Wells Borough Council, Local Plan Review call for sites)

Annual housing figure for Tunbridge Wells borough, adopted plan against the new standard method A bar chart comparing two annual housing figures for Tunbridge Wells borough. The Local Plan 2020 to 2038, adopted in December 2025, was based on 678 dwellings a year. The government's revised standard method gives about 1,098 dwellings a year, an increase of 420 a year or 62 per cent. The borough's annual housing figure has gone up by 62% Dwellings a year. Source: Tunbridge Wells Borough Council, Local Plan Review call for sites page. Adopted Local Plan 2020-2038 678 Government's revised standard method 1,098 A difference of 420 homes every year. Graphic by T Wells Today
The adopted plan and the figure the review has to work to, side by side.

Why the review is happening at all

The Local Plan for 2020 to 2038 was adopted in December 2025, and it arrived already committed to its own replacement. Policy STR1, the development strategy policy, requires the council to start a review within six months of adoption.

The council’s own explanation is that changes to the development strategy left it with a 10 year rather than a 15 year housing land supply, so there is unmet housing need to find room for. The review will cover the period 2029 to 2044.

What is being asked for, and by when

The call for sites opened on Monday 11 May and now closes at midnight on Monday 28 September. It is not only about housing. The council is asking for land for:

  • new housing, including Gypsy and Traveller and Travelling showpeople pitches and plots
  • employment uses
  • community and leisure uses
  • green open space and nature conservation
  • other uses

Anyone can submit: residents, businesses, developers, agents and landowners. If you are putting forward more than one site, each needs its own submission.

What a submission has to contain

The online form takes about ten minutes and you can save it and come back. You need your contact details, information about who owns the site, the site location, and its current and proposed use.

The part people get wrong is the boundary. Without a site boundary drawing the council will not assess your site. It has to arrive in one of three forms:

  • a spatial file, such as a shapefile
  • a boundary drawn with the council’s digital mapping tool after you submit the form
  • a PDF site location plan, an Ordnance Survey map, ideally at 1:1250 scale

Putting land forward is not the same as getting permission

A submitted site is not an allocated site. Everything that comes in is assessed for whether it is suitable, available and achievable during the plan period, with site visits, sustainability checks and input from statutory consultees. The results go into a Strategic Housing and Economic Land Availability Assessment, the technical document that then informs which sites are allocated.

One thing worth knowing before you send anything: submissions cannot be kept confidential. The council is required to publish them, and the names of individuals, groups and organisations may be published alongside.

What it means for you

  • If you own land in the borough, the deadline is midnight on Monday 28 September. No boundary drawing means no assessment, so sort that first.
  • If you do not, this is still the document to watch. When the assessment is published it will be the fullest public list yet of where landowners and developers want to build in this borough, parish by parish.
  • Expect the pressure to be on the same places. The adopted plan already puts about 2,450 dwellings at Paddock Wood and east Capel, and the review has to find room for considerably more than the plan it replaces.
  • Nothing here is a decision. The 1,098 figure is a starting point for the review, not an allocation, and no site becomes developable because someone put it on a form.
  • The council publishes the names. If that matters to you, factor it in before submitting.

We track applications as they come through the borough’s planning portal on our Tunbridge Wells planning news page, and what the market is doing on house prices.

Sources: Tunbridge Wells Borough Council, Tunbridge Wells Local Plan Review - Call for Sites, read 8 September 2026, for the 1,098 and 678 figures, Policy STR1, the 10 year supply position, the 2029 to 2044 review period, the submission requirements and the SHELAA process; Tunbridge Wells Borough Council news, REMINDER - Local Plan Review - Call for Sites - EXTENDED, published 4 September 2026. The 420 a year and 62% figures are our own arithmetic on the council’s two published numbers.