Development land in Merseyside: 798 brownfield sites
The 6 planning authorities in Merseyside have published 798 sites on their brownfield land registers — land the councils themselves assessed as suitable for housing. Together: about 1,022 hectares and an estimated 26,280 dwellings of capacity.
Rank these sites with constraints netted off →
Which councils hold the land
Every authority publishes its register separately, so these totals exist nowhere else. Click a council for its full register.
| Authority | Sites | Hectares | Max dwellings |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wirral | 190 | 168 | 11,276 |
| Knowsley | 172 | 355 | 9,822 |
| St Helens | 130 | 224 | — |
| Liverpool | 114 | 75 | — |
| Sefton | 96 | 130 | — |
| Halton | 96 | 70 | 5,182 |
The five Merseyside districts plus Halton, which together form the Liverpool City Region.
Largest sites in Merseyside
| Site | Authority | Hectares | Max dwellings |
|---|---|---|---|
| East of Halewood Plot 3 | Knowsley | 35.7 | 196 |
| Land at Cowley Street and Albert Street, Moss Bank, WA10 1TY | St Helens | 32.1 | — |
| Moss Nook Urban Village, Watery Lane, St. Helens, WA9 3EN | St Helens | 26.7 | — |
| Former D1 Oils, Dock Road South, Bromborough | Wirral | 23.5 | 1225 |
| Land south of Cherryfield Drive, Kirkby | Knowsley | 22.5 | 800 |
| Land At Knowsley Lane Huyton Knowsley | Knowsley | 21.8 | 154 |
| Town Lane - David Wilson Homes, Town Lane, Southport | Sefton | 18.9 | — |
| CENTRAL DOCKS | Liverpool | 17.4 | — |
| Land South Of Lickers Lane And Site Of Former Saunder's Nursery, Windy Arbor Roa | Knowsley | 16.2 | 350 |
| Plot 2 - Land To North Of Railway Line Bounded By Lower Road Greensbridge Lane A | Knowsley | 15.8 | 98 |
| Land North Of M62 Motorway Off Windy Arbor Road (Halsnead) Whiston Knowsley L35 | Knowsley | 14.8 | 123 |
| Land at Hind Street, Tranmere | Wirral | 14.7 | 1400 |
Source: the councils’ own brownfield land registers, published via planning.data.gov.uk under the Open Government Licence v3.0. 75 further entries repeat the area of a site already listed (councils often record a whole site's area against each phase), so that land is counted once. 386 of the 798 sites (48%) state no dwelling capacity, so the capacity figure covers the 412 that do — the real total is higher.
Before you get attached to one
A register entry is not planning permission and not an offer to sell. It records that the council thinks housing could work there. Whether the owner agrees is a separate conversation, and whether a scheme gets approved is a third.
- Net off the constraints first. Green belt, Flood Zone 3 and listed buildings kill more register sites than anything else.
- The dwelling figure is the council’s opinion. 26,280 across Merseyside is a planning-policy estimate, not a set of designs.
- Price it off recorded sales. HM Land Registry Price Paid tells you what actually sold; work the residual land value from there.
- England has no zoning. The Local Plan and the Use Classes Order decide what is achievable, application by application.
How to read a register entry properly → · Five ways to find UK development land →
GoSiteHunt is an advertising and analysis platform, not a real estate agent or planning consultancy. Everything here is indicative screening from public data — not a valuation, not planning advice, and never a substitute for the councils’ own records or your own professional advisers.