Tipner: Portsmouth council discusses alternatives to reclaimed land plan

The RSPB and Hampshire and Isle of Wight Wildlife Trust had called for the Lennox Point development to be stopped

Plans to replace thousands of homes which would have been built on reclaimed land off Portsmouth are being worked on by the city council.

The Liberal Democrat-led council paused the Lennox Point development at Tipner after criticism from conservationists.

Council leader Gerald Vernon-Jackson warned there could be less social housing in alternative plans.

Opposition councillors called for the "vanity project" to be formally abandoned.

The £1bn futuristic development created on a "super peninsula" would have seen up to 4,000 homes built.

A petition against it by Hampshire and Isle of Wight Wildlife Trust and the RSPB has been signed more than 24,000 times.

They had warned plans for the Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) would destroy feeding and roosting grounds for wintering waterfowl.

Two senior members of the Lennox Point project team resigned from their positions in recent weeks in a further sign progress on the scheme has stalled, according to the Local Democracy Reporting Service.

'Find space'

Mr Vernon-Jackson, who leads a minority administration, described the scheme as "dead", but warned the authority "needs alternatives".

"There would be 1,000 Portsmouth families unable to access affordable homes.

"We will have to find space for those homes we will no longer be able to build and we can't guarantee there will be as many social homes at other sites," he said.

He said failure to produce a Local Plan that hit the 17,700-home target could see the council stripped of its planning powers.

Conservative opposition councillors maintained the council had been slow to produce a housing blueprint and proposed schemes in the city, including at St James' Hospital, would have contributed to housing numbers.

Tory councillor Terry Norton said: "Lennox Point was an expensive vanity project that was probably never going to happen and has only led to further delays."

Development at Tipner West is still expected to go ahead but under the more limited ambitions of the £50m City Deal agreed in 2014, with existing land used for housing and business space.

Portsmouth City Council proposed creating a "super-peninsula" by reclaiming land from the sea