Calls for popular Leicester green spaces to be saved from development

The former Western Park Golf course was closed by the city council in 2015

Calls are being made for two popular greenfield spaces in Leicester to be removed from a list of potential development sites.

Parts of the former Western Park Golf Course and Beaumont Park are earmarked for building by Leicester City Council but councillors want them preserved.

The issue will be discussed at a council meeting on Thursday.

Officials said the sites could relieve "desperate pressure" for land for new homes and employment in the city.

Under the city council's Local Plan - a strategy to manage Leicester's growth over the next 15 years - a 129 acre (52 hectare) section of the former golf course could provide 412 homes and space for industrial development.

A 51 acre (21 hectare) area of Beaumont Park has been proposed for employment use and 12 travellers pitches.

'Valuable open green space'

However councillors Patrick Kitterick and Hemant Rae Bhatia, who represent the Green Party and the Conservatives respectively on the city council, have called on the authority to remove the two sites from the Local Plan.

The Local Democracy Reporting Service said the pair had submitted a motion calling on the authority to "note the concerns of people in the west of Leicester at the proposed loss of valuable green open space at Beaumont Park and the former Western Park Golf Course in the city".

The motion proposes the Labour-led council should encourage the use of previously developed brownfield sites instead.

A council spokesperson previously said: "We are, of course, under desperate pressure to find space for new housing and employment land, and the Local Plan sets out a vision for the city's growth and objectives for the city's growth over the next 15 years."

Leicester West's Labour MP Liz Kendall recently launched a petition to save Beaumont Park, saying there were other parts of the city that could be developed instead.

She also previously called on the council to listen to the views of residents campaigning to stop the development of the former municipal golf course, which the council closed in 2015.