IN NUMBERS: Development holds in Leeds but falls in Manchester
Developer confidence has held firm in Leeds, where planning applications per capita gained ground on rival Manchester and bucked the national trend.
Planning applications fell by over a fifth in Manchester but in Leeds remained steady, growing by 0.3% last year.
Despite being more than three times the size of Leeds, Manchester saw just 346 applications across the whole of 2014, compared with 309 in Leeds.
Leeds registered 4.1 applications per 10,000 residents, while Manchester saw just 1.4 applications per 10,000 residents.
According to data released at last night’s Leeds Question Time, the Yorkshire capital saw a rise in residential and hotel applications drive the city forward despite applications for telecoms falling by 85%.
In Manchester, declines across the board – except for residential applications – resulted in 99 fewer applications last year compared to 2013.
Both cities saw a strong decline in telecoms applications, though this was mainly owing to the unsustainably high number of applications in 2013.
Planning applications fell by 4% nationally over the same period.
Housing applications rose in both cities, which points to slowly recovering house building markets.
According to Land Registry data, house prices in both cities remain roughly at 2010 levels, though house prices generally rose across 2014.
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