Hundreds of new houses are in the offing for rough grazing and other fields between Swindon and Wanborough.

The land, in a triangle of open fields between the A419 and the Wanborough Road as it approaches the flyover the dual carriageway has been allocated as part of the New Eastern Villages expansion of Swindon, and will be called Foxbridge .

A large chunk, 40 acres - about the size of 40 football pitches - in the north of the ‘Foxbridge’ area has been bought by two companies working together - Danescroft and Palmer Capital.

They are not builders, but will work as land promoters - the companies will come up with a planning proposal for a development of 300 houses, try to get planning permission for it from Swindon Borough Council and then want to sell the land to a building company - if it has planning consent that will increase the price the companies can housebuilders charge for it.

Chris Button, at Palmer Capital said: “Many housebuilders are unwilling or unable to buy sites without a planning consent and we are able to perform an important role in unlocking these sites by acquiring them unconditionally, investing significant sums to obtain consent and then selling on to housebuilders so that new homes can be delivered to fulfil local needs. We have significant capital to invest in similar opportunities.”

James Trelfa, Director at Danescroft noted: “The conclusion of this acquisition marks a strong start to 2019 for Danescroft and takes our portfolio of residential plots controlled to over 1,000. We continue to seek similar unconditional opportunities, for which we have substantial equity to deploy.”

Swindon Borough Council’s cabinet member for strategic planning Gary Sumner is pleased that the council’s plans for the eastern expansion are moving ahead, and developers clearly feel more and more people will want to live in Swindon.

He said: “We now have applications in for around 8,000 homes at NEV and we will be delivering £110m of highways schemes starting this year, so I’m not surprised to see another vote of confidence from the market in seeing that these new ‘villages’ will be a great place to live.

“Swindon has great communication links with other major Towns and City’s and is becoming a popular lifestyle destination for those seeking better value homes in a fantastic location surrounded by countryside.

“We look forward to working with the new owners of the Foxbridge site to bring forward plans which reflect the location and spirit of these new villages.”