A plan to build more than 10,000 homes in Wycombe that has been four years in the making is one step closer to reality after councillors agreed to take the plan forward on Monday night.

The final draft of the Wycombe District Council Local Plan will now go before the full council at a meeting on October 9 for them to decide on.

The 450 page-long blueprint for the future of development across the district until 2033 says that a total of 10,925 homes need to be built to meet growing housing need.

That number has already been decreased from around 13,000 because of a lack of space in Wycombe due to Green Belt and Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) land surrounding it, and Aylesbury Vale is set to take on the extra 2,000 homes instead.

Over half of the 10,925 planned for the district will be in and around High Wycombe, with four reserve sites released for development - Gomm Valley, Terriers Farm and Terriers House, and Abbey Barn North and South.

Tralee Farm in Hazlemere and smaller sites including land to the rear of Hughenden Road, at Glynswood, Green Hill, at Horns Lane, Booker, and at the former Bassetsbury Allotments, will also be built on.

In a bid to meet employment needs, an area of land expected to be taken out of the Green Belt at Wycombe Airpark in Booker to allow for more business development, including employment uses on the triangle of land to the south of the airpark, while Cressex Business Park could also see major improvements.

Roughly a quarter of the total (2,650) will be built in Princes Risborough, on sites including land south of Horns Lane and at Princes Risborough Railway Station, while an area near Poppy Road will be taken out of the Green Belt to provide more housing.

There are also plans for new primary schools, a new road, open space and a new local centre, while new employment sites will be built at the Princes estate and land north of Lower Icknield Way.

In Marlow, the only new site identified for housing is near Seymour Court Road because of the flood risk from the River Thames.

Meanwhile in Bourne End and Wooburn, two sites – Slate Meadow and Hollands Farm – could see around 800 homes built, while over 400 are planned in Longwick and Kimble and other rural areas will also take smaller pockets of development.

Fifty per cent of the 10,925 homes look set to be built on what is currently brownfield land - previously developed land that is not currently in use.

Cllr David Johncock, planning chief at the district council, said they have had to make some “difficult choices” to get to this point.

He said: “We’ve made the very best use of brownfield sites and we’ve located housing in the best way we can working within the natural limitations across the district.”