932 years ago, William the Conqueror started the Domesday Book, compiling a list of all the land in his newly conquered country.

Then, at the midwinter [1085], was the king in Glocester with his council … . After this had the king a large meeting, and very deep consultation with his council, about this land; how it was occupied, and by what sort of men. Then sent he his men over all England into each shire; commissioning them to find out “How many hundreds of hides were in the shire, what land the king himself had, and what stock upon the land; or, what dues he ought to have by the year from the shire.” (Anglo-Saxon Chronicle)

On Wednesday this week, the Mayor’s Combined Authority for Cambridgeshire and Peterborough established a Land Commission to

develop a comprehensive database of available public and private sector land (prioritising large sites), identify barriers to its disposal/development, and develop solutions to address those barriers to help the Combined Authority meet its housing goals and unlock more land for employment use.

The (brief) report is at P22 here.

Note: The image above is of the page of the original Domesday Book containing entries for (among other places) Sutton, Witcham, Witchford, Little Downham and Wentworth.

Credit to Professor J.J.N. Palmer and George Slater under licence Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported (CC BY-SA 3.0)