Glastonbury, Street, Wells and Shepton Mallet were named in a rejected Somerset Council option that would have left them without new housing sites in the county's next major planning document.

The option was considered as part of early work on the Somerset Local Plan 2045, which will decide where new homes, business sites, roads, schools and other major projects can be planned across the county over the next 20 years.

Somerset Council is preparing one new Local Plan for the whole county, replacing the separate plans previously used by the former district councils.

The first public consultation is due to open on Friday, 19 June 2026, and close on Friday, 24 July 2026.

A council topic paper looked at different ways of deciding where new development should go.

One option considered was whether Somerset could avoid putting new housing and other major projects in areas where strict river pollution rules apply.

Those rules are designed to protect areas including the Somerset Levels and Moors and the River Axe. In those areas, new development has to show it will not add extra nutrients, including phosphates, to protected water systems.

The paper said it was considered reasonable to test an option that would "completely avoided development within the affected river catchments".

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The paper says that approach would have cut the number of places able to be considered for new homes and major development from 176 to 72.

It says: "It would mean that out of the top two tiers, no development could be proposed at Taunton, Yeovil, Wellington, Crewkerne, Glastonbury, Shepton Mallett, Street or Wells."

That would have left Glastonbury, Street, Wells and Shepton Mallet without new housing sites or major projects under that option.

Taunton, Yeovil, Wellington and Crewkerne would also have been affected.

The same option would have left only Bridgwater, Frome, Minehead and Alcombe, Highbridge and Burnham, Cheddar and Wincanton among Somerset's larger places still able to be earmarked for new homes and major development.

The council paper said that would have put more pressure on a smaller number of towns and villages to take new homes and business sites.

Officers did not take the option forward.

The paper says: "The conclusion of this, was that, firstly, for the purposes of HRA, it would not be possible to completely avoid locating development in the catchments of the Somerset Levels and Moors and Axe, and secondly, that it would be unreasonable to consider such a scenario as a reasonable alternative. As such, this option was not taken any further forward."

A later section of the same document says the option was rejected because of its "unrealistic spatial implications and inability to meet housing needs".

Somerset Council is now moving towards the first public stage of the new county-wide plan.

The Somerset Local Plan will cover the whole of Somerset, except Exmoor National Park. It will set out where major development should go up to 2045.

The council's published timetable says further consultation stages are expected in 2027 and 2028.

The plan is currently due to be submitted for examination in September 2028, with adoption scheduled for March 2029.

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