£200million ‘Utopian’ eco village of 500 houses given green light

Suburban sitcom heroes Tom and Barbara Good would be absolutely delighted – developers are building a utopian eco-village where residents will grow their own food and work from home.

There will be 500 houses on 300 acres at an old iron mine.

The £200million scheme near the coastal village of Millom in Cumbria aims to be the first community in the UK to ‘give more than it takes’ by producing an energy surplus.

It echoes the BBC1 sitcom The Good Life, in which Tom and Barbara Good, played by Richard Briers and Felicity Kendal, try to live an eco-friendly, self-sufficient life.

The houses will be built by local builders using local materials and designed specifically to allow owners to rent out parts of their homes and additional rooms to holidaymakers. This will enable locals to generate an income from tourism, as well as tackling the problem of empty second homes which can damage communities in tourist hot spots.

Designed in conjunction with the team behind the London 2012 Olympic Park, the properties will be built in the shape of an Italian hill town, with an amphitheatre for events and concerts overlooking a natural freshwater lagoon.

No petrol cars will be allowed at the site, which could open by 2021, but there will be driverless electric cars for residents.

Developer Ashley Dobbs said: ‘As a general rule, human beings have been taking too much stuff out of the larder. We have to put something back, otherwise as a species we will die out.

‘This is an ambitious project to create a place where people grow more food and produce more energy than they consume.’