A dossier mapping many of the 13,720 empty homes and 268 derelict sites across the Bradford district has been handed to Bradford Council as part of the Telegraph & Argus’s Save Our Green Spaces campaign.

Elizabeth Hellmich, chairman of the Heaton Township Association (HTA), has collected a petition of nearly 1,000 names urging the Council to “thoroughly examine” brown-field locations which are ripe for development before building on any more green-field sites.

Planning chiefs have pledged the dossier will be included in a 12-week public consultation on a key planning policy document.

The Local Development Framework (LDF), as it is known, will help guide any developments within the district until 2028.

Bradford Council thanked the T&A and its readers for the campaign and their suggestions for which sites could potentially be developed for housing.

Mrs Hellmich handed the dossier of more than 80 pages – including the 58-page petition – to Councillor Val Slater, the Council’s executive member for housing and planning.

Mrs Hellmich said: “We are hoping that the Council can put into its planning policy the need to look seriously at the state of Bradford.

“It is getting to the point where there are so many derelict buildings and areas of wasteland that people are embarrassed and are denying that they come from here.

“We hope that this will make the Council realise it cannot just sit back and put the future of the district in the hands of developers.

“The Council has to be the driving force behind making sure they build in the right places.”

Save Our Green Spaces was started after Bradford Council revealed its last comprehensive survey of derelict sites in the district was carried out a decade ago.

Readers were urged to fill in a form in the newspaper to let campaigners know where there is derelict land in their areas.

An interactive map on the T&A website, for people to identify derelict sites, has also received 1,500 hits since it was set up in February.

The campaign has received cross-party support from Bradford councillors and has been backed by residents’ groups in Bingley, Baildon, Menston, the Tong and Fulneck valleys and other areas where huge areas of green space have been threatened by development.

David Walker, of Baildon Residents Against Inappropriate Development (Braid), who was with Mrs Hellmich when she handed in the dossier at City Hall, said: “I think it has been a brilliant campaign, which seems to be getting the attention of people who matter in City Hall.

“It is one demonstration of people power.

“This campaign would not have had the effect it has without the support of the T&A.”

Coun Slater said: “We thank the T&A for its campaign and for sites that readers identified.

“Their suggestions have been included in our assessments in respect of the LDF.

“We would also welcome the identification of any further sites as part of our ongoing engagement.

“The policies included in the core strategy of the LDF are aimed at minimising the amount of green-field and green-built land required for development by emphasising that brown-field sites are the priority.

“We are developing an empty-homes strategy which will seek to further reduce the district’s 6,000 long term empty properties and bring them back into use.

“We want to ensure that over the next 20 years we allow for the right sort of homes in the right places for the right prices to meet housing need for our existing communities and for their children and grandchildren, whilst recognising that we have a high quality landscape that needs protecting.”

e-mail: marc.meneaud @telegraphandargus.co.uk