Council leaders say building homes on 'under-utilised' car parks will help protect green spaces from development. Cabinet members at Newcastle-under-Lyme Borough Council have approved the disposal of two car parks near Newcastle town centre along with part of a third, following a consultation.

They say that the car parks are no longer needed following the opening of the Castle multi-storey facility on Liverpool Road, and can be sold off for housing – reducing the need to build homes on green spaces. According to a council report, the 22-space Blackfriars car park, next to Staffordshire Honda, is 'significantly underused' and if combined with adjacent land will form a 'suitable area for development'.

The 13-space car park in Garden Street is 'barely used' – officers observed no cars parking there at all during a week in September. King Street Car Park is also described as being underused, but the council plans to only sell off part of it, while retaining 60 parking spaces.

Cabinet members rubber-stamped the decision to dispose of the car parks at their meeting on Tuesday. Council leader Simon Tagg believes that building on brownfield land such as the car parks will help protect the borough green spaces.

He said: "I think what we've done here is look very pragmatically at parking. We've built a new car park at Ryecroft, which will support the development of accommodation at the Midway.

"We've got some very busy car parks around the town – we're not looking to change any of those. But we're looking to bring those under-utilised ones into the housing stock for town centre living.

"Residents should get behind our approach. It's saving our green spaces and helping to meet our housing targets, and also fulfilling our ambition for a town centre for all. We all want to see a more vibrant town centre."

Deputy leader Stephen Sweeney hit out at people criticising the council for selling off brownfield land for housing.

He said: "You see people talking about sites like the former Keele golf course saying we shouldn't be building on green spaces, we should be building on brownfield sites.

"But now we have the same people saying we shouldn't be building on brownfield sites in Newcastle, such as the Bankside one, which seems a bit bizarre to me."

Cabinet members also agreed to launch a consultation on the disposal of two car parks in Heathcote Street in Kidsgrove. There are currently 74 spaces across four car parks in Heathcote Street and King Street. Public realm works, funded by Kidsgrove's Town Deal, will see this number reduced to 57, which a survey suggests will be enough to meet demand.

The council plans to demolish the former Browns service garage and use the site as a temporary car park while the public realm works are carried out.