"This is the biggest inner-city land development project in the country right now, " says Mark Lautman, Mesa del Sol's director of economic development.

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But Open Spaces Society general secretary Kate Ashbrook said that the development is earmarked for registered common land which the public has the right to use.

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Farmers lack the right to sell their land, and the supply of land for residential development near urban areas is tightly controlled.

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The quasi-governmental Rural Development Center suggests extending land-use contracts for 100 years and allowing people to pass the right to farm the land on to their children.

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