Enfield Council have selected a developer for a £2.5bn housing project – but we do not know who it is yet.

The council’s cabinet have chosen their preferred company to build the Meridian Water development in Edmonton, however they cannot name them at this stage, as the defeated bidders have a 10 day period in which they can decide whether to legally challenge the decision.

On Wednesday evening, the cabinet selected “Bidder A”, as they were referred to in the official papers, which will be one of Barratts and Segro, Berkeley Homes, or PCPD and Willmott Dixon.

If no legal challenge is made, then the selected developer is expected to be named by the end of the month, before being confirmed in the full council meeting in June.

Cllr Ahmet Oykener, cabinet member for housing, called the selection of a developer “truly and exciting moment”.

He said: “During my time as a cabinet member this is the biggest decision to come before us.”

Cabinet member for economic regeneration Cllr Alan Sitkin added: “The scale of intervention needed to reboot the economy, in the face of an insufficient number of jobs, underpaid work, reliance on council funding and a lack of opportunity, is huge.

“The council knows a shockwave is needed, and Meridian Water could be that wave.”

Evaluation of the bids ran from February to April this year, with five initial bidders whittled down to three.

They were selected via a ranking system which evaluated them on their technical, financial and legal strengths, although the exact numbers were not made public.

Whoever is chosen will be tasked with building 8,000 homes and creating 10,000 construction jobs over the 20 year building period.

The council are also seeking planning permission for a new station to be built on the site, with work starting in March next year and the first homes scheduled to be completed in summer 2018.