Greater Manchester: No Legal Basis for Releasing Extra Green Belt Land for Targets Higher than SOAN @MayorofGM

What a mess the Ministry has got itself into ober the Greater Manchester Strategic Plan

A recap

They propose major Green Belt Release based on SOAN on 2014 base

After Protests Andy Burnham forces a rethink

However this could prejudice a housing deal based on original numbers

They propose using 2016 HH base but prevented from doing so by government policy

So they use 2014 HH formation + 2016 population baseline (government policy) significantly reducing Green Belt loss

The new NPPF requires Green belt loss to be fully justified

Their is no basis in caselaw or the new NPPF for proposing Green Belt loss on significantly higher than SOAN numbers.

Malthouse criticises proposed Green Belt loss in GM citing guidance on SHLAA from coalition government that is no longer in force stating Green Belt can be considered a policy constraint on OAN.

MCHLG withdraws housing deal saying numbers are too low.

So at the same time the government is saying the numbers in Greater Manchester are too high and too low,

Even by the standards of the ministry this is a total cluster f$$$k

I suspect the treasury is insisting doggedly the original housing deal is met to the letter.

What is worse the SOAN method affordability element is to blame assuming concealed households well move to jobs in unaffordable areas reducing houjsing need, despite no demographic evidence to back this up.  Were this element dropped the ooriginal numbers would be much closer to reality.

 

 

 

 

Manchester Loses Housing Package over lowered Housing Target

Place North West

The Government has told Greater Manchester that the City Region will no longer be receiving a £68m brownfield housing fund, following the reduction of housing targets included in the rewritten Spatial Framework.

The Outline Housing Package, agreed in 2017, included a land fund of up to £50m to support the remediation of brownfield land, £10.25m to deliver affordable homes at the Collyhurst estate, and £8m in capacity funding to support setting up a delivery team.

The money and powers were offered on the basis that Greater Manchester provides 227,200 homes over a 20-year period, a figure included in the previous draft of the GMSF and the Greater Manchester Industrial Strategy.

Following the rewrite of the GMSF, the figure has been reduced to 200,980 homes. It is understood that as this is 11% below the previous figure, the Government has written to the Greater Manchester Combined Authority confirming that the deal is no longer on the table.

Greater Manchester leaders, including Mayor Andy Burnham, have defended the change as a response to the reduction in Green Belt release in the plan, and have criticised Government for sending mixed messages about population estimates, and the level of autonomy each region should have to set its own targets.

Talking to Place North West during MIPIM, Burnham said that while civil servants had set “a hard line” that if Greater Manchester didn’t stick to the higher housing numbers it would lose the £68m funding, Housing Minister Kit Malthouse had then suggested it was wrong for Government to pressure local authorities to deliver specific targets.

Without the Housing Package, the City Region is still able to access funding from Homes England, which includes a £600m small sites fund to support councils and developers to release smaller sites.

According to the Housing the Powerhouse coalition of housebuilders and land promoters, which has consistently called for higher housing targets, the decision by Government is an opportunity for GM politicians to negotiate an “even better deal”.

Housing the Powerhouse spokesman Rob Loughenbury, of Lexington Communications, said: “The development industry supports the creation of a GM Plan, including the focus on promoting high quality, healthy and affordable communities.

“We also recognise the difficult political compromises that have had to be made. But we have consistently argued that the assessment of overall housing need is not aligned with the Combined Authority’s more ambitious statements about economic growth. It would be a shame and a significant backwards step if Greater Manchester has lost its £68m brownfield housing package as a result of this.

“If the housing deal is no longer on the table, Greater Manchester must rise to the challenge of negotiating a fresh housing package that reflects its ambition to tackle the housing crisis and support the growth of a global city. The question of overall housing need should be revisited, along with whether the right mixture of homes is planned to meet the aspirations of residents.”

Canada release all its building footprints as open source so why cant @ordnanceSurvey

GISArea

Digital transformation is providing organizations with not only information that was never thought possible, but information that is accessible and usable. Data is the foundational resource that allows organizations to transform and uncover the insights they need to make smart decisions.

And this transformation is no different when the organization is the Government of Canada.

In July of 2018, StatsCan and Microsoft collaborated in order to tackle a unique challenge for our vast country. Together, by leveraging AI, they developed a solution that will help all Canadians.

Using’s StatsCan’s Open Database of Buildings which is generated from municipal open databases, along with satellite and aerial imagery, coupled with Bing Maps’ significant investments in the areas of deep learning, computer vision and artificial intelligence, Microsoft is strengthening Canada’s census with smart data and a better understanding of where people live. This is done by mapping the footprints of every building in the country. We are releasing more than 12 million building footprints in Canada to the OpenStreetMap community.

When you know where the buildings are, you know where the people are. Accounting for this has always been a great challenge for governments, as well as humanitarian efforts and philanthropic initiatives. By putting people on the map, everyone can have access to services that we can sometimes take for granted.

As open data, the map of building footprints will be available to all Canadians looking to better understand their country. Building Footprints allows for integrating open data from municipal, regional, and provincial governments to meet the needs of official statistics. A better understanding will allow for better decision making across all sectors, both private and public.

Microsoft Building Footprints is more than simply outlining the buildings that exist along the roads on a map. These building footprints identify the buildings you didn’t know were there, on the roads and pathways that don’t appear on maps and don’t connect to any known road networks. By using satellite and aerial imagery, Microsoft was able to look for the stuff that maps didn’t know existed. And by relying on imagery that is constantly being updated, new construction is quickly added to the database, unlike traditional mapping that will never catch up as new shovels hit the ground every day across the country.

In order to identify every single building in Canada, from coast to coast to coast, through machine learning, the solution was able to identify shapes, learn which were buildings and then convert everything to geometry data that is easily processible for geography applications. Canada is only the second country where Microsoft has undertaken this initiative after the U.S. and the machine had to relearn and adjust for Canada’s vast rural, agricultural and differing landscape and biomes. With adjustments along the way, the whole process took approximately four months to map every building.

Now that it is live and open to everyone, we are proud to have been part of this massive open data initiative that helps Canadians and ensures that everyone is counted. And we are excited to see what happens next as governments, businesses, NGOs and academic institutions take advantage of what we have learned.

 

Government Responds to Thames Estuary Growth Commission Report

Here

we are now looking to local partners; from local authorities, Local Enterprise
Partnerships, universities, businesses and civil society, to realise this vision and see the Thames Estuary stepping up to deliver well-balanced, inclusive growth on a scale
comparable to the Midlands Engine, Northern Powerhouse and Oxford-Cambridge Arc

James Brokenshire

In same breath, one more step closer to national planning.

It commits to a strategic Thames Estuary Growth Board and a ministerial champion.

We are publicly committing to exploring the potential for at least two new locally-led development corporations in the Thames Estuary. We will work collaboratively with places to create thriving communities where people want to live and work, to deliver high-quality, popular and well-designed places to live.

I know of two areas in South Essex that have been exploring this.

The government announced at Budget 2018 that it is supporting a study to develop
options and consult the local area on a Great Thames Park.15 This forthcoming natural capital analysis will assess the options to maximise the socio-economic and cultural value of the area’s natural assets, including creating a park for communities to enjoy.
We also recognise the importance of showcasing the many benefits of natural capital to the community and making sure that all developments deliver environmental net gain.

It rights rules out a Lower Thames Barrier

Thames East Line
The Commission set out how government should consider a multi-modal crossing as
part of its planning for the next Thames Barrier.
We support maximising benefits from large-scale infrastructure and recognise that
consideration of a multi-modal replacement Thames Barrier brings opportunities.
However, the location proposed by the Commission is not one the Environment Agency would currently consider due to extensive investigations of navigation, flood risk, existing infrastructure, and environmental requirements which limit the feasible locations for areplacement barrier to two sites.
Based on current sea level rise estimates, the Environment Agency expect a future
barrier would need to be operational by 2070. Delivering a replacement Thames Barrier by 2050 is significantly earlier than the timeframe set out in the Thames Estuary 2100 Plan and is not supported by the current business case for the Thames Estuary 2100 Plan. This remains subject to regular review by the Environment Agency.

But no consideration of a more feasible Kent-Essex Link perhaps tunneled parallel to the Lower Thames Crossing.

How much overspill from London – a total fudge.

Government expects all local authorities to plan for the number of homes required to meet need in their area. We would encourage cooperation between the London boroughs and neighbouring authorities in Kent and Essex and welcome further engagement with those places, including with groups of London boroughs, in exploring how we might support them to plan for and deliver significant increases in the provision of homes.

On joint Spatial Plans

Government welcomes the Commission’s recommendations in encouraging more joint
planning between local authorities in Kent and in Essex. The government welcomes
joint planning to help coordinate solutions to cross-boundary issues, to use strategic
level planning to meet the national challenge of delivering more homes in a more
integrated way, whilst also grasping the opportunity to use precious resources more
efficiently in the process. To achieve this, we have strengthened the National Planning
Policy Framework to emphasise greater cooperation between local authorities and
outlined our ambitions to encourage more joint planning, particularly through work on
housing deals.
We recognise that in some places across the Estuary, this is already happening and
are encouraged by progress in South Essex, wherein six local planning authorities and Essex County Council have agreed to produce a Joint Statutory Spatial Plan. The joint planning work being undertaken by the Estuary partners in South Essex is moving
forward at an ambitious pace, with a statement of common ground and revised Local Development Schemes for each of the authorities. The Joint Statutory Spatial Plan will set out the areas overarching spatial strategy, housing target and distribution, strategic development and employment opportunity areas and key transport and other infrastructure priorities. Along with housing and employment, the Joint Statutory Spatial Plan aims to plan for and deliver large scale infrastructure that will permit long term growth for the region.

Geography is not always easily defined across the area outlined in the
Commission’s report. Government supports joint planning arrangements as defined by local partners and stands ready to offer support to places seeking to engage in
developing compelling proposals which support housing growth over the longer term.
These proposals or joint working arrangements should not be limited by the geography of the Estuary and we would encourage cross boundary working.

No its not going well.  Its at least 4 months behind schedule.  The area is densely populated and 100% Green Belt.  The needs can only be me through large new settlements linked to new infrastructure.

On roads

The A127 is a key route for Essex linking London with Basildon and Southend and
Rochford. In Basildon, the A127 corridor is home to one of the largest single
concentrations of advanced manufacturing companies in the South of England. The
corridor makes substantial contributions to the prosperity of the South East Local
Enterprise Partnership area and offers considerable growth prospects. The South East Local Enterprise Partnership has secured over £41 million towards improvements to the road.

This 41 million is just for feasibility work which shows the necessary scale of works needed to the A127, this includes the feasibility of bypassing Basildon to the Noth and bypassing/extending the A127 to the East of Southend/Shoeburyness.

It rejects a Lower Thames Multimodal Crossing

At the scoping stage of the Lower Thames Crossing project, the Department for
Transport re-examined the potential for a multi-modal crossing. We are confident that the project, as currently scoped, is taking forward the best overall option. Transport demands do change over time due to a number of factors such as growth and housing, and as part of normal planning, the Department for Transport continues to look at emerging future transport trends to ensure we have robust strategies and future investment plans in place.
The Commission has also suggested that a future Thames East flood barrier could
provide the opportunity for a multi-modal transport crossing (see section above).
Transport demands do change over time, and as part of normal planning, the
Department for Transport would consider the opportunity for synergy with any identified transport investment needs at the appropriate time. However, the department’s current focus remains on taking forward the Lower Thames Crossing, in line with Highways England’s consultation launched in October 2018. The cost of a new rail link could be expected to be high and any new investment proposal would need to offer value for money and be technically feasible.

This is narrow thinking.  The scoping was well in advance of joint planning and determination of scale of housing need was established.  A multimodal crossing could support 2-4 large garden town developments north and south of the Tames.  Making these road based as opposed to zero carbon would be the greatest missed planning opportunity of the early 21th C.

So overall much the same problems as Thames Gateway a focus on projects rather than joined up land use and transport planning at the strategic scale with opportunities missed for co-planned infrastructure to achievea shift in development forms and transport patterns.  Same old failure, some old reactivity, same old sprawl.

 

 

The MHCLG Design Manual Sorted

MHCLG tenders for ‘visual design manual’ to support revised PPG

This is good so good you wont need planning permission

 

Remember just how much of your rear garden you can concrete over.

Threat of earthquakes need not preclude permitted development

In rare event planning permission is needed the better buildings commission has some advice for your front garden

Beds in cowsheds – not a problem – but check those pesky rules about dutch barns

Make sure you meet minimum parking standards

But make sure you protect the Green Belt (reproduced with permission from the Daily telegraph Green Belt Library)

 

 

 

 

Room Size Standards to Be introduced for Office to Resi PD – Ministerial Statement

Hansard

Planning: independent report on build out rates and permitted development

At Autumn Budget 2017 the Government announced an independent review, chaired by Sir Oliver Letwin, to examine the significant gap between housing completions and the amount of land allocated or permissioned, and make recommendations for closing it. I sincerely thank Sir Oliver and his panel for their hard work over the 12 months that followed.

Sir Oliver’s draft analysis, published in June 2018, took an in-depth look at the rate of housing delivery on a number of large sites in high pressure areas around the country. He concluded that the binding constraint on housebuilding rates once implementable planning permission had been granted was the ‘absorption rate’ – meaning that homes are built at the rate at which housebuilders believe they can be sold at their target prices. Importantly, the Review found no evidence that speculative land banking is part of the business model for major house builders. I note that there has been widespread acceptance of Sir Oliver’s analysis across the sector and a consensus has emerged that it is the market absorption rate that determines the rate at which developers build out large sites.

Sir Oliver’s final report, published alongside Autumn Budget last year, concluded that greater differentiation in the types, tenures and design of housing delivered on large sites would increase the market absorption rates of new homes.

I welcome Sir Oliver’s support for greater emphasis on housing diversification within the planning system. The revised National Planning Policy Framework has already embedded a requirement for a greater mix of housing; it explicitly requires a mix of size, type and tenure of housing that reflects the diverse needs of local communities. My department is also committed to improving the design of new development. The purpose of the Building Better, Building Beautiful Commission is to tackle the challenge of poor quality design and build of homes and places, and I look forward to their final report later this year. My department also has a number of funding programmes specifically designed to support a more diversified housing market, such as the Home Building Fund.

As confirmed in Spring Statement, my department will shortly publish additional planning guidance on housing diversification – to further encourage large sites to support a diverse range of housing needs, and help them build out more quickly.

I note Sir Oliver’s recommendations that authorities should further capture land value uplift by insisting on specific levels of greater housing diversification – and also note that many in the housing-building industry are sceptical of this approach. I agree with the principle that the costs of increased housing diversification should be funded through reductions in residual land values. The Government is committed to improving the effectiveness of the existing mechanisms of land value capture, making them more certain and transparent for all developments. My focus is on evolving the existing system of developer contributions to make them more transparent, efficient and accountable and my department is gathering evidence to explore the case for further reform.

I will keep the need for further interventions to support housing diversification and faster build out, including amendments to primary legislation, under review. My department will also work closely with Homes England to identify suitable sites and will look for opportunities to support local authorities to further diversify their large sites. Once again, I am very grateful to Sir Oliver and his panel for their important analysis and recommendations, and for their hard work over the course of the Review.

My priority now is to ensure faster decision-making within the planning system. My department will publish an Accelerated Planning Green Paper later this year that will discuss how greater capacity and capability, performance management and procedural improvements can accelerate the end-to-end planning process. This Paper will also draw on the Rosewell Review, which made recommendations to reduce the time taken to conclude planning appeal inquiries, whilst maintaining the quality of decisions. I will also consider the case for further reforms to the compulsory purchase regime, in line with our manifesto commitment.

Permitted Development Rights

The consultation, Planning Reform: Supporting the high street and increasing the delivery of new homesclosed on 14 January 2019. As confirmed in the Spring Statement it is our intention to bring forward a range of reforms. To support the high street we intend to introduce additional flexibilities for businesses. This will be to amend the shops use class to ensure it captures current and future retail models, which will include clarification on the ability of (A) use classes to diversify and incorporate ancillary uses without undermining the amenity of the area, to introduce a new permitted development right to allow shops (A1), financial and professional services (A2), hot food takeaways (A5), betting shops, pay day loan shop and launderettes to change use to an office (B1) and to allow hot food takeaways (A5) to change to residential use (C3). Additionally, to give businesses sufficient time to test the market with innovative business ideas we will extend the existing right that allows the temporary change of use of buildings from 2 to 3 years and enable more community uses to take advantage of this temporary right, enabling such premises to more easily locate on the high street. I will also shortly publish “Better Planning for High Streets”. This will set out tools to support local planning authorities in reshaping their high streets to create prosperous communities, particularly through the use of compulsory purchase, local development orders and other innovative tools.

We will take forward a permitted development right to extend upwards certain existing buildings in commercial and residential use to deliver additional homes, engaging with interested parties on design and technical details. We would want any right to deliver new homes to respect the design of the existing streetscape, while ensuring that the amenity of neighbours is considered. We will also make permanent the time-limited right to build larger single storey rear extensions to dwellinghouses and to introduce a proportionate fee. I do not intend to extend the time-limited right for change of use from storage to residential. This right will lapse on 10 June 2019. Alongside I intend to review permitted development rights for conversion of buildings to residential use in respect of the quality standard of homes delivered. We will continue to consider the design of a permitted development right to allow commercial buildings to be demolished and replaced with homes. We will also develop a ‘Future Homes Standard’ for all new homes through a consultation in 2019 with a view, subject to consultation, to introducing the standard by 2025.

Finally, we intend to remove the permitted development right and associated advertising deemed consent in respect of new telephone kiosks, reflecting that mobile technology has changed the way people access telephone services since the right was introduced in 1985; amend the existing right to install off-street electric vehicle charging points to allow for taller charging upstands to address advances in rapid charging technology; and will look to bring forward a draft listed building consent order which will grant a general listed building consent for works to listed waterway structures owned, controlled or managed by the Canal & River Trust.

I intend to implement an immediate package of permitted development right measures in the spring, with the more complex matters, including on upward extensions, covered in a further package of regulations in the autumn.

This statement has also been made in the House of Lords: HLWS1374

The Oxford-Cambridge Arc: government ambition and joint declaration between government and local partners

MHCLG

29 pages not insubstantial but not yet a spatial plan. I dont think it was mentioned in Hammond’s Speech as it didnt include a housing number, he likes those

Joint Declaration of Ambition between
Government and the Arc
This joint declaration has been agreed between the Government, local authorities across the Oxford to Cambridge Arc, Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority, the Arc’s four local enterprise partnerships (LEPs), and England’s Economic Heartland.
We, the parties mentioned above, recognise that the area incorporating the ceremonial county areas of Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Northamptonshire, Bedfordshire and Cambridgeshire forms a strategic belt, which we refer to as the Oxford-Cambridge Arc (‘the Arc’). We also acknowledge the vital links beyond the Arc: for example, there are important relationships with the Midlands, with the M4 corridor and Heathrow Airport, with London and the Greater South East, and with the rest of East Anglia.

We recognise that the Arc is first and foremost an area of significant economic strength and opportunity, which can further benefit its existing and future communities and businesses by realising its potential. It has a population of over 3 million and a Gross Value Added over £100 billion per year. Building upon strengths in individual parts of the Arc, especially in science, technology and high-value manufacturing, there is the long-term potential to transform the Arc as a whole into a world-leading economic area, acting as a testbed for innovation. Because of this potential, the Government has already designated the Arc a key economic priority. We jointly set out to meet its full economic potential, building on forthcoming Local Industrial Strategies, for the benefit of existing and future local communities and businesses, and in the national interest.
We acknowledge that meeting this economic potential will demand our collective
determination, over the long-term, to deliver significantly more homes in the Arc, of the right quality and in the right places to meet its needs. We recognise that this could include the development and expansion of existing, as well as new, settlements. This will be needed both to address the housing affordability issues already felt in many parts of the Arc, and to provide places to live for future communities attracted by the Arc’s economic opportunities.
We know that meeting our long-term economic and housing delivery ambitions for the Arc will require long-term commitments to provide the enabling infrastructure, in the widest sense, that communities and business will need. We support the delivery of transport links such as East West Rail and improvements to the strategically important roads network, and remain committed to involving local communities and businesses in helping to decide where and how infrastructure is built. We recognise the need to plan for and deliver substantial additional infrastructure ahead of the arrival of new communities, including necessary transport infrastructure, utilities, digital connectivity, health and education.
Crucially, we value the natural environment highly, and aim to meet our economic and housing ambitions while overall improving, rather than degrading, the environment in the Arc. We want better places to live, which are beautiful and inspiring, to benefit the Arc’s residents today as well as tomorrow. The Government has already set out its intention for the Arc to embody England’s 25 Year Environment Plan, which we will work together to deliver, including through planning for local natural capital. We want new developments to
use intelligent and sensitive design to create or enhance habitats and improve habitat connectivity, in situ and in the surrounding area. We also want to improve access to the environment for existing and new communities in order to improve health and wellbeing.
We recognise that meeting all these ambitions for the Arc requires us to take a long-term view, at least to 2050, and for us to work collaboratively across geographical, political andthematic boundaries. Doing so will require open thinking and dialogue without harming the ongoing plan-making process. While extant local development plans and joint plans must evidently retain their integrity whilst they are in place, we will consider what planning approaches and flexibilities may be appropriate in future, within and across the Arc, to better support meeting our overall ambitions. This could include considering the role of a
spatial vision or strategy for the Arc as a whole, as well as the most suitable delivery vehicles for specific developments. We recognise that resources would need to be available for this work.
We agree that a collaborative approach to meeting our ambitions also means changing the way we work, as organisations and collectively. The Government has established a crosscutting portfolio and delivery team for the Arc, bringing together departments, agencies and projects, with common high-level reporting lines at a ministerial and departmental
level. Local authorities and LEPs have established Arc-wide coordination groups both for council leaders and LEP chairs, and for council and LEP chief executive officers.
England’s Economic Heartland provides a single local voice for strategic infrastructure across the Arc and beyond its boundaries. Both within Government and locally, we have organised our work relevant to the Arc across four thematic areas, reflecting our ambitions set out in this joint declaration:
• Productivity – ensuring we support businesses to maximise the Arc’s economic
prosperity, including through the skills needed to enable communities to benefit from the jobs created;
• Place-making – creating places valued by local communities, including through the
delivery of sufficient, affordable and high-quality homes, to increase affordability and support growth in the Arc, as well as wider services including health and education;
• Connectivity – delivering the infrastructure communities need, including transport and digital connectivity, as well as utilities;
• Environment – ensuring we meet our ambitions for growth while leaving the
environment in a better state for future generations.
To act as a bridge between Government and the Arc itself, the Government has committed to establishing a joint Advisory Group comprising experts and leaders across these themes, led by an independent Business Chair. Their role will not only be to provide expertise, but to be a figurehead for the Arc nationally and internationally, galvanising the necessary leadership and support to help realise our ambitions across these four thematic areas.
Our ambitions for the Arc are long-term, and while we believe it is right to maintain pace of delivery on existing commitments such as East West Rail, we recognise the need to plan to meet our full ambitions for the Arc in an integrated and inclusive way. As a next step, we are therefore going to launch a broad, joint, public engagement exercise over Summer 2019. This will engage with the public across the four themes above and will be used to help inform our future plans for the Arc and ensure they benefit existing and new communities and businesses.

Most of the copy is similar to the Budget policy statement.  Three things are new.  Firstly it is the first joint political statement including by the local authorities for ‘significantly more new homes’ though not yet stating how many

The second new element is the committment to a summer of engagement in 2019.   Though I suspect that without clarity over route options, strategic growth potential locations etc. it will simply become a summer of blight and fear.

The third is a committment of several million pounds towards nautural capital planning, though this will be of limited value until it can be integrated with planning of places.

It reveals 100 Garden Community bids were received for’ 523,000 homes, of which a
number are within the Arc;’  though I myself made a bid for 250,000 homes on one site as an example of the 5 or so settlements that would be needed to meet the housing needs of teh area plus inevitable overspill from land constrained areas (such as London) which illustrates the gap that needs to be filled.

On next steps it states:

• Complete the analysis into new or expanded settlements and consider where
economic and housing growth, including through locally-led plans, could maximise
the benefits of new road and rail infrastructure;
• Consider how the design of new settlements can support the Industrial Strategy
Grand Challenges, through the demonstration and deployment of new technologies;
• Complete underway assessments on Garden Communities bids, and announce
successful proposals in spring 2019;
• Work with the Building Better, Building Beautiful Commission to gather evidence on design and quality place-making in order to identify opportunities to promote
improved design quality and greater community consent; the Commission will
publish an interim research report by July 2019;
• Work with local authorities to consider what planning approaches and flexibilities
may be appropriate to better support planning and increased housing supply over
the long-term.

The first point being the completion of the AECOm work.

Accelerated Housing Green Paper Announced in Spring Statement

Next step of Planning reform

Spring Statement

To move us towards [300,00/annum] target, today the government can announce further progress on planning reform, as set out in more detail in the accompanying Written Ministerial Statement laid by the Secretary of State
for Housing, Communities and Local Government. In the coming months, the government will:
Independent Report on Build Out Rates – Introduce additional planning guidance to support housing diversification on large sites. Sir Oliver Letwin concluded that greater differentiation in the types andtenures of housing delivered on large sites would increase build out rates.
Response to consultation on Planning Reform – Introduce a package of reforms including allowing greater change of use between premises, and a new permitted development right to allow upwards extension of existing buildings to create new homes.
Accelerated Planning Green Paper – Publish a Green Paper setting out proposals on how greater capacity and capability, performance management and procedural improvements can accelerate the end-to-end planning process.

It didnt mention the Oxford-Cambridge Arc – though a joint statement was made on that today

Shropshire Plans 3,000 Home New Settlement at Green Belt Motorway Junction with No Public Transport

At Tong junction M54 and A41, seriously in this day and age.  The A41 is rapidly becoming a corridor of sprawl as is used as M6 bypass.  Classic example of unsustinable strategic planning.  Logistiocs site yes, housing site no.  So much potential for rail restoration in Shropshire. Why not in the Shifnal -Albrighton Rial Corridor, the wierd district borders here should not be used to distort logical development patterns.  No strategic options, no alternative, contrary to revised NPPF how out of date and going nowhere.

Shropshire Star.

Policy Exchange Calls for 15 ‘Millenial’ New Towns in London Green Belt

Standard

A generation of “millennial” new towns needs to be built in the commuter belt circling London to provide homes for young workers priced off the housing ladder, a report concludes today.

It says the “pioneering spirit” of post-War planning that created new towns such as Crawley, Bracknell and Milton Keynes needs to be rekindled to solve the capital’s housing crisis.

In total, 15 “new millennial towns” with 30,000 homes each should be created along major transport routes out of London, the report from the centre-Right Policy Exchange think tank says.

Each town would help meet demand for affordable home ownership, increase access to green space and provide “beautiful” housing developments.

The think tank argues that a new Department for Growth should work with the Mayor of London and developers.

 

The report, co-authored by Richard Blakeway, ex-deputy mayor for housing under Boris Johnson, warns current plans to boost housing supply, including Sadiq Khan’s London Plan, will “fall short”.

The new towns proposal is likely to be controversial with environmental campaigners as it would require green-belt land to be built on.

But the report says this loss could be acceptable if the towns “are built to the highest quality … with a proportion of new homes available for discounted sale to millennials”.

Co-author Jack Airey, a research fellow at Policy Exchange, said “a more reasoned discussion” was needed about the green belt: “Most of this land deserves the utmost protection from development, but a significant chunk of farming and scrub land does not.”

Labour housing spokesman John Healey said the report “rightly identifies the need for Government to do more to … the next Labour government will start a new generation of new towns and garden cities”.

Next boss Lord Wolfson, founder of the Wolfson Economics Prize for “new thinking” on economic policy, said: “Political leaders who want to win the support of young millennial renters should read this report and act on it.”