A case for strategic planning… beyond the Arc!
Well, so far so good. If you’re after some strategic growth and infrastructure. If you’d like to get levelled up (and who wouldn’t). If you’d like a coordinated regional response to your problems which can transcend local authority boundaries. Then it’s happy days, because the good folks at the Ministry have you covered! Well. I mean. So long as you live here:
Now don’t get me wrong. I’m a huge Arc fan. I spent many happy years living in the Arc. Lots of my dearest friends still do. I work there more or less every week. Yes. I think it’s safe to declare this blog a pro-Arc zone.
And Government’s introduction to the Arc spatial framework is full of really interesting ideas. As ever, here’s your reminder to go to Simon Ricketts for a typically top-end summary: here.
But for me, the trickier bit is the justification for singling out the Arc for this special strategic treatement but nowhere else.
Sure. You’ve been there? You know then that the Arc’s a lovely area. Sure, its homes are often very desirable (and tend to come at a hefty price, which makes the Arc one of the least affordable areas in the country). Sure it’s got fantastic economic potential. World class unis. And on and on and on. Bicester village - great deals on designer bags. But have a look at the real shopping list of reasons for producing a spatial framework:
“By working across the Arc, we have an opportunity to drive environmental improvement including recovery of nature and biodiversity net gain, cleaner air, reduction of flood risk and improving resilience to floods, ensuring communities have better access to green space and more sustainable energy and water supplies”
“The Arc is also an area that is constrained by inadequate infrastructure, a stressed and fragmented natural environment, escalating housing costs, and complex local governance.”
“This government is committed to levelling up growth and opportunity across Britain. Inequalities within regions are even larger than those between regions. That is true in the Arc, as is not felt evenly, and inequalities between and within the Arc’s towns and cities are acute.”
“The supply of new homes in the Arc’s main centres has not kept up with demand.”
And here’s the real kicker - sorry for the long quote but it’s worth it:
“1.24 A coordinated approach is difficult because the Arc comprises: 23 local planning authorities; a mayoral combined authority, eight transport planning authorities, the area’s Local Enterprise Partnerships (which have responsibility for economic development), and England’s Economic Heartland – the sub-national transport body that covers a slightly wider area than the Arc. There is also no single institution with the necessary competence and authority to lead a coordinated approach. This means that planning at the local level for homes, business space, infrastructure and the environment is not integrated, and is unable to take an Arc-wide view. If we want a better future, we need to plan for growth by thinking about the provision of infrastructure, housing, the environment and the needs of businesses and universities at the same time. We cannot continue to plan for transport, the environment and housing separately, or to think of economic development as separate from housing provision and commercial development.
1.25 To realise the full opportunities – and overcome the challenges – will require coordination of planning functions across the region. Local councils cannot do this on their own because of the level of coordination needed across the area, and because they do not have all the levers needed to develop a genuinely integrated plan. Government needs to play a supporting role to bring together a strategic approach at the Arc level to support better planning and ultimately better outcomes for the economy, environment and communities.”
Now here’s a thought experiment: in all of those quotes above, try replacing “the Arc” with “the West Midlands” or (gulp) “Greater Manchester” or “Surrey” or “the West of England”. Or just… “England”.
Of course, thank goodness, down in London the brand new plan’s finally ready to roll. But remember all that levelling up we have to do? It doesn’t work, does it, if large-scale ambitious strategic planning were to become a preserve of the south-east? This is about the need to integrate strategic infrastructure investement and spatial priorities across large spatial geographies. Now come on… that isn’t just a London thing. Or even an Arc thing. It’s a national challenge. And for my money, it needs a national solution. If you’re looking for one, can I suggest that you have a scan through this.
Philip Barnes - veteran of this blog - said something characteristically brilliant on Twitter the other day. In response to the old demographer’s adage that “every map of Chicago is a map of racial segregation”, Philip wrote that “every map of England is Green Belts”. I mean… superb. And so true. You start seeing it everywhere. The housing delivery test map? It’s a map of the Green Belts. Labour vs. Conservative constituencies: it’s a map of the Green Belts. Heck even a heatmap of UK property values looks an awful lot like a map of Green Belts.
But you may remember the point I was banging on about here. When it comes to the housing crisis, the real problem we’ve set for ourselves is that most places the Government wants to increase housing delivery are:
Constrained by Green Belts; and also
Without any strategic planning mechanisms to review Green Belt boundaries properly.
Now, strategic planning’s about an awful lot more than housing. But here’s my 30 second elevator pitch: take the Government’s justification for producing an Arc spatial framework. And apply it to all of us. Apply it across England. Because if the logic of a regional strategic framework’s good enough for Ox-Cam, it’s good enough for everybody else. More than that - it’s necessary. It’s a must-have. To meet cross-boundary challenges in a sustainable way which reflects regional priorities. Particularly given the Government’s welcome desire to scrap the duty for local authorities to cooperate with one another. Yes, even with all its “top-down targets from regional quangos and bureaucrats” and its “failed Soviet tractor style top-down planning targets” which Eric Pickles thought such a “terrible, expensive, time-consuming way to impose house building and worst of all threatened the destruction of the green belt”. Yep. With all that stuff. We still need it. I mean… we’ve tried doing planning without regional spatial frameworks for over a decade now. And I don’t know what you think. But I think things could be going a little better.
In the meantime, stay well #planoraks. I hope you can enjoy some of this spring-like weather. And keep on planning.
