Textbooks
Explore our diverse range of digital textbooks designed for course adoption and recommended reading at universities and colleges. We publish over 140 textbooks across the social sciences, and an annual subscription to digital textbooks is possible via BUP Digital.
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Books: Textbooks
In this chapter, human organisation of the built and natural environment is outlined, from ancient times up until the present day. Approaches to planning from around the world are used to aid understanding of where we are today, and help to highlight changes in the urban form of towns and cities in the UK. The main focus then turns to planning in the ‘modern’ post-1947 era up to the present day, highlighting the principal influences and issues. Planning in the ‘public interest’ is considered in the context of changing market forces and political direction. The chapter concludes by reflecting on the tensions inherent within the planning system currently operating in the UK.
This chapter explores the delivery of projects. The focus is on both governance and funding, together with a consideration of the barriers to implementation and theory associated with this. From a governance perspective, approaches such as Urban Development Corporations and Urban Regeneration Companies are introduced, together with smaller scale models such as Enterprise Zones and Business Improvement Districts. Finance is briefly discussed via, for example, Tax Increment Financing.
The governance of planning in the UK is examined in this chapter. The hierarchy of spatial scales at which planning operates, from the international and national tiers down to district and neighbourhood level, is set out as a basis for understanding how planning decisions are made. We summarise the agencies of planning, their role in planning decision making and the dimensions of integration between parties, alongside an exploration of changes in approach to public involvement in the process. The crucial role of negotiation is highlighted, with a particular focus on the role of the planner in this process.
This chapter is concerned with the decision-making space: how are decisions made? Through what process? And based on what legal construct? We explore how policy is used in decision making, as well as reviewing the different ways in which applications and decisions are made and managed. The chapter looks at the different forms of decision making, including permitted development, prior approval and permission in principle, as well as full, outline and reserve matters approaches. We also look at the wider aspects of practice, including conditions, planning gain, appeals and enforcement.
This chapter introduces the role of plans and policy in the making and management of place and space. It refers to some of the key components of a typical plan, and outlines some key plan-making principles, such as the need for an effective evidence base and proactive community and stakeholder involvement. The chapter introduces the concept of the UK’s plan-led system and the role of the statutory development plan. It introduces key policy goals and outlines some of the plan-making activities that planners need to engage with. It identifies the need for plans to be sustainable, and outlines how planners seek to ensure different social economic and environmental goals are being met.
The fully updated Short Guide to Town and Country Planning provides an concise introductory overview of the practice of planning for those with little or no prior knowledge. This second edition considers who planners are and what they do, showing how planning - as an art, science and system - has evolved as an organised action of the state.
The book discusses the planning system, processes, legal constructs and approaches, taking into account the recent regulatory changes within the UK nations. Restructured to improve readability, it explores the interactions of government and society with the planning system, and the relationship between urban planning, the environment, and placemaking. It encourages the reader to adopt a reflective and inquisitive outlook, and features:
• case study boxes;
• further reading and resources;
• guidance on the recent policy and system updates, including those through devolution.
This opening chapter provides an overview of what planning seeks to achieve and the type of outcomes that can be achieved if it is practised successfully. It presents some of the global challenges that planners are having to respond to, such as those relating to climate change, urbanisation, environmental degradation, and deteriorating health and wellbeing. The chapter presents some of the goals and principles that are being advanced for planning today, and exposes some of the tensions that can arise when planning for the ‘public good’. The planning profession is also introduced, with the chapter providing some insight about the education and training of planners and the knowledge, skills and behaviours they are expected to have.
Infrastructure delivery planning can be considered by sector, funding, location or delivery method. While these are all important components of infrastructure delivery planning, the approach that is advocated here as being most effective is a focus on place. Without this, infrastructure delivery planning can be producer-driven and disconnected from society’s needs. Consideration of infrastructure delivery planning can also be undertaken at varying spatial scales appropriate for different types of infrastructure. Areas have their own requirements for infrastructure and this investment impacts on places influencing the quality of life for residents and business.
A major challenge for infrastructure delivery planning is the integration of producer and user interests to create added value. This can be achieved through a spatial vision incorporating standards of access, quality of service and efficiency in delivery. Different providers of infrastructure are not required to work together, even as part of regulatory and consent regimes. Spatial planning’s role is to bring together the strategy, policy, programmes and projects in ways that are beneficial for the areas and its population. This does not suggest that spatial planning has specific delivery roles or powers over all infrastructure delivery decisions. However, spatial planning has a role in understanding the combined effects of existing and planned infrastructure that can be of significant benefit to investors and localities. Much of what spatial planning can achieve will be through its role in advocacy, agenda setting and framing investment decisions.
Spatial planning is concerned with both the development of plans and programmes and their delivery.
Infrastructure is an essential element of making places. It is delivered through spatial, territorial and strategic planning. It supports all aspects of life through existing and new infrastructure. Infrastructure delivery planning is concerned ensuring that this investment is focused on achieving sustainability, equity and economic objectives. As shown in Box 12.1, spatial planning is about place-shaping and placemaking. The use of infrastructure is central to achieving these ends.
In this book, infrastructure delivery planning has been considered by types of infrastructure – physical, environmental/green and social/community and by scale of governance. There has also been a consideration of the methods used in these process of accessing existing infrastructure needs and those of the future. It has also been concerned with the funding that can be applied to infrastructure delivery. In this last chapter, the key principles of effective infrastructure delivery planning are discussed.
When engaging in infrastructure delivery planning, specific negotiations of development applications or pressures from providers can narrow the consideration of infrastructure requirements. Developers may offer infrastructure that appears attractive, creating new facilities, whereas providers will argue the case for investment based on their own criteria and priorities. These factors are important in spatial planning but they also need to be set into a wider context to ensure that infrastructure decision-making is not within silos or taken in isolation from the rest of the infrastructure investment for the scale of territory under consideration. Modes of transport, for example, may be delivered separately but unless they work together their investment will be underutilised.
Green infrastructure is used as a generic term to identify practices and investment that support the environment (CEC, 2013i). Green infrastructure ranges in scale and type from major flood alleviation schemes to small open spaces. In this chapter, rural and larger scale green land uses are discussed as environmental infrastructure while the term green infrastructure is used for urban settings. Tzoulas et al (2007) define green infrastructure as comprising ‘of all natural, semi-natural and artificial networks of multifunctional ecological systems within, around and between urban areas, at all spatial scales’ (p 169) and can include all types of formal and informal spaces including gardens (Cameron et al, 2012).
Linkages between environmental and green infrastructure are an important consideration in their provision and the associated value that they generate. Together they are a major contributor to the resilience of any locality, its people and economy as well as its environment. Environmental and green infrastructure also support biodiversity and contribute to the visual impact of places acting as an important component of health and well-being.
Environmental and green infrastructure has a core role in the protection and support of biodiversity as it operates vertically and horizontally through ecosystems (Duffy et al, 2007). While biodiversity is important in specific locations, this is within the construct of wider governance and regulatory systems. The EU has had a long-standing interest in biodiversity although this has primarily been through legislation on specific aspects (Jordan, 2008) until 2012 when a more integrated approach was introduced (CEC, 2012c).
