Most planning policies only last a few years before they are
officially abandoned or they are undermined and nullified by events. But one flagship planning policy has survived
for over a hundred years with little amendment or public opposition – not even
from those people who would benefit most from its abandonment. That policy is the rule that cities must not
be allowed to grow outwards but must be constrained by an ever tighter Green Belt.
[Warning: I got carried away when writing this, and it has ended up far too long. But I quite enjoyed it, so I hope somebody finds it worthwhile to plough through to the end]
Abandoned plans
Perhaps the most striking example of a UK planning policy
that that was adopted, rigidly enforced for many years and then abandoned is that of
regional planning. This policy – of
diverting economic growth away from South East England and toward areas of industrial
decline - began in the 1930s as a reaction to unemployment in the North,
Scotland and South Wales. It was given statutory backing by the 1947 Town and
Country Planning Act with its requirement for Industrial Development
Certificates (IDCs) and later for Office Development Permits (ODPs). Some short
term success was achieved in the 1960s with the location of major car and
truck-making factories in Scotland (Linwood and Bathgate), but these became
uneconomic and eventually closed. The policy was maintained by both Conservative
and Labour governments until 1979, when the Thatcher administration largely abandoned
it in favour of encouraging development in the locations favoured by the
developers.
There are many other examples of key planning policies that
were introduced, maintained for many years and then abandoned in the light of
experience or expediency, or of changes in the environment or public and
political opinion. I have listed some of
these in an appendix at the end of this article.
But I return to the one planning policy that - exceptionally
– has survived for more than a century.
A planning shibboleth: The Green Belt
Green Belt policy can be traced directly to Ebenezer
Howard’s “Garden Cities of Tomorrow”, first published in 1898. He wrote:
“There is .... a question in regard
to which one can scarcely find any difference of opinion. It is wellnigh universally agreed by men of
all parties, not only in England, but all over Europe and America and our
colonies, that it is deeply to be deplored that people should continue to
stream into the already over-crowded cities, and should thus further deplete
the country districts.”
Howard then quotes the Chairman of the LCC, Lord
Rosebery:
“There is no thought of pride associated in my mind with the idea of
London: by the great appalling fact of these millions cast down, as it would
appear by hazard, on the banks of this noble stream ..... A tumour, an
elephantiasis sucking into its gorged system half the life and the blood and
the bone of the rural districts.”
From this one can infer that Howard didn’t very much like
big cities, especially London. He also
had a romantic view of rural life. His
answer to the problem of overcrowding, squalor and congestion in the city,
contrasted with depopulation of rural villages, was to rehouse urban
slum-dwellers in “garden cities” well away from the central city. These garden
cities were to be self-contained and combine the job opportunities, high wages
and social facilities of the city with the clean air and natural beauty of the
countryside. Two towns embodying Howard’s principles, Letchworth and Welwyn,
were actually built at respectively 40 and 20 miles from London. Implicit in this policy was that the physical
spread of the city (now often referred to pejoratively as “urban sprawl”)
should be halted, and that consequently land on the edge of existing cities
should be protected from development.
This was what was to become the Green Belt.
Howard’s views gained currency and became received wisdom in
the early part of the 20th century.
In 1935, led by LCC Leader Herbert Morrison, the Greater London Regional
Planning Committee, endorsed the idea of a “green belt or girdle of open space”
around London, and this recommendation was incorporated into Patrick
Abercrombie’s advisory Greater London Plan in 1944. Since then, the metropolitan Green Belt has
acquired statutory force and has been greatly extended. With government encouragement other towns and
cities have followed suit and designated their own green belts – albeit the
problems that these green belts were intended to solve were not necessarily the
same as London’s.
Current government policy on green belts is set out in the
latest version of the National Planning Framework as follows:
“133.
The government attaches great importance to Green Belts. The fundamental aim of
Green Belt policy is to prevent urban sprawl [sic] by keeping land permanently open; the essential
characteristics of Green Belts are their openness and their permanence.
[Note the pejorative
language. This is not really a
justification for green belts. Rather it is a circular argument or
tautology. It assumes that “keeping land
permanently open” is a Good Thing and that urban expansion (“sprawl”) is a Bad
Thing. But why? Who loses, and who would benefit?]
It continues:
“134. Green Belt serves 5 purposes:(a) to check the unrestricted sprawl [again] of large built-up areas;
(b) to prevent neighbouring towns merging into one another;
(c) to assist in safeguarding the countryside from encroachment;
(d) to preserve the setting and special character of historic towns; and
(e) to assist in urban regeneration, by encouraging the recycling of derelict and other urban land.”
Again these “purposes” do not really justify the policy. Leaving aside its continuing pejorative
language (“encroachment”, “unrestricted”) the document does not explain why large
built-up areas should not get larger; why neighbouring towns should not merge
into one another (think Brighton and Hove, Manchester and Salford, Warwick and
Leamington, Portsmouth and Southsea); why the countryside should be protected
from “encroachment”; why a green belt is necessary in order to preserve the
character of historic towns (plenty of historic towns seem to manage without
them); or why a green belt, rather than simply designating the land for
agriculture or recreation, is needed in order to encourage recycling of urban
land.
The fundamental theme that underlies all these claimed justifications
is, as in Howard’s original tract, a deepseated
dislike of the city.
Problems with Green Belt policy
In seeking to protect the edges of cities from development, while
accepting that provision must be made
for economic and population growth, Green Belt policy is attempting to divert
development to other locations. So what
possible locations are there for such development?
There are three possibilities:
- Within the existing urban area. This could be achieved by redeveloping existing land at higher densities, or by building on virgin sites (parks, playing fields, allotments, urban farmland) within the city; or
- On previously undeveloped land at a distance from the city (either within or adjacent to other settlements or in completely new settlements); or
- On the edge of the city.
It is not immediately obvious that options (1) and (2) are
preferable to option (3).
While there may be scope for recycling “brownfield” land
(e.g. former industrial sites, MoD land), it is questionable whether building
on former school playing fields or allotments or urban farmland within the city
is desirable. Arguably, such green areas are of more value and to more people
in the inner city than preserving the open outlook of people living on the edge
of the city. This is in fact a policy choice favouring the amenities of an
articulate and influential group of mainly middle class suburban dwellers over
the interests of the inarticulate residents of the inner city (including the
homeless).
The corollary of the green belt policy was the post-1945 new
towns and expanded towns programme.
However, although the intention of the Garden City and New and Expanded Town
planners was that their new settlements should be self-contained, in practice
they became indistinguishable from other commuter towns and villages around the
South East. The Greater London commuter
zone includes the New or Expanded Towns of Milton Keynes, Northampton and
Peterborough in the north, Swindon and Bracknell in the west, Basingstoke,
Crawley and Ashford in the south, and Braintree
and Basildon in the east – all part of successive governments’ “overspill”
programmes. In practice, there is
substantial commuting to London from these towns. For example, according to the 2011 Census,
9415 residents of Welwyn/Hatfield District travelled approximately 35 km to work in
London (4102 by train and 4074 by car).
Similarly, 5820 residents of Milton Keynes travelled at least 80 km to
work in London (3707 by train and 1563 by car).
[Acknowledgements to LSE report "A 21st century Metropolitan Greenbelt" ]
Thus by protecting the edge of the city at the expense of
dozens of towns around London, the Green Belt and the complementary
New/Expanded Towns programme have lengthened the journey to work of tens of
thousands of London workers while increasing CO2 emissions and
placing additional strain on transport systems.
It has also been argued (in my view convincingly) that
another of the perverse effects of the Green Belt has been that by limiting the
supply of housing in London it has raised house prices and therefore land
prices. In turn the effect of this has
been both to price low income workers out of the city and to make it more
expensive to build houses. (There is some debate about which is cause and which
is effect, but the practical result is the same).
In all probability Green Belt policy has also been a major
contributory cause of the slowdown in housebuilding in the 21st
century (compared with earlier decades) and the housing shortages and
homelessness that have been the inevitable consequence.
The whole Green Belt policy has been founded on hostility to
cities and a false dichotomy between town and country (implied in the very
title of the Act of Parliament). Viewed
more objectively, towns are really only a special case of countryside (think
about it).
A Green Blanket policy
So if we scrap the Green Belt, what should replace it?
What it should not mean is that all land on the edge of
cities immediately becomes available for development. The designation “green belt” is not itself a
land use. Rather it is an additional
protection for land that is (in most cases) allocated for a specific use –
commonly agriculture, forestry, playing fields, country park, etc.
Section 38(6) of the 2004 Planning and Compensation Act
(which re-enacted Section 54A of the 1990 Town and Country Planning Act) requires
that planning applications should be determined in accordance with the
development plan “unless material considerations indicate otherwise.” This is unlikely to change, so de-designation
of the Green Belt simply means that a planning application to build houses on
land allocated for agriculture in the development plan will be refused unless a
special case can be made that there are “material considerations [that] indicate
otherwise”. Former Green Belt land would
thus be treated on the same basis as any other land.
What de-designation would permit is a more rational approach
to urban form. If there is a demonstrable
need for more housing (or industry or whatever), and a particular site offers
the best opportunity for meeting that need, then it should be evaluated
alongside other alternatives – and not ruled out on the dogmatic grounds that
it is in the Green Belt.
So instead of a green belt policy, I think we should have a “green
blanket” policy. There should be a
presumption against development on any greenfield site that is not
already allocated for development - whether within the city, or separated from
the city, or on the edge of the city – unless it can be shown that the
particular greenfield site is the best or only site that would meet the development
need.
© 2020
Robin Paice
Appendix – some abandoned planning policies
Birmingham Urban Design Study. In the late 1980s Birmingham City Council engaged
consultants (Tibbalds) to produce a policy to guide urban design in the city
centre, and this policy was duly adopted in 1990. Inter alia the policy placed
limits on tall buildings except in particular locations (especially the city
centre ridge). However, by the late
1990s commercial and political pressures led to the approval of 30-storey buildings in locations that conflicted with
this policy – which was thus effectively abandoned.
Glasgow’s Comprehensive Development Areas (CDAs) and Highway
Plan. In the late 1950s and early 1960s
Glasgow embarked on a vast programme of demolishing most of its 19th
century sandstone tenement buildings and replacing them with predominantly high
rise flats and maisonettes. These were
to be located in 27 CDAs around the city centre. At the same time the Greater Glasgow
Transportation Study (GGTS) recommended a network of urban motorways which led
to and encircled the city centre and complemented the adjacent CDAs. However, by the late 1960s, a reaction set in
against both the wholesale demolition of structurally sound tenements and the
attempt to solve traffic problems by road building. The clearance and motorway
programmes were halted in favour of conservation.
Parker-Morris standards.
In 1961, at the request of the Ministry of Housing and Local Government,
the Parker-Morris Committee recommended minimum space standards for Council and New Town
housing, and these were duly adopted.
Although not mandatory for private sector housing, they were a bench
mark against which new private housing could be judged. However, in 1980, the new Conservative
government abandoned them as a cost-saving measure.
Local Development (Structure) Plans. Since 1948 all planning authorities have been
required to produce a local development plan (the terminology changes: they
used to be called structure and local plans, then unitary development plans,
then local development frameworks).
These were required to follow government policy and be subjected to
local public examination and justification and then government endorsement. In
practice, however, they are often undermined and nullified by arbitrary
government planning decisions that conflict with the approved plan. For example, without any warning or objective
justification, the 1980 policy of Enterprise Zones completely changed the urban
structure of many towns where they were designated (e.g. Dudley,
Sheffield/Rotherham). Similarly, major
infrastructure projects, such as HS2, Freeports, or new airport runways, can
render plans obsolete over a wide area.
SERPLAN. For nearly
five decades from 1962 the South East Regional Planning Conference met
regularly, under the guidance of central government, to develop and co-ordinate
their plans into an evolving regional strategy (known as “Regional Planning
Guidance”) for the South East. This
strategy included targets for releasing land for housing to accommodate
expected population growth throughout the region. However, in 2010, partially in response to “nimby”
objectors, the new Coalition government scrapped this system and has not
replaced it.
© 2020
Robin Paice
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