The LDF isn’t working, is it ? - Public forum - Planning Advisory Service (PAS)

Another 10 months on. Do we have any examples yet of how an adopted Core Strategy say, has led to a better form of development, or some other beneficial outcome, compared to the Local Plan ? Has the LDF made a difference yet ?

We adopted our Core Strategy in 2007 after about 3 years' work and a short, focused hearing which bore no resemblance to the sprawling Local Plan Inquiries of the previous system. Since then: A strategic justification for preventing scattered rural market housing development has led to a more sustainable pattern of development and greater provision of rural affordable housing. The Highway Authority has committed funds to a relief road which will act to reduce air pollution in an Air Quality Management Area. Our infrastructure requirements have been subject to discussion with a wide range of providers and we are now preparing an Allocations and Infrastructure DPD which will promote a more strategic and sustainable pattern of development as a result. Without the clear spatial guidance from our Core Strategy this document would be considerably harder to produce. Nothing's perfect but getting on with it seems to be the best option.

Some guilt over this as first proposed the concept of 'core policies', a more flexible system, binding examinations less topic based and more spatial plans, formula based infrastructure charges and produced in 'months not years' in a paper (which Mike Hayes helped to write) to Mike Ash and Tony Baden then at the ODPM in 2002. At the time they were quite desperate for ideas for reform. Local plan making had become slow and plans were growing by accretion to documents of up to 900 pages long for which you needed a fork lift to carry. The treasury were threatening to abolish development plans altogether and Tony and Mike successfully fought a battle demonstrating that some requirements of government policy needed lines on statutory maps. It was with some shock though when reforms were laid out by in speeches by Lord Falconer, who i had never previously met, to hear him quoting myself back at me. Oh boy, the submission, and a few other similar ideas from submissions, there was something of a consensus for change in the profession, were lifted wholesale almost. The basic idea though was a more 'agile approach' plans quickly drafted and adapted, but what we saw in the detailed drafting of the legislation and the guidance was the opposite - a 'waterfall' approach to plan design (look up the waterfall design methodology on wikipedia) a 'big design up front' philosophy where there were rigid stages progressed in a slow sequence. How could a plan be produced in moths when there was an (unnecessary) SCI, then an (unnecessary) LDS and then after issues and options an (unnecessary) preferred options etc. The legislation and regulations - if whales could do plan in one para of an act why did England require a chapter of endless interlocking acronyms none of which used the term 'plan'. Seeing two-three years being added before you even got to a real plan was one reason I went away from plan making to getting stuff built. After a few years I returned to plan making either as interim management, drafting stages of plans for LPAs and advising them on process and soundness. With the wisdom of age I can now see areas where my assumptions were wrong, where the new system has worked badly and where it has worked well. Simon is spot on, where it has worked it has worked very well, Plymouth, Horsham, North Northants, quick plans unlocking potential joined up and aiding delivery three cheers. In all such cases though it has required almost superhuman LDF managers. The interlocking complexity of the new system requires an almost sensai ability to juggle multiple knock on consequences of actions. Where it has worked badly though, it has been a disaster, probably adding on average four years to plan review timescales that were too slow anyway, and with average planning policy team sizes rising by between a third and a half despite doing less. Experienced people have left plan making and teams are inexperienced and struggle to find managers. As a profession we were taught to 'muddle through' but muddling through after strict tests were introduced was a recipe for chaos. The biggest car crash of course was Stafford - sadly my home town. It was like your home team going up against Brazil, but with a 4-4-2 formation. Was a vague series of fuzzy objectives with no spatial strategy or directions for development really supposed to be the future of planning! Wasnt the idea to draw better quicker lines on maps. I was shocked that so few planner I spoke to shared my view that this had to be found unsound. Luckily the inspector was necessarily ruthless. Ok there is no finally a recognition that plans need to consult on realistic spatial options, be produced in fewer stages, and have earlier interventions on quality control issues - so that the risks arnt too endloaded. As a profession as well we are increasingly getting a grasp of the implications of the SEA directive to how we draft and consult on plans. This means that many of the same pratfalls would have occurred even if the 2004 act had never happened. I was wrong in giving too much emphasis the to the seat of the pants approach. The emphasis on evidence and research and showing audit trails for key decisions is unquestionably good for the whole of planning. Decisions now are much more robust even if slower. Most non councillors would also agree that examinations and binding reports are the parts of the system working mpst well. Disappointedly perhaps we have seen less innovation in the form and content of plans then I expected. It is a form of 'defensive medicine' risk aversion to the consequences of unsoundness is perhaps at play. Despite my initial skepticism I have been won over to the concept of 'soundness', though the self assessment toolkits could be less tiresome. The test gives a good benchmark and inspectors reports can be much shorter. If only PSS12 had a better understanding of the origins of the terms in modern logic and 'argument theory' in the law. If planning students learnt this field at college the profession would be much better for it. The worst consequence in my view has been the creation of a small number of instant 'experts' in the new system who proclaim to lecture everyone else about it and whose business model seems to be patronisation and leeching on the failure and dispair of local authorities. Dont get me wrong I am not pointing the finger at all government regional office officials or all consultants in this field - all but a handful do an excellent job. There perhaps is a consensus in the profession about what has worked well and hasnt, going back to the old system is no option and wholesale reform would be equally disruptive. We have to improve what we have and the latest changes are a start. Simplifying the regs must be a priority If it is possible for myself and chris sheply to write the equivalent of the regs, the eip procedure rules and the tests of soundness for Jersey in plain english on two sides of A4 surely they can be made better. They are so complexly cross referenced that reading them is like playing a cryptic soduko. Secondly project management of plans can be radically improved. Research shows 75% of all projects are severely late - what % of plans measured by the first LDS's - must be over 95%. Yet research also shows that new techniques of project management achieve 90% of projects on time and under budget. We also need to shift gradually away from good practice guidance - now the suite of this is almost complete - to developing tools for thinking about places, and making tough decisions about locations. Such spatial thinking tools, heuristics to use the scientific term, can be enormously useful in team working. I hope to be writing something about the use of these soon. Finally we need to conceptualize plan making as less of completion of an everextending checklist and more like the setting off an exciting saga. With this philosophy I think we can fix the mindless proceduralism and get back to making plan making fun.

So a few examples of where it may have worked. However being slightly cynical it does seem to me to be a rather expensive and complicated way to get control over scattered development in open countryside or support for building a new road. I would have thought these were just as easily achievable through a selective review of existing policy ? It may be the case that LDF is more appropriate in some urban areas where the strategic issues are perhaps more important than the detail whilst Local Plans or Unitary Plans remain the most effective way to plan in rural districts.