Development Management DPDs - Public forum - Planning Advisory Service (PAS)

Charlotte, I have just completed a very comprehensive 140,000 word Development Management DPD for one of the outer London Borough's. This is currently having its formal SA and legal sign off before approval by the Council's Executive to run a Reg 25 consultation this Spring. Most of the procedural stuff is pretty much standard as for any other DPD - (see the extensive guidence on the PINS website). Since this new DM DPD will be replacing a 1998 Borough wide UDP (which was quite largely a reflection of late 1980's issues) then the degree of change was pretty substantial! The really demanding issues were in integrating requirements of the emerging London Plan; the Council's rather "motherhood and apple pie" SCS, a near adopted Core Strategy and numerous locally specific technical issues. I could give you a lot of practical pointers, but there are a few key issues: (1 . The critical need to take elected local members of the planning committee wth you in the course of preparing a draft text. They need to have "ownership" - and quite genuinely do contribute a lot towards the local distinctivness of the document. They want a robust document that reflects their own current priorities and those of local residents who are later consulted at the Reg 25 consultation. They should be involved in a "working group" context regularly, frequently and often in what may be quite lengthy discussions about the emerging draft text (this also amounts to a very useful member training opportunity - away from the more political situation of an actual planning committee meeting); (2. The internal officer politics are sometimes very demanding. Specialists such as those involved in refuse collection, environmental noise or say air quality matters will be prone to silo thinking and really quite reluctant to see their own areas of expertise challenged and tested before being written in as development management policies (There was also reluctance to see earlier and less wheighty SPGs to which those specialists were quite wedded, superceeded by any new and more wheighty DPD); (3. As a formal DPD it will have to exist as an adopted hard copy document. However, 99% of future users wil be referring to the on-line pdf version - which they can print or copy and paste as they see fit. The electonic text should be written with internal and external hyperlinks to aid navigation around the documen. URLs to external sources such as documents available from the Planning Portal need to be given in full - rather than "click here". (4. Perhaps 90% of users will be interested members of the public, including potential objectors, or householder developers. The text should therefore be written very much for the layman rather than "professionals". Quite a bit may well be more in the nature of consumer advice rather than strict planning policy. Where relevant, It should also refer or cross reference with requirements of the Building Regulations or say the Party Wall Act - even though those are not strictly the proper business of "Planning Control" in the traditional sense; (5. Although any Development Management DPD is the critically important "delivery mechansim" for SCS and Core Strategy aims; pardoxically it is not really a job for collegues who I shall affectionately and respectfully call "policy wonks". Any LPA will find it very difficult to divert capable, hopefully very experienced and high level Development Management staff to the drafting of a future DM DPD. However, that is really what the task demands. A good DM DPD will reflect a wealth of robust knowledge about what works and what dosent. It needs to reflect a Development Manager's focus on outcomes, rather than on process. From your own perspective at CBRE, now that many or most Core Strategies are well on the way, my own estimate is that the production of robust and effective DM DPD's is going to become a major source of work for well organised consultancies. Happy to talk if I can help further. Regards, Tony Boswell

Charlotte We have produced a DM DPD (as part of our MWDF) which is currently at examination (the public hearings were last Tuesday). We stuck rigidly to the guidance and made it as concise as we could and only included policies that did not repeat national guidance. As a consequence there are no policies for example on transport or on flooding- we include in Appendix 1 of the DPD those matters we have specifically excluded on the basis there is national guidance. regards Mark.