2 August 2011
How do we want to develop our cherished county?
There often appears to be two camps in Norfolk: those who want to ‘keep Norfolk Norfolk’ and those who want us to stop missing out on the opportunities other counties take for granted.
The truth is, I suspect, that these two instincts are deep inside everyone from Norfolk. All of us who care about this special place will have felt both sentiments at different times.
Can we have heritage AND opportunity? I say yes. We should be able to have the new businesses, houses and facilities we need without destroying our heritage. We ought to be able to develop our towns and villages in way that improves, rather than damages, Norfolk’s identity.
For too long we have had to choose between two models of ‘development’ in Norfolk: mass commuter house-dumping, or retiree and second home development in our villages. Neither is sustainable. Both have their roots in a London-centric view of what Norfolk has to offer.
We need another way. A Norfolk Way. We need development based on a vibrant local economy with small businesses and ‘organic’ housing back in the villages and in towns where people want to live. Modern technology and work patterns make this increasingly possible. Few of the work-force of tomorrow will be commuting to 9 to 5 jobs in office blocks. We are more likely to be self-employed, or working in small companies empowered by IT to compete worldwide.
We need to reject the stale choice between ‘Pro’ and ‘Anti’ Development and embrace the opportunity to design places that work for people who work in this modern way.
Norfolk is the perfect place to embrace this new approach to development, with our attachment to heritage, frustration at historic under-investment, and the urgent need for opportunities for our young. The Government’s Localism Bill provides a perfect opportunity for us to pioneer a new model of planning. Development should be something planned for Norfolk by us, rather than something done to Norfolk by others.
The Government has made a start by scrapping the last Governments housing targets and the unaccountable Regional Assemblies set up to impose the housing quotas on us, and through the Localism Bill has restored powers over local planning back to communities and councils.
The challenge now is to tackle the crisis in our planning system. Over recent years people’s trust in developers, councils and Government has fallen to such an extent that a general hostility to all development has gradually taken hold. This in turn has led most developers to similarly lose trust in the system, relying on lawyers and a ‘pile ‘em high’ approach to applications which our councils are too often powerless to resist.
Too often the planning system is about ‘development zoning’ of commuter housing estates instead of a real consideration of the long term social, economic and environmental needs of the places it exists to serve. In my experience most people are not against development. Who would be? They are against bad development, which is a completely different thing. If we had more community–led local Plans, with greater sensitivity to local design styles, materials and heritage, and with deeper thinking about the nature of Norfolk and our ambitions for it, I’m sure we could defuse a lot of the hostility to what passes for ‘planning’ today.
We need ‘sustainable development’. But in current planning law that term is used to mean that development only goes where existing communities are sustainable. Here in Norfolk that condemns all but our largest villages to inexorable decline. Real sustainable development should mean using development to help make places sustainable. Most of the 110 villages in my constituency would welcome 10 or 20 houses provided they were built as part of an agreed Village Plan, designed and built in materials which complemented the existing village, were priced to be affordable to local people working in local jobs and some of the development benefit was recycled back into supporting community facilities.
Imagine if every Town and Village had a Plan which set out a vision of how the people in it want it to evolve. We could then approach developers after the plan has been put together to invite them to tender to make it reality. This would be far better than the current system in which all development is ‘developer-led’, deepening distrust, dispute and disillusionment.
Nowhere is this truer than in Attleborough and Wymondham in my constituency. Both are beautiful market towns located south of Norwich on the A11, with a strong heritage and appeal as places to live and work, and both have been zoned by the last Government for significant growth. However both of these towns have active community groups concerned that the development will not be planned in a way that improves the town, but will lead to urban sprawl and the irrevocable undermining of the very qualities that make the towns so attractive.
In recent months I have been working with the local Councils to see if we can involve local people more deeply in helping shape a Town Plan that everyone can contribute to and have confidence in, and can be used to guide development over the coming months and years.
There are lots of examples of best practice from all around the UK of where this sort of process has been done well with wonderful results. Let’s look at them, learn from them and adapt and develop best practice to develop our county our way: The Norfolk Way.
Unless we act we are in danger of bequeathing to the next generation a legacy of retiree villages and urban sprawl around our towns and cities of which none of us will be proud.
This is our county. It is our planning system. Let’s take responsibility for it and make it work for us.
Published in the EDP, Tuesday 2nd August 2011
There often appears to be two camps in Norfolk: those who want to ‘keep Norfolk Norfolk’ and those who want us to stop missing out on the opportunities other counties take for granted.
The truth is, I suspect, that these two instincts are deep inside everyone from Norfolk. All of us who care about this special place will have felt both sentiments at different times.
Can we have heritage AND opportunity? I say yes. We should be able to have the new businesses, houses and facilities we need without destroying our heritage. We ought to be able to develop our towns and villages in way that improves, rather than damages, Norfolk’s identity.
For too long we have had to choose between two models of ‘development’ in Norfolk: mass commuter house-dumping, or retiree and second home development in our villages. Neither is sustainable. Both have their roots in a London-centric view of what Norfolk has to offer.
We need another way. A Norfolk Way. We need development based on a vibrant local economy with small businesses and ‘organic’ housing back in the villages and in towns where people want to live. Modern technology and work patterns make this increasingly possible. Few of the work-force of tomorrow will be commuting to 9 to 5 jobs in office blocks. We are more likely to be self-employed, or working in small companies empowered by IT to compete worldwide.
We need to reject the stale choice between ‘Pro’ and ‘Anti’ Development and embrace the opportunity to design places that work for people who work in this modern way.
Norfolk is the perfect place to embrace this new approach to development, with our attachment to heritage, frustration at historic under-investment, and the urgent need for opportunities for our young. The Government’s Localism Bill provides a perfect opportunity for us to pioneer a new model of planning. Development should be something planned for Norfolk by us, rather than something done to Norfolk by others.
The Government has made a start by scrapping the last Governments housing targets and the unaccountable Regional Assemblies set up to impose the housing quotas on us, and through the Localism Bill has restored powers over local planning back to communities and councils.
The challenge now is to tackle the crisis in our planning system. Over recent years people’s trust in developers, councils and Government has fallen to such an extent that a general hostility to all development has gradually taken hold. This in turn has led most developers to similarly lose trust in the system, relying on lawyers and a ‘pile ‘em high’ approach to applications which our councils are too often powerless to resist.
Too often the planning system is about ‘development zoning’ of commuter housing estates instead of a real consideration of the long term social, economic and environmental needs of the places it exists to serve. In my experience most people are not against development. Who would be? They are against bad development, which is a completely different thing. If we had more community–led local Plans, with greater sensitivity to local design styles, materials and heritage, and with deeper thinking about the nature of Norfolk and our ambitions for it, I’m sure we could defuse a lot of the hostility to what passes for ‘planning’ today.
We need ‘sustainable development’. But in current planning law that term is used to mean that development only goes where existing communities are sustainable. Here in Norfolk that condemns all but our largest villages to inexorable decline. Real sustainable development should mean using development to help make places sustainable. Most of the 110 villages in my constituency would welcome 10 or 20 houses provided they were built as part of an agreed Village Plan, designed and built in materials which complemented the existing village, were priced to be affordable to local people working in local jobs and some of the development benefit was recycled back into supporting community facilities.
Imagine if every Town and Village had a Plan which set out a vision of how the people in it want it to evolve. We could then approach developers after the plan has been put together to invite them to tender to make it reality. This would be far better than the current system in which all development is ‘developer-led’, deepening distrust, dispute and disillusionment.
Nowhere is this truer than in Attleborough and Wymondham in my constituency. Both are beautiful market towns located south of Norwich on the A11, with a strong heritage and appeal as places to live and work, and both have been zoned by the last Government for significant growth. However both of these towns have active community groups concerned that the development will not be planned in a way that improves the town, but will lead to urban sprawl and the irrevocable undermining of the very qualities that make the towns so attractive.
In recent months I have been working with the local Councils to see if we can involve local people more deeply in helping shape a Town Plan that everyone can contribute to and have confidence in, and can be used to guide development over the coming months and years.
There are lots of examples of best practice from all around the UK of where this sort of process has been done well with wonderful results. Let’s look at them, learn from them and adapt and develop best practice to develop our county our way: The Norfolk Way.
Unless we act we are in danger of bequeathing to the next generation a legacy of retiree villages and urban sprawl around our towns and cities of which none of us will be proud.
This is our county. It is our planning system. Let’s take responsibility for it and make it work for us.
Published in the EDP, Tuesday 2nd August 2011
