Chair of the Office for Place Nicholas Boys Smith shares some insights from the government department’s inaugural conference earlier this month.
The conference, held in Stoke-on-Trent on 18 and 19 March, brought together experts from the planning, surveying, development, architectural and landscape architect sectors to discuss how design codes can work at different spatial scales, how setting clear asks on quality can de-risk the development process, how placemakers can better understand what people like and value, and how digital can transform the planning and development sector.
Here Boys Smith shares his 15 key takeaways.
1. It’s harder to fix errors than to make them in the first place
Pretty much everyone now agrees that post-war planning did enormous harm to towns and cities, ripping them apart with dual carriageways, retail parks right besides town centres and the general loss of ‘Lego urbanism’ (finely hewn local streets and squares) for ‘Duplo urbanism’ (faceless lumpen blocks in ill-defined spaces). Sadly, in some places it still feels like we are living in the post-war era. As Jon Rouse, city director of Stoke-on-Trent, reminded us “repairing the tears in the urban fabric is much harder than making the tears in the first place.”
2. The road to meeting our housing need runs through Stoke-on-Trent and Grimsby not just Sussex and Greater London
Though the path is a different and is (initially) more about increasing demand through regenerative place-improvement and jobs. New development in ‘left-behind’ places need to be centripetal not centrifugal, regenerative not parasitic, energising not dissipating.
3. The need to rebuilt trust in regenerative development not parasitic development is paramount
Mary Parsons of Lovell Partnerships cited an articulate youngster on regeneration: “at best it’s a necessary evil.” Are we creating for the delight of the public or the plaudits of peers? She continued: “I’ve never met anyone who wanted to live in an icon. They want to live in a home.” Christopher Wren (who was not at the conference) wrote that ‘architecture aims at eternity and is therefore the only thing uncapable of modes and fashions in its labels.’ Let’s create places for the plaudit of the people not fellow professionals. Place matters more than decade.
4. Planning is categorically not the proverbial ‘bad guy’ … but we do need to de-risk planning
One delegate asked how easy it was to know what you can build where? The reality is that it’s not that easy.’ Amandeep Singh Kalra of Be First agreed: “Our system’s greatest challenge is its discretionary nature… let’s remove subjectivity to set land values.” A modular house builder added from the floor the importance of predictability.
5. We do know what makes a good place
Don’t fall for the old canard that ‘design is subjective.’ It isn’t. Where we live, where we walk has very measurable and in large part predictable consequence for our personal health and happiness. We are not automatons controlled by our environment, but we are humans influenced by them as many studies have shown and as Matthew Carmona outlined. Data scientist Chanuki Illushka Seresinhe said that people were happier in more beautiful places. Creating better places is therefore very much about improving health and happiness.
6. Design for children and the elderly and you’ll probably create good places for everyone
Across the world, humans’ needs from their neighbourhoods are remarkably consistent across class and culture though with important ‘slopes’ in the data due to climate and latitude. But it can be harder for the very young and the old to get about: it’s not that, for example, children are different species with completely different needs. Places carefully considered with children and the elderly’s liberty to move about will probably work better for everyone.
7. Good places are green places
There is a virtuous circle between where we live and the weight with which we tread upon the planet. This is true from street trees’ effect on microclimates to how we move about to the longevity and resilience of beautiful buildings and places whose embodied carbons over time tumbles as they find new uses down the decades. Creating and stewarding good places is ultimately to build not just for our generation but for the future, in communion with the future as well as the present and becoming ‘good ancestors’.
8. Aiming high helps
The changes in the ‘bar’ within the NPPF with the expanded aims of creating beautiful as well as sustainable places and the shift in the ‘bar’ from schemes needing to be ‘not bad’ to needing to be ‘good’ has provably made it easier for councils to turn down bad design. It is an important statement of raised expectations for how we can live as neighbours.
9. You can and should trust the people
And you need to respect what people tell you, not manipulate it. “You have to give power away,” as Stoke-on-Trent chief executive Jon Rouse put it. This includes respecting the important role that local councillors play. Technology is already changing the game here. Victoria Hills, chief executive of the RTPI, made the observation that soon, “the public will be able to design their own places with AI.” Robert Kwolek of Create Streets was unfazed. “It’s an opportunity to be welcomed,” he said while outlining how working with neighbourhood preferences can boost support.
10. Beware of fake consultation
“I’ve seen plenty of codes that just code on what people were going to do anyway. What’s the point of it?” said Amy Burbridge of Homes England. Asking simple and visual questions is important. Cathy Francis of DLUHC suggested we start with the question “where would I live?”
11. Pride and heritage matter
People care about home. Let’s work with that not against it. As Liam Gregson of the Northern Housing Consortium put it: “Make the most of historic buildings … as emblems for people to gather around.’ Paul Williams, a Stoke-on-Trent-based member of our expert advisory panel was very powerful on this: “don’t underestimate the concept of pride,” he said, “help people realise that they can still love the places they call home.”
12. Digital planning hasn’t really happened yet
As always, digital planning adviser Euan Mills, was very compelling on this. “PDFs are the very worst model for the web,” he said. “The web is 30 years old now. But if you ask Chat GPT about planning, it won’t tell you anything because it doesn’t know anything because it is all lost in PDFs.” Design codes done well will be a clear online process of what can, and cannot, be built easily in certain places. They should de-risk development with a clear quality ask.
13. Design codes need to clarify not complicate
This is our collective challenge and opportunity. Here, for now, is our answer by the way: 10 criteria for effective design coding
14.There is a new focus on place and a lot to be hopeful about
There was even a lot of hope about. Paul Williams from the Staffordshire University Business School was keen to “help people realise that they can still love the place they call home” while Liam Gregson of the Northern Housing Consortium detected “a new placemaking… in which people are empowered”.
15. Lots of priorities emerged for future research
Staffordshire University’s Williams, suggested we needed to find ways to measure pride in place to justify investment, while others suggested data standards for local plans and design codes. Much more on this to follow, so watch this space.
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