Five radical ideas for a better planning system

摘要

In the March issue of Town & Country Planning, Tom Pain takes academics to task for their silence in debates about the philosophy of planning and for absenting themselves 'from the fight for the values of planning'. Colleagues at the Bartlett School of Planning, UCL, have been engaging in just such a discussion over the past six months about the future direction of planning. In the run-up to the general election, a group has produced a quasi-manifesto under the title Five Radical Ideas for a Better Planning System. The aim in producing the manifesto is to consider ways of responding to current problems in the system commensurate with the sweeping changes that we have witnessed over the last five years. Among these one might number the abolition of the regional tier, the under-resourced introduction of neighbourhood planning, the publication of the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) as the single expression of government policy in England, and the drastic cuts in local authority budgets. We believe that central government has failed to provide a coherent and relevant planning agenda or to resource a strong planning system.