Updates

The High Streets Task Force has published a report on creating resilient and revitalised high streets. Twenty case studies and recommendations have been published since the start of 2022, as here.

The Mayor set a target for London to be net zero carbon by 2030 and he commissioned Element Energy which analysed four possible pathways to the target in their report and the Mayor’s response is here.

A House of Lords’ report was published on this subject. It concluded that without reducing the barriers to meeting housing demand — including skills shortages, lack of available land, resources for local planning authorities, the reduced role of SME housebuilders, inadequate support for social housing provision, and the barriers and delays in the planning system — it will not be possible to meet targets for various types of homes.
RTPI has commented on the report in a blog here.
An article in Building magazine covers the Peers’ criticism of the [more…]

Martin Esom, chief executive, Waltham Forest LBC, explains how his borough is shaping localities around the people who live and work there.
Does your borough have those ambitions?

The GLA has provided the latest details about London’s Opportunity Areas.
If you click through the map and see information for any OA, has your borough endorsed the potential housing and job numbers and are the timescales for delivery and the dependencies for the developments clear?

The government’s chief planner, Joanna Averley, in her latest newsletter to local authorities proposes that we must bring about a change in urban attitudes so that towns and cities once again become attractive places in which to live, work and socialise.
The vital importance of the freight and logistics sector to shops, households, assembly lines, hospitals and other public services is emphasised.

London Forum supports the content of the Mayor’s GLA Urban Greening Factor (UGF) Guidance for borough assessment of new applications to achieve Policy G5 for Urban Greening in the March 2021 London Plan.
Presentation slides describing the UGF guidance are here.

The Local Government Association and others commissioned a report which makes the economic and fiscal case for constructing 100,000 new council homes each year.
The Centre for Social Justice has produced a new vision for affordable housing in an analysis of the hidden housing crisis.

The London Recovery Board has met to discuss progress of its nine recovery missions to help make London greener, fairer and safer. The Mayor has published their updates on the Talk London website here.

A retrofit advice note has been written by London Forum trustee Helen Warner on the points to take into consideration when making a home more carbon efficient.

The November 2021 Planning Bulletin from Historic England is here.

There are eighteen items in the published Environment Act that planners, developers, communities and decision makers need to understand and apply.