Developing a Spatial Strategy for the New Era of Strategic Planning

The Government has made clear its ambition to bring forward a universal system of strategic plans to be in place by the end of the Parliament.

In March we had the first details of legislation set out in the Planning & Infrastructure Bill and now we have details of the devolution in the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill.

Authorities will soon have the powers to once again plan strategically. Spatial development strategies will give authorities the opportunity to plan across boundaries, at a larger scale and for the longer term.

In June we launched our series previewing our approach to developing a spatial strategy for this renewed era of strategic planning. Below is a recap of the key points from that series, sharing our experience working with authorities to develop growth strategies across a sub-regional/regional geography and the building blocks of developing a set of spatial options.

Get in touch with us if you are about to embark on the preparation of a Spatial Development Strategy (SDS), and want to find out more about how to undertake a spatial options exercise at a strategic scale:

• Explore capacity led potential for growth that focuses upon opportunity and strategic vision.

• Undertake a positive, robust, evidence-based planning exercise.

• Begin a conversation about which growth options can best balance important priorities and objectives for the area.

  
  

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Switch the Focus: why starting with targets misses the point 

Our current planning framework pushes plan-makers to identify a target, then to ask the market to find land/sites to meet the need. What opportunities could be revealed if we turned that on its head?

A focus on the long-term, which identifies the opportunities for growing existing places, new places or regenerating places. Guided by an understanding of the sustainable capacity of places and settlements and what spatial patterns can help to meet plan objectives.

When we search for the best locations for large-scale development, we need to think about what opportunities are generated by that place. Its specific geography, its land, its economy, its settlement pattern, its natural ecosystem, its patterns of movement across and within. 

To find the right places, we also need to ask the right questions, such as Where are the opportunities to align infrastructure with development? and What spatial patterns can help to meet objectives as best possible? 

Strategic planning cannot just be about targets; it’s about unlocking potential to meet need and opportunity. The better the questions, the better the places we create.

It’s all about the data: but only if it’s the right data

Planning for the long-term and across boundaries needs a different approach than what is typically collected in current local plans.

Data sets need to focus on opportunity; what could be developed, not what could be delivered (that will be remain the role of local plans). Also being mindful that the longer the plan period the less certainty there is with economic and demographic projections.

Data needs to be inherently spatial and mappable across larger than local areas. The development of strategic spatial options requires the selection of data sets that best reflect priorities set out in the Vision and Objectives for the SDS, and consider these against competing national land-use policies.

Assembling the right data, at the right scale is so important as it helps to provide the foundations for building the spatial strategy.

Strategic Mapping: Finding patterns, not creating boundaries

Identifying choices around growth opportunities at the strategic scale requires a clear visual mapping and presentation.

Visualising patterns of existing and potential development across regional and sub-regional geographies supported with strategic-scale constraints and designations. And, not forgetting to avoid the temptation of zooming in and defining boundaries!

Using a consistent mapping technique, like hexagonal grids, helps to visualise and then assess these with a degree of consistency. This also reminds us to stay high-level and refrain from defining extents and drawing red-line boundaries.

Strategic mapping is about seeing the big picture, because the right patterns reveal the right places.

Understanding policy drivers that influence location; and getting comfortable with trade-offs

As practitioners at the strategic scale, we need to start with understanding ‘where’ and ‘why’, not just ‘how’.

This means working with locational policy drivers, not site-specific policies, and seeing how these influence locations for growth. For example, sustainable locations and flood risk in national policy, as well as more place-specific opportunities that can come from aligning growth with strategic infrastructure (existing and planned), like transport corridors, utilities, and energy provision.

Whilst each of these drivers is often considered in isolation through a sequential approach, the reality of strategic planning is that they rarely exist independently. Instead they interact, sometimes supporting each other, but often introducing tensions and trade-offs that push and pull potential strategies in competing directions.

Critical in all this is understanding the choices, and deciding the weight to attach to these drivers to inform the development of a spatial strategy.

What are you trying to achieve? What are your strategy objectives? And can you map them?

To plan strategically we need to think spatially. That starts with a clear vision and strong place-based objectives. This should set the direction of the strategy and define what success looks like.

We then need to identify the spatial data that helps to deliver on these objectives as best as possible and map these.

Visualising the spatial objectives using relevant datasets makes them tangible and helps show how they can relate to a place. Crucially the mapped spatial objectives provide the platform for developing meaningful, location-informed spatial options, and are the foundation of any strategic spatial strategy.

Developing Spatial Options: Create, explore, choose, test

To develop a strategic spatial strategy, you need meaningful choices, and to develop choices, you need spatial options. Clear, well-considered alternatives that can be tested and refined.

We can create spatial options by overlaying and combining different spatial objectives that relate to the vision and the overarching aims of the strategy.

Importantly, options should be meaningfully distinct: different directions, different implications, different opportunities so that the strategy that follows can be shown to emerge from a transparent, robust process.

Once fixed, options can be tested and assessed against the objectives, policies, and evidence to then deliver a preferred strategy that will be robust, transparent and ready to move forward to underpin an SDS.

In summary

Drawing on our experience and approach, here are the most valuable considerations for those beginning the process of developing and testing a strategic spatial strategy: 

•  Start with spatial objectives, not just targets, understand what you want to achieve and why. 

• Use the right data, strategic, spatial, and aligned with long-term ambitions to make sure you can map your spatial objectives to help build a strategy that delivers.  

• Map and analyse at the appropriate scale, zoom out to find patterns, not sites. 

• Understand and consider policy drivers, and be ready to make choices between areas of pressure, protection and priority.

• Build real spatial options, that are distinct from one another, mappable and can be tested and evaluated in a clear and consistent manner.

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