Community engagement through town planning

This ongoing town-grown engagement project draws on six years of work with local communities and elected representatives in Brighton and Hove, partly through advisory work with local authorities and councillors, but mainly through academic and student collaborations with local councillors, council officers and community groups.

The Conservative-Liberal Democrat Coalition government elected in 2010 introduced the Localism Act 2011, followed shortly afterwards by the Neighbourhood Planning (General) Regulations 2012. The legislation heralded a new power for neighbourhood visions to be enshrined in new Neighbourhood Development Plans (NDPs), part of the statutory local development plan. Tight control of high level housing numbers is still held as a ‘strategic’ element of the Local Plan which communities have to be in conformity with, although they can opt for more development if they choose.

The process of setting housing numbers can become a political battlefield, as accusations of ‘top down’ imposition of housing numbers set by the national Planning Inspectorate lead some communities to question whether Localism happens in practice. Some communities consider there is little point undertaking a Neighbourhood Plan when they are powerless to prevent housing numbers they consider unsustainable, however for those communities in broad agreement with the housing number set for their area, there is a new opportunity for communities to decide where sites are located and to establish local policies for the area in a Neighbourhood Development Plan.