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Podcast episode 127: Let's get digital

Episode number 127 of the podcast is available now via this link or from Apple and Spotify.

Long-serving Listeners might recall that for Episode 6 of the podcast I published a chat with Euan Mills, then of the Connected Places Catapult, on the potential for digital innovation, urban data, and user-centred design to improve the planning system.

Euan, now CEO and co-founder of Blocktype, got in touch with me earlier this year and asked if he could put together an episode on the progress that has been made over the past five years towards this aim.

This was both a kind invitation and a coincidental one because at around the same time the Spring Budget Statement included reference to “piloting the use of AI solutions to support planning authorities to streamline their local plan development processes, producing plans in 30 months rather than the current average of seven years. This builds on work to date which has already reduced planning officer processing times by up to 30% per application.”

This episode features four conversations that Euan recorded back in March with four people both very knowledgeable and very active in this space. They are Alistair Parvin, CEO of Open Systems Lab; Dr Sue Chadwick, Strategic & Digital Planning Advisor at Pinsent Masons; Matt Wood-Hill, Head of Digital Planning Software at MHCLG; and Paul Downey, Planning Data Service Owner at MHLCG.

During the course of this episode Listeners will learn a lot about how digital innovation, urban data, and user-centred design are improving the UK planning system.



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