50 Shades of Planning

The end, when it came, was fittingly ignominious. The Publication version of the Greater Manchester Spatial Framework (GMSF), which is in the public domain, but will not now be published for public consultation, was to help “transform Greater Manchester (GM) into a top global city”, but Stockport’s councillors must have missed that bit as they presumably skimmed straight to the housing allocations chapter. Stockport’s vote on continuing to progress the conurbation-wide development plan document (DPD) bore less of a resemblance to New York’s City Council and more of a resemblance to Dibley Parish Council. The GMSF states that “the strength and strategic location of Greater Manchester puts it in an ideal place to act as the primary driver for the Northern Powerhouse”, but such lofty rhetoric played second fiddle to members’ concerns about the plan being based on ‘developer wants rather than community need’; it’s reliance on ‘out-dated’ statistics and who’s ward was ‘bearing the brunt of

How remiss of me! Since I began working in the West Midlands I have been recording an annual collection of reflections on devolution and the Birmingham shortfall. Here we are towards the end of 2020 and I very nearly managed to miss the sixth instalment. If this is the first of these blogs that you have come across feel free to catch up via these links:·  2015 ; 2016 ; 2017 ; 2018 ; and 2019 (a fifth anniversary podcast special). December 2019 was a month that neatly encapsulates the issues at play in the West Midlands. It was last December that Birmingham City Council’s (BCC) Cabinet considered the looming three year anniversary of the adoption of the Birmingham Development Plan (BDP). A review mechanism, readers of past blogs and followers of this whole, sorry farrago will know, was introduced late in the day into the BDP whereby BCC would review the Plan within three years of adoption (10 January 2017) if the expected rate of progress on distributing a 37,900 home shortfall was n

Fixture release day is the footballing highlight of the summer. Even those fans for whom relegation was the paltry reward for another season of dedicated service will at least have something new to look forward to. It might not be a cash-laden consortium of far east owners, or a precocious young coach, or a new star striker, but there will at least be a couple of different teams on the fixture list. If your team finished mid-table in one of the middle divisions then you will have a few new faces. They might include a Goliath on their way down, a David on their way up, or perhaps just a once familiar foe that has spent a few seasons in either the sun or the shadows. From the moment the preceding season has finished and matters of promotion and relegation have been settled I will have had my eye on new grounds to visit. I put every game in my work calendar and then surreptitiously slip the games that I fancy during the first half of the season onto the kitchen calendar. I repeat this e

As each week of the ‘Great Lockdown’ of 2020 has passed excursions have either been crossed off the kitchen calendar all together or added to a list on the back page of things that need to be added to 2021’s version. Filey at Easter with my family would have been lovely. The Peak District with the families of my university pals over the May Day Bank Holiday weekend would also have been lovely. Travelling down to celebrate my Mum’s birthday, my sister’s birthday and my nieces’ birthdays with them rather than via Zoom would have been lovely too. I was really looking forward to Trent Bridge though. There will be international cricket this summer, but the first test will certainly be behind closed doors and the final test almost certainly will be too. I am reconciled now that all but the last vestiges of hope remain with not spending two days in the upper tier of the Radcliffe Road End in August. In 2015 the Royal Town Planning Institute (RTPI) sought to find England’s ‘Greatest Place’

Every so often a word enters the public conversation that you have never heard before, but all of sudden is everywhere. A word that captures the zeitgeist. In the summer of 2006 it was metatarsal. In the Autumn of 2019 it was prorogue. In the Spring of 2020 it was furlough.  I was granted a leave of absence from work on 6 April and am still furloughed as I write this at the end of May. Whilst all around key workers are keeping the lights on I am being paid to stay at home.  There have been moments when the enormity of why I am at home and not stuck on a motorway somewhere has escaped me. These moments have, I admit, usually involved a book, a beer and some late afternoon sunshine. For the most part though this has not been an especially relaxing time.  Like all families (apart from those involved in the running of the country) we have had to deal with not going anywhere, which was novel at first, but quickly become a nuisance. Layered on top of that has been the home-schoo

Lehman Brothers filed fo r bankruptcy and the run on Northern Rock started in September 2007. I joined the relatively new Leeds office of Drivers Jonas (DJ) not long afterwards with a brief to grow the residential business, but within what seemed like no time at all there was no residential business to be had. Credit had been crunched. 2008 was not a pleasant time. I remember the other Associates jostling to position themselves as specialists in whatever fields there were still fees to be had in. Somebody pitched themselves as a health sector specialist. Somebody else pitched themselves as an education sector specialist. I had dipped into PPG15 a couple of times, but was by no means a heritage specialist. Nevertheless when the sector lead needed somebody to speak at a conference in Liverpool my hand was the first to go up. I recall chatting with the other speakers before it kicked off and the conversation was dominated by the economic outlook. An older chap sought to console the you