The 50 Shades of Planning Blog

Episode 179 of the podcast is available now via this link or from the usual podcast platforms. Friend of the podcast Andrew Taylor and I were at a symposium organised by Create Streets at Hatfield House in June last year called ‘Building for generations’. It was an interesting day and all the of presentations and the conversations there upon led me back to the fundamental question as to why places look the way they do. That, it seemed to me on the train back that evening, would make for a good episode of a town planning-based podcast because of, course, sometimes lost perhaps amongst the noisier topics of conversation like housing numbers or Green Belt or strategic planning, is that a fundamental function of town and country planning is to improve existing places and create high-quality new ones. So, I sought to convene some experts in the field of design and placemaking to answer that question. Those experts are old friends of the podcast Hana Loftus (who steers the conversation), t...

Episode 178 of the podcast is available now via this link or from the usual podcast platforms. I was in Birmingham recently and took the opportunity whilst there to catch up with old friend of the podcast Myles Wild-Smith and new friends of the podcast Mike Knott, Bart Shirm and Beth Pywell. Myles is a Director at Lichfields, Mike is a Regional Practice Lead at Stantec, Bart is a Senior Planning Policy Officer at Sandwell and Beth is an Associate Director at Nexus. During a good ol’-fashioned, Shades-style ramblechat we talked about the NPPF's non-appearance before the parliamentary summer recess; local plan progress and the recent Pennycook pragmatism letter; changes to the BNG regime; Bart’s recent trip to Canada, which led us back to the reform agenda here; and towards the end, a favourite hobby horse of mine, application fees.

Episode 177 of the podcast is available now via this link or from the usual podcast platforms. This is another episode in the Hitting the High Notes series, which, if you have not listened to one before, is town planning’s equivalent, nee rip off, of Desert Island Discs. During these episodes I chat to preeminent figures in the planning and property sectors about the planning permissions or projects that have helped to shape them as professionals and, so that we can get to know people a little better personally, for every permission, project or stage of their career, I also ask my guests for a piece of music that reminds them of that period. Unlike Desert Island Discs you will not, I am afraid, hear any of that music during the episode because using commercially-licensed music without the copyright holders permission or a very expensive PRS licensing agreement could land me in hot water, so, when you have finished listening, you will have to make do with YouTube videos and a Spotify p...

Episode 176 of the podcast is available now via this link or from the usual podcast platforms. A couple of months ago I saw that Shaun Knights at Preston City Council and national vice chair of the Young Planning Officers Society (POS), had posted on LinkedIn encouraging nominations for POS’ ‘Emerging Planner Award’ (EPA). “I’ve already seen some genuinely impressive submissions that show the amazing day‑to‑day work young planners are doing and the fresh ideas they’re bringing into LPAs”, Shaun wrote. “Hmm”, thought I. "I am interested in the amazing day‑to‑day work that young planners are doing and the fresh ideas they’re bringing into LPAs, and I bet that 50 Shades listeners would be too..." I sent Shaun a message asking if he and his Young POS colleagues would be up for making an episode together with some of the planners that were subsequently short-listed for the award and he was, and some of them were, and so they put together what you are will hear ahead of and after...

Episode 175 of the podcast  is available now via this link below or from the usual podcast platforms. The role of local councillors in the planning system has been a familiar topic of conversation on the podcast in the context of, for example, overturning officer recommendations and the case for a national scheme of delegation. There is less talk about the role of MPs in the planning system, which is something that friend of the podcast Andrew Taylor wanted to remedy. This then is the second of what he and I hope will be five episodes exploring the role of a member of a parliament by way of conversations that Andrew records with representatives from the now five major parties. This time, the Liberal Democrats, and a conversation recorded with Vikki Slade and Sarah Gibson at Soho Radio Studios in April 2026. Andrew, regular listeners will know, is Group Planning and Sustainability Director at Vistry. Vikki represents Mid Dorset and North Poole and is a former group leader on B...

Episode 174 of 50 Shades of Planning is available now via this link or from the usual podcast platforms. I was in London recently and whilst there caught up with friends of the podcast Hana Loftus , Mike Kiely , Nicola Gooch , Simon Ricketts and Andrew Taylor . Hana is a Director at HAT Projects; Mike is a former Chief Planner and now an independent planning consultant working mainly in the public sector; Nicola is a Partner at Birketts; Simon is a Partner at Town Legal and Andrew is Group Planning & Sustainability Director at Vistry. In a conversation recorded at Soho Radio Studios  we chatted about some of the hot topics exercising the planning profession at the minute. We talked about the legal challenge by some London boroughs to the Mayor’s package of time-limited emergency measures to support housebuilding. We talked about planning committees, the national scheme of delegation, statutory chief planners, the designation of LPAs for poor performance, the Nature Restoratio...

Some of you might know that since January 2024 I have been issue a periodic newsletter. I was conscious that I had not issued one for a while, but did not realise until logging in to Mailchimp at the weekend that it had been three months since the last one. Evidently I am struggling to find the time so have decided to call time on that. To be fair, when I had been issuing them of late, they had become little more than summaries of the podcast descriptions so they were not really what I had in mind when I started them. If you are subscribed to this blog and to the 50 Shades podcast then you will not miss anything I publish on these platforms. One of the aims of the newsletter was to bring people together and, as well as sharing news of the blog and podcast, I hoped that it could act as a noticeboard for anybody wanting to share things of possible interest. I think that I can achieve those aims, and perhaps even achieve more, with a WhatsApp Community . The spur was being asked on Lin...

Episode 173 of the podcast is available now via this link or from the usual podcast platforms. This is the fourth of a series of episodes being led by the oldest friend of the podcast, Paul Smith . Paul, regular listeners will know, is the Managing Director at the Strategic Land Group and a Housing Today columnist. Paul put it to me a little while ago that debates about the planning system in England tend, for the most part, to focus solely on the planning system in England. We very seldom look to other countries for inspiration and ideas. Paul wanted to remedy that and so in this series he is chatting with planning professionals and academics from a number of countries to find out what works well there, what works less well, and what can we learn. In this episode Paul explores the planning system in New Zealand with Stuart Donovan . Stuart is an economist and Senior Fellow with Motu Research, an independent Wellington-based economics and public policy institute. In a conversation rec...

You might have seen that friend of the 50 Shades of Planning podcast Catriona Riddell's latest column for Planning was called 'How planning could work in 2036 (if the new system is allowed to bed down)'. "High speed railways, electricity lines and reservoirs, plus a network of new towns offering plentiful affordable housing, will be enabled in the next decade by the reformed planning system, says our columnist." "2036 is looking bright, thanks to the decisions made in 2026!" was Catriona's final line. What if those decisions are not made though? An alternative take on what we might be dealing with in ten years time was shared by a mutual friend of Catriona and I in a WhatsApp group to which we are both part and the author of that alternative take was agreeable to me sharing it anonymously on here. In 2036 it has been accepted that the plan-led system was a myth. The 30-month plan-making system was a disaster due to pesky things like needing to achie...

Episode 172 of 50  Shades of Planning is available now via this link or from the usual podcast platforms. I was invited to contribute to an event in Leicester back in October last year and also on the panel that evening was Grant Butterworth , who I have known for a long time. Grant kindly invited me down early for a tour of the city, which I readily accepted because Leicester is not a place that I knew well and Grant is always fine company. Anyway, as we were walking around and Grant was pointing out this scheme and that scheme he suggested to me that I really should invite Peter Soulsby on to the podcast, and so I did, Peter accepted, and we met at some studios on the outskirts of Leicester in January. Peter, or rather Sir Peter, has been a politician for over fifty years. He was first elected to Leicester City Council in 1973, but lost his seat in 2003. In between he served as the Leader of the Council twice. Peter was then the MP for Leicester South from 2005 until he resigne...

Episode 171 of 50 Shades of Planning is available now via this link or from the usual podcast platforms. I was invited by Lorenzo Pandolfi of Logic Planning back in February to a seminar that he was hosting jointly with Simone Pagani of GIA Surveyors. They had invited Chris Katkowski of Kings Chambers and Russell Harris of Landmark Chambers to tell the story of the Shard inquiry. I was disappointed not to be able to make it, I recall that I was in Newcastle that afternoon, but one of the benefits of being an amateur podcaster is that if I cannot attend something I can politely enquire as to the possibility of it being recorded. Not just for me, obviously, but for the 50 Shades listenership as well. As it so happens, and perhaps not surprisingly, the event was oversubscribed and so it was agreed that we would turn it into a 50 Shades episode. Over the course of an hour and a quarter or so you will hear two of our most prominent KCs share their recollections of one of the most consequen...

Episode 170 of the podcast is available now via this link or from the usual podcast platforms. "The second (epochal change) is the technology revolution led by developments in artificial intelligence, which will change everything. I mean everything. There is no point in debating whether this technological revolution is a good or bad thing. Just know it is a ‘thing’. In fact, it is ‘the thing’. It will displace jobs, though creating new ones, but no one yet knows the full consequence. Companies and countries will rise or fall on the back of it. It will revolutionise the private sector and should in time revolutionise public services and government. Yet people in most countries, including Britain, have no idea what is about to hit them." Not my words, Readers, but the words of Tony Blair in his recent essay . What is about to hit us? What are the implications of AI in the planning context? What does it mean for what we do now and what we might do in the future? What are the le...

Episode 169 of 50 Shades of Planning is available now via this link or from the usual podcast platforms. The role of local councillors in the planning system has been a familiar topic of conversation on the podcast in the context of, for example, overturning officer recommendations and the case for a national scheme of delegation. There is less talk about the role of MPs in the planning system, which is something that friend of the podcast Andrew Taylor wanted to remedy. This then is the first of what he and I hope will be five episodes exploring the role of a member of a parliament by way of conversations that Andrew records with representatives from the now five major parties. First, Labour, and a conversation recorded with Elsie Blundell and Mike Reader back in March. Andrew, regular listeners will know, is Group Planning and Sustainability Director at Vistry, Elsie represents Heywood and Middleton North and Mike represents Northampton South. Andrew explores with Elsie and Mike...

Episode 168 of the podcast is available now via this link or from the usual podcast platforms. I was in Manchester recently and took the opportunity whilst there to catch up with friends of the podcast Charlotte Leach, Katie Wray, Claire Petricca-Riding and Paul Smith. Charlotte runs her own communications and strategic advisory business, Katie is a Director at Deloitte Real Estate, Claire is a Partner and National Head of Planning & Environmental Law at Irwin Mitchell, and Paul is Managing Director at The Strategic Land Group and a Housing Today columnist. Our conversation, recorded at Reform Radio , was a good old fashioned 50 Shades-style ramblechat. We started with the local elections and then from Reform got on to planning reform and back again and before we knew it an hour had passed by.

As I wrote a few weeks ago, when two property professionals meet, to paraphrase Samuel Johnson, their first talk is of the planning system. When two planners meet their first talk might not be of the RTPI, but very often, I find, conversations ultimately lead in that direction. For example, as you might have heard, during podcast episode 159 the point was made that, if the Masters required for chartered status burdens graduates with a year's more debt, and employers, certainly consultancies, do not in a tight labour market require such status, why would they stay at University for that final year or take on two years of part-time study? As another example, you might have seen recently that planners at Basildon were subjected to some pretty unpleasant behaviour by some councillors on the planning committee. Discussions with people about that led me to wonder how many planners within LPAs are chartered and so might expect to be able to rely on the RTPI for support were they to laun...