Abstract
A 2011 Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) report calculated that an additional 750,000 homes would be needed by 2025 to meet projected demand in the UK. If this is to be achieved, a significant number of new communities will be developed over the next decade. Local councillors have considerable potential in influencing the social sustainability of such new developments, particularly in the context of the current “Localism” agenda in the UK. However, this role of the local councilor is not well understood. The aim of this project was to explore the role of the local councillor in improving such outcomes. We selected two rural greenfield and two urban regeneration sites as case studies. Planning officers and local councillors were interviewed across the sites in order to identify factors that can lead to improved social sustainability. Emerging themes indicate the importance of the councillor’s role in community engagement and consultation, the changing nature of relationships, the importance of appropriate and timely infrastructure, and models of governance and accountability. These findings are discussed in terms of their implications for policy.
Highlights
Local councillors are well positioned to play a key role in realising sustainable outcomes for new communities
Within our case study sites, in Longbridge, the City Council identified that the future of the area would require careful planning three years before the demise of MG Rover
Local democratic arrangements need to be structured in a way that allows new communities to feel that they own their development, linking back to our findings regarding community engagement, and highlighting how each of these elements interlinks with the others. Through this series of interviews with planning officers and local ward councillors in new communities, this short study has shown that there can be considerable challenges for local councillors as new communities are developed, whether they are on greenfield sites or regeneration projects
Summary
Local councillors are well positioned to play a key role in realising sustainable outcomes for new communities. In this paper we begin to examine this potential for delivering social sustainability outcomes for new developments through an analysis of local councillors‘ and council planning officers‘ experiences of the development of new communities in contrasting locations in England. In this introduction we first explore the policy background regarding new communities in the UK and the concept of social sustainability as used within that context. We begin to analyse the role of the local councillor acting within this context, leading on to our research objectives for this study
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