Author: Carolyn Kagan, Steady State Manchester

As we move towards a future in urban areas where people travel less, buy locally and live more convivial lives, we need vital and liveable neighbourhoods. This means we have to think carefully about neighbourhoods and how they can be either built or ‘retrofitted’ to work well.

It is always good to see what is happening elsewhere and to learn what we can use for our own, usually quite different contexts. One such innovation in neighbourhood thinking is the 20 minute neighbourhood. This is a very simple idea, a neighbourhood in which we can all get the goods and services we need within a twenty minute walk of our house. But it’s an idea that has come into its own –Sustrans, for example, has included a call for Twenty Minute Neighbourhoods in their 2019 general election Manifesto.

The idea originated in Portland, Oregon, and has been taken up by Melbourne in Australia.

The Portland Plan was developed by a wide coalition of public sector agencies, businesses, residents and the not for profit sector. They say the Plan is about ‘boosting prosperity and educational outcomes, and helping to advance health and equity’. Indeed, vibrant 20 minute neighbourhoods, in which 90% of Portland’s residents can easily walk or bicycle to meet all basic daily, non-work needs, forms part of the city’s Climate Action Plan, and could be an important component of our own local authority plans.

Melbourne’s 20 minute neighbourhoods

The idea was taken up and adopted in Melbourne, in their Plan Melbourne 2017-50, and a summary can be found here. So, as in a previous blog on this site, where we were discussing ‘Retrofitting Suburbia’ we turn to Melbourne for a greater understanding of the 20-minute neighbourhood. It is Melbourne that has led the way in thinking about, and researching, not only the advantages of a 20-minute neighbourhood, but also what it will take to move from where we are now, with housing developments and urban infrastructure designed around the car, to where we would like to be.

Research undertaken by the Heart Foundation (Victoria) for the Victorian Government identified the following hallmarks of a 20-minute neighbourhood:

• be safe, accessible and well connected for pedestrians and cyclists to optimise active transport
• offer high-quality public realm and open spaces
• provide services and destinations that support local living
• facilitate access to quality public transport that connects people to jobs and higher-order services
• deliver housing/population at densities that make local services and transport viable
• facilitate thriving local economies

The following diagram, taken from Plan Melbourne, summarises the components of a 20 minute neighbourhood.

20-Minute neighbourhoods are one way to underpin strong and sustainable communities, where people enjoy good access to local jobs, services, amenities, social infrastructure, green space, diversity of housing, safe walking and cycling networks, good public transport and a rich social and cultural life.

Of course, the built form of individual neighbourhoods will vary. However, a planning system based on the 20-minute neighbourhood, is a place-based design approach that has the potential to lead to improvements in public health and well-being as well as social cohesion, and a part of this is an increase in the efficiency of the transport and active travel network (public transport, walking and cycling). Let’s look at some of the requirements of a 20-minute neighbourhood. For more information see the projects that Plan Melbourne 2017-50 have in progress.

Attributes of a 20-minute Neighbourhood

Getting about (and transport)

The core of a 20-minute neighbourhood is its walkability and priority given to pedestrians.800 metres (about half a mile) is the distance of a 20-minute neighbourhood or 20 minutes in time (based on average walking times of healthy adult and taking into account waiting at junctions and meandering routes). It can be a bit tricky working out the walkability of an area, but there is a methodology, based on work carried out in Australia, known as a PEDSHED analysis. Look here for information about how to conduct a PEDSHED analysis. Whilst of course public transport is to be supported, these kinds of distances within a neighbourhood are not usually covered by public transport: it is more helpful to think of public transport linking neighbourhoods. Cycling might do, if there were good cycling infrastructure, but the idea of the 20-minute Neighbourhood is to give priority consideration to pedestrians and walkability. Moving towards pedestrian friendly neighbourhoods would certainly create more attractive places, and it has been argued they create more economically productive places. Furthermore, walkable neighbourhoods promote healthy lifestyles, while ensuring community facilities are accessible to people of all ages and abilities. Get access right for the least mobile, and we get it right for everyone.

So, pedestrian infrastructure, connections and streetscape design should be considered during any local planning process with priority given to pedestrians in neighbourhoods, particularly in community hub spaces (what, in Melbourne are called activity centres) – not always so easy now the car is king. Even the walking infrastructure we do have (pavements) is often blocked by cars parking on them – an issue raised persistently by Living Streets.

Housing

Diversity of housing, near to local facilities, such as shops and public amenities are needed for a 20-Minute Neighbourhood. Research underpinning Plan Melbourne has identified a number of different metrics that can be used in the establishment of 20-minute neighbourhoods. In terms of housing density, this work reckons that a minimum housing target of 25 dwellings per hectare is needed to support built form features that align with the 20-minute neighbourhood hallmarks. Our estimates of density in Manchester was 40 people per hectare – which sounds about right.

Community hubs and activity centres

Community hubs, known in Melbourne as neighbourhood activity centres are at the heart of the 20-minute neighbourhood. These are more than the local high street, about which there is much attention and interest in the UK, as if high streets can be divorced from other public services and amenities. In contrast, a neighbourhood activity centre is defined as any place that attracts people for shopping, working, studying, recreation or socializing. An activity centre is a mixed use centre where people work, shop, relax, meet friends and family and also live: it is a mixture of commercial and other land use, including recreation, learning and living. As such activity centres, or community hubs have the potential to be an integral part of community life and are certainly fundamental to the creation of 20-minute neighbourhoods.

Public realm space is, then a part of 20-minute neighbourhoods. Gone are the patterns of zonal development, separating housing, workplaces, retail opportunities, services, education and leisure. Gone are the out-of-place shopping centres, the leisure centre that is located on a busy commuter road but away from other amenities, the work places to which people have to travel. In many parts of Greater Manchester, what could be considered neighbourhood activity centres are incomplete, with shops being central, but with less consideration of nearby housing, health, leisure and work facilities – and of course many fail the walkability test. However, there is the potential to create cohesive community hubs, or activity centres, which will also serve to afford neighbourhoods a clear identity and residents a strong sense of pride in place, by building on facilities that already exist, but carefully targeting conversion of and creation of space to be more comprehensive and cohesive.

There is some support for this kind of neighbourhood place-making.

The UK Government’s future of the High Street Fund recognises the need to move to more integrated neighbourhood centres (without adopting all of the attributes of the 20-minute neighbourhood). The Government says ‘We want to encourage vibrant town centres where people live, shop, use services, and spend their leisure time’ . Although the Government is talking about Town Centres, rather than neighbourhoods, these initiatives could help us move towards neighbourhood activity centres, and this momentum is maybe something on which we can build.

Participation in planning

Local government has a role in supporting both the development and vibrancy of neighbourhood activity centres and also a network of neighbourhood activity centres within their jurisdiction, and ensuring that diverse housing and other facilities are all within 800m of the activity centres. 20-minute neighbourhoods may already exist in some places (see below for Melbourne’s approach to established and new neighbourhoods); in others they will have to be nurtured. They are unlikely to happen without a coordinated, collaborative community partnership approach, within which people living in those neighbourhoods play an important part. Both the Portland Plan and the Plan Melbourne, were developed through an extensive participatory planning approach.

Plan Melbourne’s Five-Year Implementation Plan argues that community participation is critical to the principle of living locally within 20-minute neighbourhoods. Action 52 of the Implementation Plan seeks to create resilient communities by increasing community participation early in the planning and development of urban renewal precincts. As it says, community participation and engagement can strengthen community resilience, increase knowledge and understanding of change, and empower local groups to be part of shaping the communities’ future. (Furthermore, Plan Melbourne points out in a way that we rarely see in the UK, that community participation in the planning process and creating a city of 20-minute neighbourhoods align with the Sustainable Development Goals: Goal 3 good health and wellbeing; and Goal 11 sustainable cities and communities)

A different approach for established and new ‘greenfield’ developments

The implementation of Plan Melbourne began with established neighbourhoods, and moved on to new ‘greenfield developments’

Established neighbourhoods

In some of Melbourne’s established neighbourhoods, the council collaborated with communities to identify strategies to create more healthy, vibrant and inclusive neighbourhoods. These strategies were discussed in a workshop with project partners, and informed the development of a Pedestrian report and Planning report for each neighbourhood.

The strategies in both reports reflected the Heart Foundation’s Healthy Active by Design (see above) guidelines and the relevant 20-minute neighbourhood attributes, and included:

• Movement Network – Install safe school crossings
• Housing Diversity – Review residential zoning
• Destinations – Streetscape improvements
• Public Open Space – Improve access to local parks
• Community Infrastructure – Upgrade facilities
• Sense of Place – Install public art with youth groups
• Healthy Food – Investigate a community garden

‘Greenfield’ developments

The aim for Greenfield developments was to test, in 2018-19, 20-minute neighbourhoods in growth areas and showcase the benefits of community decision-making in these areas. The projects set out to deliver:

• An academic Literature Review of liveability outcomes in greenfield areas, based on the hallmarks (for example, general indicators and health and wellbeing indicators);
• Pedestrian Report assessing the pedestrian infrastructure in one area; and
• Social Infrastructure Report recommending stages for delivery of facilities in one area.

The sequencing of infrastructure development has been seen to be crucial in moving away from a car culture – for example if active travel and public transport infrastructure are not in place until after people have started to live in houses, then cars will predominate.

What is not to like about 20-minute neighbourhoods?

All the evidence, particularly from Melbourne and Portland, suggests that 20-minute neighbourhoods help us move towards more resilient, convivial and viable ways of living.

One commentator reminds us that young people increasingly choose to rent and live in 20-minute neighbourhoods. For all of us, they would be places that are inviting to walk or linger for a chat, indulge in people watching, and just ‘be’. Places where people can meet, become hives of creativity and the development of new ideas and industries – they are also enjoyable.

However…

Are 20 minute neighbourhoods really accessible? Does the walkability test discriminate against older, mobility impaired or pram pushers? Key to achieving 20 minute neighbourhoods is their walkability. There is a methodology for assessing the accessibility of 20-minute neighbourhoods, and others have proposed using GIS to help in the assessment, concluding that higher levels of walking are linked to dwelling density, street connectivity, land-use mix, and net retail area.

Carolyn Whitzman, an urban researcher has reported a number of challenges that Melbourne has not yet overcome (although she still considers the 20-minute neighbourhood idea a worthy goal). Perhaps most importantly is a failure to list the essential social infrastructure or distance measurement methods to be used to create the 20-minute radius for each neighbourhood. In contrast, she says, Portland’s strategic plan for a 20-minute city requires four key pieces of social infrastructure located close to affordable residential housing. These are: public primary schools, grocery stores, green parks, and public transport stops with minimum travel frequency standards. (Although note the point made above about walkability surpassing public transport for within-neighbourhood mobility.)

Clearly one of the tasks for planning 20-minute neighbourhoods is to identify the key infrastructure requirements within and between neighbourhoods. In addition, proposals are needed to improve infrastructure in under-serviced areas (in recognition that the City and even the neighbourhood centre is often well-served) and introduce affordable housing to well serviced areas, rather than confine it to the periphery.

What should we do?

The first step is to map what already is – to get together with residents, businesses, services, and all those with an interest in a particular neighbourhood and look at existing public life, use of spaces and quality of public space infrastructure in our neighbourhoods and to ask how is public space performing for people? We need to use the People for Places thinking promoted by Jan Ghel, former city architect of Copenhagen. His approach stresses first life, then space, then buildings, rather than the other way round, which is often the way our urban space is developed. From there we can plan, in the knowledge that the future should only be 20 minutes away.

Author: Lesley Riddoch, The National

A series of heavy-handed investigations by the Scottish Housing Regulator (SHR) has resulted in the departure of key staff and long-serving local committee members from some of Scotland’s best-performing Housing Associations (HAs) and racked up six-figure consultants’ bills to be met by Glasgow’s poorest tenants. As one HA manager put it: “Hundreds of thousands of pounds are being spent on usually fatuous, unnecessary enquiries and investigations instructed by SHR, carried out by ridiculously expensive consultants … and paid for by tenants, amongst the poorest in society.”

All of which might be fair enough if the investigations uncovered evidence of shocking malpractice, woeful mismanagement or sky-high rents. But generally speaking, they haven’t.

Twelve Housing Associations have had intensive SHR involvement in the last five years and all are community-led organisations, prompting the suspicion that the regulator has a mission to professionalise the unique tenant-led associations that exist in Glasgow and beyond.

One SHR intervention began in 2017 when allegations prompted the suspension of an HA director and a nine-month investigation. After he was able to present evidence in his own defence, the regulator (via HA solicitors) offered him one year’s net salary for “loss of office”. The SHR refused to deal with him directly, key members of the volunteer committee resigned and now the majority are “parachuted in” regulator appointees. The bill for intervention by London-based consultants is estimated, by the regulator, to be over £100k.

The former director, who has 40 years involvement with the housing movement and wants to remain anonymous, said: “In my final years in charge, we had some of the lowest rents, lowest rent increases, best and quickest repairs, most professional care services and highest levels of tenant satisfaction in Scotland. There were no risks of any significance, but tenants must pay the price of regulator intervention. Our tenants did not need protection by the SHR, they needed protection from it.”

Another community-led Glasgow-based HA spent two years trying to comply with an “over-exacting” SHR. Their director also wants to remain anonymous and said: “We were looking to refinance and needed consent from SHR. At their insistence we commissioned a consultant to carry out a governance review who rated our performance as good. SHR wouldn’t accept that consultant’s report and wouldn’t explain why. The issue has gone backwards and forwards with slow responses from them. Eventually they stated there was ‘material non-compliance’ to regulatory standards but wouldn’t give details. Then the Covid lockdown kicked in, and now we’re stuck. We’ve spent £100k on regulation over the last two years – money that could have been spent on new kitchens. We feel there’s a desire to professionalise committees – to have accountants and lawyers. We see that as unhealthy because with unfamiliar ‘experts’ present, there’s a danger governance gets deferred to them. It seems local people aren’t trusted any more.”

Yet another Glasgow-based HA director told me: “If you look at our engagement plan on the SHR website, you’d think our Housing Association is a basket case. But amongst 150 RSLs (Registered Social Landlords) we have some of the lowest rents, lowest costs per unit, no debt, 96% tenant satisfaction and we met energy-efficient standards a year early. Still the SHR criticised us for ‘widespread failures’.”

Bizarrely, it was complying with SHR guidelines that first brought them to the regulator’s attention: “They queried our relatively high number of new committee members. But we did that because SHR had urged HAs not to have folk on committees for life.”

Not surprisingly, these disputes finally bubbled into the public domain.

In January 2020, an editorial in the specialist Scottish Housing News talked of “considerable disquiet” within the sector and “heavy-handed interventions” by SHR staff with “one common theme: bullying”. The paper reported allegations that “the style of work employed by the SHR is aggressive, over the top and frightening”.

BRUCE Forbes, director of Angus Housing Association for 24 years, told Scottish Housing News upon his retirement: “The SHR is tearing apart some housing associations for relatively minor errors or indiscretions that could’ve easily been resolved by constructive dialogue.”

In February, a Freedom of Information request was lodged which found that only one in 12 of the decisions to take statutory action in HAs had been sanctioned by the SHR board. The rest were taken by regulator staff.

In April, SNP MSP James Dornan, convener of Holyrood’s Local Government and Communities Committee, wrote to George Walker, chair of the SHR, asking how the organisation audits the impact of inspections on RSLs and tenants. Around the same time, the Scottish and Glasgow Federations of Housing Associations started consultations, prompted by complaints about the SHR by their members.

So what’s happening?

All the Housing Associations under investigation are small, hyper-local and community-led, with “volunteer” boards composed of local tenants rather than lawyers, accountants and professionals who live elsewhere. Some think there’s an agenda to encourage mergers in the (unproven) belief that big is beautiful and to install more middle-class professionals in place of savvy, local, working-class volunteer committee members.

Others think a big factor was the chill that went through the whole sector after the 2008 banking crash when the SHR was created. That context could have prompted an over-zealousness by regulator staff who, according to HA directors, also lack management experience in the sector. The regulator disputes this, saying “a number of staff have direct experience of working in social landlords as officers and board members”.

Nonetheless, it seems ironic that small, volunteer-led RSLs must comply with every aspect of 90 regulatory requirements, while the SHR itself is exempt from the more exacting standards expected of larger regulatory organisations, because of the “small body” provisions of the Code of Audit Practice.

Still, there’s no denying the Regulator has uncovered some big problems. At Ferguslie Park HA, £533k was paid to staff in severance payments. As a neighbouring housing director put it: “Staff had gripes and instead of dealing with them, the HA decided to pay them off. The SHR had its fingers burnt. But problems like that are few and far between.”

It’s true, too, that some local residents have gripes with HA performance. When Brenda Wilson, a former committee member of Glasgow’s Thistle Housing Association, revealed £500k had been spent on fees for SHR-approved consultants (money that must be found by tenants), the Toryglen Residents’ Blog was instead outraged that Thistle’s improvement work on local houses is still ongoing, despite a promised completion date of 2016.

THE SHR says organisations which need interventions have, “complex, significant and deep-rooted weaknesses, a failure of leadership”, and workplace cultures which left them “vulnerable to poor behaviours and incompetence”. It says board approval is only needed when a landlord’s homes might be transferred to another RSL and intervention is used “as a last resort, when there has been significant failure by a landlord … to protect the interests of tenants”.

SHR was unable to give a total cost for their interventions but referred to individual reports, one of which put the cost of an external manager for 15 months at £118,722.15 excluding VAT, adding: “These costs were partly offset by wider savings in staffing levels and substantial improvements in performance.”

Housing Association directors argue that complex, time-consuming engagements with the regulator demand vast amounts of staff time.

The SHR says the vast majority of engagements with the 186 social landlords it regulates are “positive and constructive”, and cites the following quote from Gordon Laurie, chair of Dalmuir Park Housing Association: “Dalmuir Park has been transformed since the regulator’s intervention. The expertise and knowledge of the statutory manager and appointees have been invaluable. By supporting the committed, locally elected members and a talented, enthusiastic staff team, real and lasting improvements in governance, performance and financial viability have been achieved.”

One housing sector – two very different accounts of SHR intervention.

So, what’s the solution?

Even the SHR’s fiercest critics believe a regulator is necessary and few argue for “regime change” as the first option.

Instead Housing Associations want the SHR to trust the general capacity of community-led housing associations, recruit folk with operational experience of running RSLs and start with quiet words of helpful advice instead of expensive interventions.

Would that be so difficult?

Author: James Henderson, University of Edinburgh. Philip Revell, Sustaining Dunbar. Oliver Escobar, University of Edinburgh

Introduction  (The full summary paper is here)

This Summary Discussion Paper supports understanding of the key elements and options for an emerging participatory research agenda to support, inform and critically consider the development of the community economy in Scotland and more widely. It does this by offering a range of frameworks to support dialogue and participatory research on building such an economy, and builds from our earlier Community Anchor research report

Fundamental to understanding this call for ongoing participatory research are a number of related crises:

• Political: local democratic deficit and the rise of populism.
• Social: stubbornly high-levels of poverty and inequality – and related demographic change.
• Economic: lack of capacity for locally-led development and resilience.
• Ecological: the climate emergency and other ‘over-demands’ on eco-systems.

In effect, the multi-headed challenges of local-to-global sustainable development as, for instance,expressed as the UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals.

The Community Anchor Research Report illustrates, through a series of exemplars, the potential of these locally-led, multi-purpose bodies to facilitate a wide range of local economic, social, democratic and ecological development – or community-led place-making – and so local leadership focused on change – that are required in supporting them in taking such an agenda forward.

The Report, however, puts the emphasis not solely on community anchor organisations as central to

such a research process but sees them as one key element in a wider local community sector and as part of a wider social and political debates across Scotland related to local democracy, community resilience, local sustainable development, social justice, and social and ecologically-related change.

In this paper, we take this further by drawing on the notion of the community economy to provide

‘space’ to support discussions of the relationships, roles and aspirations within that community sector.

We explore this notion of the community economy as a system of local (not-for-profit) community

sector organisations and networks. And we position this thinking as part of a wider body of thought on the roles of the community economy within the workings of state, market and society3 and on our learning so far on infrastructure for developing the community sector.

We tease out what such participatory research needs to involve and consider given the complexity of:

• the opportunities, challenges and dilemmas that these multi-faceted crises present
• the roles of community anchors and the community sector can offer to lead and support change
• the scale of urgent social, societal and global change – ‘social transformation’ would seem appropriate – now required.

We position these discussions in the current Scottish policy context and the emerging opportunities for the community sector to engage with and – where relevant – challenge the state, including: community empowerment, community ownership and land reform, social enterprise, public service reform and the ongoing Christie agenda, and sustainable development and climate change.

What we present is a series of initial frameworks and ‘language’ of emerging issues and opportunities to inform ongoing dialogue and further research. This is not then a research proposal – this must be fashioned through such ongoing discussions.

The full summary paper is here

Author: Deborah Anderson, The Herald

IT started out as a petition against expanding a business park and now 16 years later a group of conservationists have just secured the largest urban land buyout in Scotland.

Our Glen, land at the Historic Douglas Support Estate, was bought by Viewpark Conservation Group, in Lanarkshire, and its 2,200 members. The 171 acres was acquired with funds of £512,600 from the Scottish Land Fund.

Dating back to the 17th century, the land was once home to Rosehall House. The mansion was demolished in 1939 and the area had been used for recreation for many years. In 2004 there were plans to expand Strathclyde Business Park in the area, but campaigners began a fight to protect the site.

Roseanna Cunningham, Land Reform Secretary, said: “Communities across the country, whilst impacted in so many ways by the Covid-19 lockdown, are playing a vital role in maintaining our resilience, our spirit and local support networks.

“They will also play a critical role in our recovery from the pandemic, which is why I am delighted that the Viewpark Conservation Group – one of 46 projects to have received a share of £8.1 million of Scottish Land Fund in 2019/20 – has finalised its community buyout. As well as creating jobs, the ‘Our Glen’ project will give the people of Lanarkshire a place to treasure, enjoy and improve their own wellbeing whilst protecting a wonderful part of our country.”

Grace McNeill, chairwoman of Viewpark Conservation Group, said: “My feet haven’t touched the ground. The historic Douglas Estate now belongs to the people. After many delays, issues and hurdles, we now own the historic Douglas Estate. Thanks to all the board members, volunteers and fantastic community support – our glen is finally legally transferred into public ownership and we are most grateful to the Scottish Land Fund for their financial support.

“We have been top of all the lists for all the wrong reasons here – recording the highest levels of asthma and coronary heart disease in North Lanarkshire. This is an important step towards preserving and protecting Viewpark Glen and giving back something of natural beauty.”

Mrs McNeill said they hope future generations could be persuaded away from a sedentary lifestyle constantly on computers and iPad, and come out into the great outdoors for healthier exercise and fresh air.

She added: “There are woods with mature trees, fish in the North Calder, and habitat for deer, badgers and otters. It is a real asset to the area and the county.”

John Watt, Scottish Land Fund Committee chairman, said: “It is so gratifying to see the hard work of Viewpark Conservation Group coming to fruition. This is a perfect example of how the Scottish Land Fund can help motivated communities make a real difference to the lives of people in their local areas.”

The estate is bounded by the busy road network of the M8, M74 and the A725.  The community group will preserve and regenerate the land and have ambitious plans to manage the woodlands – tidying up and replanting, and to build a healthier more active community. Three jobs will also be created.

Mrs McNeill added: “During lockdown we have seen a dramatic increase in people spending time in the great outdoors. There are wonderful walks here and we intend to improve those and create new river walks. We know that our facility helps to address mental health issues of lockdown, and we anticipate that spending time in green space will become prescriptive to address symptoms of anxiety.”

The funds will help to restore the farmhouse to create a reception area for people visiting the Glen, with information and education facilities, a café and exhibition area to showcase the estate’s history.

Community Land Scotland, the membership organisation which supports rural and urban land buyouts, is delighted Viewpark Conservation Group are the new owners.

Kristina Nitsolova, Urban Development Officer at Community Land Scotland, which has supported the group, said: “This is the largest urban buy out in scale of land size since urban communities have been able to access funding to purchase land and assets to further the sustainable development of their local area in 2016.”

Author: Clare Symonds

Most people don’t believe that they know much about planning, but if you give them a moment they quickly realise how important the effects it has on their lives.

Councils like Glasgow will now be looking at how, in a post-Covid world, they can take the opportunity to build better, healthier, fairer, greener cities. How they approach this will have a huge impact on the citizens and their health and well-being, not least the mental health and well being of those impacted by development. The effect of that development being dependent on many factors including the way that people are involved in the process of decision making.

If we asked Glasgow’s/Scotland’s citizens what kind of a model of planning do we want, one led by care for people and place or one that is led by the profit driven hand of an unfettered free market, it is likely that most would opt for the former. Indeed, most planners probably entered their profession with the former in mind. Likewise, it is likely that most people would opt for a collaborative rather than adversarial system of planning.

In theory in Scotland there are three core sets of interests in planning; planning authorities, developers and the public. This view is underpinned by the Aarhus Convention (to which the UK is signed up) which makes it clear that people have rights to a say in decisions that affect their lives. But this principle poses difficulties alongside our market drive planning system, which rather than regulate development is more readily seen as a facilitator of development. The predominantly market-led system of development equates public interest with development, ie any development is seen as a positive if it creates growth and contributes to the economy. This leaves little space for meaningful community engagement and is by its very nature divisive, casting anyone who objects to a development as a problem.

There is a common perception of people who respond to planning applications are a nuisance, so much so that they have their own specific negative label of NIMBY’s. And yet if you take a different more neutral view of development, one where development is only perceived to be a good thing if it contributes to the health and well being of society then the role of ‘objector’ is cast in a different light and perceptions can change. The objector is more akin to a positive role model of someone carrying out their civic duty in order to protect the public good rather than a nuisance.

It is not only communities who feel that they are cast in a negative light. Many planners too have expressed feeling undervalued, unappreciated and ground down by the market driven system where they operate in a culture of austerity and lack resources and time. This is a system where the developer is seen to be the chief customer and planners are expected to facilitate rather than regulate their actions. It all suggests a rather dysfunctional planning system, where it is increasingly awkward for anyone whether community or professional to be critical of development, whether or not that development is in keeping with policy or plans, is bad for the environment or simply poor quality design.

This same system also allows developers to put in repeat applications, a luxury that they make frequent use of, often doing so over a number of years, gradually grinding down any community appetite or ability to respond. Add to that the developers unique ability to appeal decisions and their deep pockets to challenge decisions that don’t go their way in the courts and it seems the system is entirely geared towards the profit driven hand of an unfettered free market rather than one led by care for people and place.

In this development friendly world planners are expected to be solutions focused, and are less able to behave impartially because of the increasing commercialisation of the planning process. Communities are expected to be pro development, ready to engage earlier and earlier in the system in order to ensure that they are ready to accept the inevitability of some form of development.

Meanwhile the system too often seems to discourage local elected councilors from engaging with their constituents, some interpreting the code of conduct requiring them to be impartial to mean not communicating at all with people who are opposed to a development for fear of being barred from voting on an application. This often leaves communities baffled and angry as to why their elected representatives are apparently not representing their views.

It is easy to see how detrimental a disagreement between those not wanting a development and those wanting to profit from a development can become, with planners placed rather awkwardly in the middle, unable to be totally impartial and too under resourced to actively and fully engage with the community. This conflict ridden system is likely exacerbated in cases where there is a history of a repeat application, stalled development or application being modified over long periods.

What happens then to those impacted by negative aspects of development and the development process? Who is currently listening to the voices of those concerned? Whose needs are being serviced in this current model of planning? The property development industry or the public?

Imagine this scenario

Supposing there is a situation where luxury flats are proposed on a greenspace by a developer wanting to make a handsome profit. The development comes at the expense of the community from the perspective of threatening local business, damaging wildlife areas and being out of keeping with the area. The community and many others are opposed and multiple objection letters are received, making valid arguments. The situation grinds on for years, with an imbalance of power dynamic allowing the developer to damage the site and its wildlife, intimidate local residents and have pretty much open access to planning officers allowing them to change the details of an application on multiple occasions. Meanwhile members of the public are not allowed to attend site visits or meetings where key decisions are made and are unable to monitor progress because of lack of resources and a planning portal that is not kept up to date!

This is not unheard of my any means, but is it an example of a planning system that cares for people and place? In whose power is it to change the system?

Changing the way our economy currently runs may be out with the gift of a local council, but can a local authority respond and change the way it deals with planning, perception of communities and how it looks after its planning department? Should local authorities be doing everything in their power to overcome some of the deepening inequalities of the market driven system? I would say the answer to both questions is an emphatic YES!

The current covid situation has led the Government to allow some relaxation of planning rules, many of these are once again in the favour of developers. Local authorities should be considering ways of enabling the public to engage in planning in the new restricted world we live in, for example, providing extended deadlines or enabling online attendance of planning committees. In the new normal the planning system has to start serving communities before property developers – it always should have!

If you have had experience of fighting for community benefit over property developers profits please comment below.

Author: OneKind

The management of driven grouse moors is killing Scotland’s wildlife and, in some cases, illegally persecuting our protected species.

Red grouse (Lagopus lagopus) are wild birds that live in heather moorlands of the UK and Ireland.

In order to keep red grouse numbers as high as possible, gamekeepers routinely kill predators, such as foxes and stoats, undertake large-scale mountain hare culls and, on some estates, illegally persecute birds of prey, such as hen harriers and golden eagles.

A fifth of upland Scotland is used for driven grouse shooting, with the land being managed to maximise the number of red grouse available for shooting.

Mountain hares

It is time for the Scottish Government to reform the intensive management of Scotland’s grouse moors and put an end to the indiscriminate killing of our wildlife.

More than 26,000 mountain hares are killed each year on Scotland’s grouse moors, according to Scottish Government figures.

The mountain hare is Britain’s only native hare and its conservation status was recently downgraded to ‘unfavourable’ as a result of new data supplied by the UK to the EU, primarily because of hunting and game management. This means that special conservation action needs to now be taken to stop further declines and aid population recovery.

Yet, gamekeepers routinely carry out mountain hare culls as they fear that the hares spread disease via ticks to red grouse, thereby reducing the number of red grouse available for commercial shooting. This management has persisted despite the fact that scientists at one of Scotland’s independent research institutes concluded that there was ‘no compelling evidence base to suggest culling mountain hares might increase red grouse densities’.

Hares are notoriously challenging to shoot as they are small, fast-moving animals that are able to take cover easily. This means that the risk of causing injury rather than a clean kill is heightened, and hares can suffer greatly as a result. There is also no requirement for cull returns during the open season, or for welfare monitoring of these culls, so the scale of suffering is unknown.

OneKind has been campaigning to secure greater protection for mountain hares for the past three years, with a petition currently before the Scottish Parliament Public Petitions Committee as well as an open letter to the Scottish Government that has now attracted almost 22,000 signatures.  Both call for an end to the slaughter of these iconic creatures.

Protected birds

There is a clear and well-documented association between driven grouse moors and the illegal persecution of protected birds of prey.

Methods of killing these protected birds include shooting, live-trapping, illegal poisoning and nest destruction. Each year RSPB reports incidents on driven grouse moors in its Birdcrime report.

In order to help conservation planning of golden eagles, in 2017 a number of these protected birds were satellite-tagged. Of the thirteen that later went missing, eleven occurred on land managed for grouse moors.

In May of this year, a young male hen harrier was also found in an illegal spring trap sat next to its nest on a grouse moor. The hen harrier did not survive, and a senior vet confirmed it was clear that he had suffered greatly.

Another trap was found in its nest, beside abandoned eggs, and with no sign of the female hen harrier. Naturalist, Chris Packham, met with experts, including OneKind Director Bob Elliot, to unravel the horrific storyon camera.

It is no coincidence that the majority of those convicted of raptor persecution crimes are gamekeepers.

Legal traps

Traps and snares can be, legally, set on grouse moors to target the red grouse’s natural predators: foxes, weasels, stoats and other birds. However, these traps are indiscriminate, and cause suffering to non-target species too, such as protected badgers and even companion dogs and cats.

There is no limit to the number of animals that gamekeepers can legally kill, and many of the target species are not protected by closed seasons.

Bird Traps

In addition to the estimated 700,000 red grouse shot each year in the UK, hundreds of thousands of other birds are also killed each year on driven grouse moors.

Birds are captured in legal live-catch corvid traps, traps which are also indiscriminate as to the species of bird caught: victims can spend hours under stress in this confined space before the gamekeeper arrives to shoot or beat them to death.

Foxes are targeted with cruel, outdated snare traps: an anchored noose that is positioned to capture an animal by its neck, leg or abdomen.  They can cause severe physical and mental suffering for captured animals and although they are only meant to ‘restrain’ the animal, their struggle to set themselves free causes the wire to tighten, often leading to severe injury or strangulation.

To lure foxes into snares, gamekeepers often lay snares around a ‘stink pit’: a place where the gamekeepers dump rotting animal carcasses. The smell of decomposing animals lures the foxes towards the dead animals, where they are then caught in the snares surrounding the pit. During our work in the field we have discovered foxes, deer, geese and fish in stink pits.

Although stink pits are targeted towards foxes, they can also attract badgers, otters, pine martens and domestic cats and dogs.

The future

We believe that it’s time to end the indiscriminate killing of wildlife on grouse moors and elsewhere and that’s why we recently launched a petition with the Scottish Parliament to conduct a full review on the use of traps and snares and their impact on animal welfare. You can keep up to date with our campaign here.

OneKind is also part of a coalition of like-minded organisations that have come together to work towards radical reform for Scotland’s grouse moors.

The Revive Coalition has the backing of naturalist, Chris Packham, and recently hosted a collaborative conference with members of the public.  You can sign the Revive pledge to revive Scotland’s moors here.

Author: Scottish Government

The Town Centre Expert Review Group, announced last month by Communities Secretary Aileen Campbell, has put out a call for written evidence on how to revitalise town centres in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The deadline for written evidence is Friday 21^st August at 17:00. Additionally, a series of invitation-only themed oral evidence sessions will take place online week commencing 17^th August 2020.

As part of its deliberations, the Town Centre Expert Review Group is inviting individuals, organisations and stakeholders to contribute through this Call for Evidence. Organisations representing or focusing on the views of individuals who normally find it difficult to engage are strongly encouraged to take part. A public survey will also run alongside the consultation process to obtain the views of local communities.

Context

Experts from sectors including town planning, public health, transport and business are reviewing the vision for Scotland’s town centres and the means to achieve it. The review will build on the progress of the Scottish Government’s 2013 vision and subsequent Town Centre Action Plan.

The expert review group is chaired by Professor Leigh Sparks, Chair of Scotland’s Towns Partnership and Deputy Principal and Professor of Retail Studies at the University Stirling. Other members of the group include representatives from COSLA, the Royal Town Planning Institute, South of Scotland Enterprise, the Carnegie Trust, the Federation of Small Businesses, Public Health Scotland, Sustrans, Inclusion Scotland, the Development Trusts Association Scotland and the Scottish Government.

Initial high-level findings and ideas to drive the vision for Scotland’s town centres will be developed by early September. These will then be refined, and further evidence and work conducted to the end of November 2020, when the group’s report will be finalised.

The Town Centre Action Plan, published in 2013, can be accessed through the Scottish Government’s town centre regeneration page, where you will also find links to the 2013 National Review of Town Centres, as well as Year 1 and Year 2 progress reports on the Town Centre Action Plan.

Themes and Questions

The Review Group has indicated its intention to collect responses along the following broad themes:

• Retail and Commercial
• Climate and Sustainability
• Planning, Access & Place Management
• Culture and Creative
• Housing and Property
• Local Government and Economic Agencies
• Communities, Wellbeing and Inclusion

The Review Group would ask that your evidence (and please state if it is an individual or an organisational response, providing details of the latter) focuses on the following questions:

1. What are the challenges and opportunities facing town centres in Scotland and how should these be addressed?
2. What are the barriers to developing town centres suitable for their communities and how can these be removed?
3. To what extent has the Town Centre Action Plan (TCAP) delivered against its stated ambitions? In what areas has delivery been successful? In what areas is there room for progress and/or barriers to overcome?
4. To what extent are the stated objectives and policy challenges TCAP seeks to address relevant for the new challenges for our towns?
5. If TCAP were to be revised, what additional or replacement areas and objectives would you recommend should be included and how should these be addressed?
6. Can you provide details and contacts of any examples of excellent practice in town centres which you believe have wider potential?
7. Is there anything else you would like to add?

Guidance for Submissions

• Please limit your submission to no more than six sides of A4
• Please submit in a plain word document in Arial 11pt font
• You can submit your evidence by emailing TCAPreview@lovelocal.scot
• The deadline for submissions is 17:00 on Friday 21st August 2020

Read more and keep up to date with the view at lovelocal.scot – Town Centre Action Plan Review Group.

Author: Derek Logie

“The Highlands have been subject to steady de-population for the last half-century and have been treated like a dying patient to whom people have been handing out hot gruel, etc., with the patient merely grumbling and growling as it went into a decline… The one urgent thing is to stop any further migration. In addition we want to bring people back to the Highlands. Last year I spent some time going round the Highlands and the urgency of doing something for the womenfolk, giving them decent houses and modern facilities, was stressed upon me as being absolutely imperative if people were to remain in the Highlands. In one village all the young women had disappeared. There was a male population which was going to die out because without women no country can survive,” Arthur Woodburn MP, Secretary of State for Scotland 1949

I’m learning French at the moment and the quote above would be a good illustration for that French proverb “plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose” -the more things change, the more they stay the same. The Highlands are again experiencing depopulation, research from the James Hutton Institute highlights the demographic timebomb facing remote rural areas with urgent policy measures required to help young people remain and encourage in-migration.

I came across the quote from Arthur Woodburn MP in a 1949 House of Commons debate on Swedish Houses. I was researching the background to the construction of the village of Achnamara in Argyll in the mid-fifties. Achnamara was one several villages constructed in the late 40’s and 50’s to provide homes for forestry workers. The homes at Achnamara were amongst several thousand ordered by Robert Matthew, the Chief Architect in the Department of Health for Scotland who had been stranded in Sweden during the war but used his time there to design house kits that would conform to Scottish building regulations – see Timber Cladding in Scotland 2002.

This debate in Parliament frames the ambition of the time, highlighting that Crudens of Musselburgh are “nearing the completion of their 3000 rural houses programme” with the Secretary of State discussing how “at the moment about 1600 houses are being built in the Highlands”. As Woodburn put it the Government made this “kind of blood transfusion into the Highlands” happen, bringing in contractors to build at scale because “we cannot wait three years to get them” and the local construction industry “simply cannot tackle the job”.

Rural Housing Scotland are currently working on a housing project in the Argyllshire village of Achnamara. The community want to build affordable housing to enable young working people to settle there. Young people are being priced out of the area and without them Achnamara will be, as one community member put it, “an elderly and a holiday place”.

The community at Achnamara are like many rural communities across Scotland. They want to provide homes for young people to remain and return, opportunities for new households to settle and appropriate homes to enable old people stay. All recognise that housing is crucial to stem depopulation, sustain local schools and services and help the economy grow. These communities are “doing it themselves” partly because they want to own and control the housing to make sure it meets their communities’ needs, partly because rural communities have always been self reliant, partly because housing associations and councils have abandoned rural development in recent years and partly due to the failure of the developer led model to deliver in rural areas.

Community led housing that contributes to the regeneration and repopulation of our rural communities is an essential part of urgent action required to stem depopulation and provide homes. There are communities across rural Scotland with housing projects ready to go: such as Ballater, Braemar and Bunessan (and that’s just the B’s!). These communities need help to drive forward housing ambitions, but government funding for this support from organisations like Rural Housing Scotland has been axed.

Rural communities are being expected by government to help tackle the rural housing crisis and depopulation without help to build their capacity, and without expert advice and support. They are being asked to jump through bureaucratic hoops to prove they need houses and deserve public investment. An innovative housing project to create new “Smart Clachans” to stem depopulation on the Isle of Luing has been turned down for funding because there is nobody on the housing waiting list – there is nobody on the list because there are no homes! So young people leave. This is Argyll which is haemorrhaging population and the local council strategy is to support repopulation initiatives – never mind stated national government policy is to tackle rural depopulation.

Small community organisations are stepping up to the challenge but development is delayed as they’re asked to borrow thousands to pay up front for housing development when the government is sitting on millions of grant funding it cant spend because they’re placing hoops and obstacles in front of the very communities they say they want to fund.

Post COVID recovery like the post war period offers us an opportunity for renewal, to rebuild better; to roll out a programme of house construction across rural Scotland; working with rural communities to deliver the housing they need. There is an opportunity to boost rural economies by using this programme to create a market for the development of cross laminated timber (CLT) buildings in Scotland utilising local timber. This would ensure that the benefit of public investment in housing was not just the production of homes but the creation of jobs in construction and in manufacturing. Using local timber will also have significant environmental benefits and by building back better we can finally tackle the endemic fuel poverty in rural Scotland.

Rural Scotland requires a further “blood transfusion” to bring new blood and life to our remote communities. Post COVID this needs the Scottish Government to be as ambitious as we were post war.

To this end, the Scottish Government should establish an action plan to ‘build back better’ and support rural communities post-COVID:

• A programme of 10,000 homes in rural Scotland over the next five years
• The establishment of a national land banking agency to secure land for housing – purchasing land at current use value and engaging with local communities to ensure land is acquired in the best location – see Housing Land Corporation
• The priority development of homes in areas of depopulation to enable young people to remain and enable the settlement of those looking for a more rural life post COVID
• The creation of a national building company to deliver rural homes at scale – working with local communities to build what’s needed, where its needed and transferring ownership of finished homes to local trusts
• The development of a facility to manufacture cross laminated timber homes at scale with standard ‘kits’ customised to meet local circumstances/venacular – with passivhaus as standard to meet climate change targets and tackle rural fuel poverty.

Author: GoBeyond

In SW Edinburgh, the GoBeyond network enablers, Space & Broomhouse Hub, Big Hearts

Community Trust and Whale Arts, would like to start a conversation with the people who live and

work here, about the area adopting a people led strategy to create a ‘Community Wealth Building

Locality’, based on Wellbeing Economics and a greener recovery.

This will be supported in particular by community anchor organisations, above, as well as embedded

into the distributive and creative network that GoBeyond can facilitate, to involve many local and

smaller community groups and initiatives, and led by people in local communities.

We would like to also to be outward looking and to start a conversation with City of Edinburgh

Community Planning Partners, Business and Scottish Government, about what this might mean for

their understanding of the locality and the opportunities here to ‘build back better’ and to be part of

the growing community wealth and wellbeing economy approach locally and internationally.

Principles of a Community Wealth Building Locality

First small steps:

• Using a distributive network between organisations and small community groups to increase

collaboration and mutual support, underpinned by community spirit and kindness

• Local grants programmes to help innovation, decided upon either participatory budgeting,

or when events are not possible, anchor organisation staff with community representatives

• Attract investment in key local anchors to be part of the post Covid Recovery

Medium to long term steps in SW Edinburgh Locality:

• Attract progressive procurement of goods and services in SW Edinburgh by major partners
• Attract investment that creates jobs in the social enterprises locally and reskills for

environmentally friendly and wellbeing focused sectors

• Attract new green infrastructure investment, for ideas such as environmentally sustainable

food production (growing to catering), transforming urban space, active travel and green

forms of transport, and increased low carbon affordable housing, informed by the Edinburgh

Climate Commission findings and recommendations

• Develop projects that encourage socially productive use of land and property

Long term for SW Edinburgh:

• Making communities and financial power work together for local places and people,

informed by the Edinburgh Poverty Commission findings and recommendations

• Align ourselves with the Community Wealth and Wellbeing Economy approaches in Scotland

and internationally to guide us

This Community Wealth Building approach will take courage to build, where we go beyond the

historic sole economic value, and the intrinsic value of people and assets underpin an holistic

approach to development in the next 10 years in SW Edinburgh.

Author: Michele Bianchi, The Conversation

Any community thinking of buying their local pub can receive free advice from Community Shares Scotland

British pubs are dying. In 2001, the UK counted 52,500 pubs. In 2018, that figure stood at 38,815. Now the fall-out from coronavirus will likely devastate the industry further as pubs struggle to reopen safely and generate enough income to survive.

This dramatic rate of closure signifies a dangerous risk for many historical pubs all over the UK, some of them dating back centuries, representing a cornerstone for many communities. In rural areas, pubs are often the last remaining business open that can offer a social hub for people.

Keen to see this vital social lifeline preserved, many groups have decided to take action and save their local pubs, converting them into collective properties and community hubs. Research by my colleagues and me shows how these projects foster more socially minded behaviour, collaboration and trust. It also shows how community-owned pubs (COPs) support their communities.

Public houses are fundamental and iconic institutions of British culture. For centuries they have existed as vital social hubs for both locals and travellers. Alongside many roads and at the heart of every village, taverns and inns provided accommodation, food, company and typical British ale.

Brewing production also took place in many of these facilities named alehouses. During the reign of Henry VII, these businesses became known as public houses or more simply, pubs. Despite their deep roots in British history, pubs have been suffered a structural crisis in the last 20 years for a variety of reasons including crippling business costs and increased taxation, changes in alcohol consumption habits (such as trends in wine drinking and cocktails) and cheaper prices at off-licences and supermarkets.

Community-owned pubs pubs take a different approach to the traditional business model. They allow local groups and charities to use their spaces for free. They host events and activities proposed by local residents and generally create a welcoming atmosphere for everyone. Shareholders and customers feel a particular bond with these places because their recognise the community value embedded into them.

How communities save their pubs

Our work examined three cases study in London: The Antwerp Arms (1822) in Tottenham, The Hope (1855) in Charshalton and The Ivy House (1871) in Nunhead. These three pubs have similar histories and are good examples of how a community-owned pub works and thrives.

In all three cases, the pubs were previously owned by big pub companies. Under previous managements, all three were poorly run and lost their bonds with local communities. Then the owners decided to sell the properties to developers for converting into flats and homes.

Keen not to lose such historic buildings, local communities mobilised to campaign against the demolition and figure out solutions for saving these places. Thanks to the forward-looking action of some local residents, who went on to become leaders of these initiatives, communities were able to raise enough funds to firstly acquire the licences and then the actual properties.

Today these pubs are collectively owned by local shareholder groups. The Antwerp Arms has 360 members, the Ivy House has 371 and the Hope has 48. No one expects returns on the capital invested. Instead, according to the shareholders we interviewed, their main aim for investing was to rescue the pub for the community.

Another key factor for the success of these initiatives (in particular the Ivy House and Antwerp Arms), has been the possibility to list these pubs as an “asset of community value”, which has allowed groups to save these buildings from market speculation and plan collective action for their reconversion.

For each one, activists decided to reopen the pubs providing food and drink as usual, but they have also enriched them with new activities devoted to specific community needs. These three COPs host local charities meetings for free, raise money for local initiatives, select local producers for their food and ales menu, employ local people, provide after-school activities, hold bike repair workshops and organise cultural events. Anyone can propose ideas to the board and develop them within the community pub.

How COPs enhance community life

Interviews with founders, shareholders and customers show how these long-term projects have provided an appreciation of history and brought a sense of purpose and achievement, renewing and boosting the sense of community.

Activists and shareholders have been able to preserve a significant place which represents for them a cornerstone in their community history. They have also been successful in generating a new social identity of local community in highly dense urbanised neighbourhoods, connecting people who might otherwise have remained anonymous neighbours. There is also a sense of getting back to the real function of pubs in terms of connecting and belonging:

Everybody perceives this as a community asset. There’s never any trouble and … it’s very safe … There is a community atmosphere with … good conversation, no TV, no radio music. In the 1960s and 1970s, English pubs were like this. Customer, The Hope

Our findings show how participants have expanded their social interaction with other residents and reveal how things like trust and collaboration have also increased. Crucially many have come to understand how partnership and collaboration are valuable tools for figuring out common problems.

Most of all, being part of a community-owned pub enhances the experience of being part of a community, one that works together for the common good, which can achieve great things when local people unite and decide to build something positive and lasting for the future.