Housing design 'not most important factor' in defeating nimbyism, say planners

With the government pinning its hopes on the Building Better, Building Beautiful commission, it has emerged that only one in 10 of the nation’s planners believe design is the most important factor in persuading local communities to accept a new development on their doorstep.

A new survey by the Royal Town Planning Institute (RTPI) found that while planners welcomed the government’s focus on improving the design of housing developments, 89% believed other factors were more important than design when trying to reassure locals about a housing scheme being built nearby.

The government-backed Building Better, Building Beautiful commission, formerly headed by philosopher Roger Scruton until his dismissal yesterday over a series of “unacceptable comments”, is expected to make a series of final recommendations by the end of this year.

The commission – a new chair for which will be appointed “in due course”, according to the government – will argue for how new homes can be better designed to meet expectations of both buyers and those living near to new housing developments.

But more than three-quarters (77%) of respondents to the RTPI’s poll believed design ranked equally with areas such as affordability and infrastructure availability, while 12% went further and said it was only a minor consideration.

And most planners wanted more say around housing design, the poll discovered from its 764 responses. Nearly 90% wanted more input in housing design, although more than half of those polled believed they had much more than limited influence in this area.

More than half (57%) of those responding said they used a tool or process to assess design quality but they also wanted greater consistency across the country, as well as standards to be applied.

According to the RTPI, tools used to assess quality include planning forums, annual “quality counts tour” – in which architects, planners, councillors and members of the public look at completed developments – and peer-review panels, RIBA design stage reviews and briefings.

Victoria Hills, the RTPI’s chief executive, said the survey’s findings would “help demonstrate to the Building Better, Building Beautiful commission and the government that planners stand ready to tackle the challenges of poor-quality design and build of housing.

“The enthusiastic response to the survey shows how much our members care about housing design and want the RTPI to do more to help them bring about places that are attractive, functional and of high quality to live in.

“There are key issues to do with the commerciality and culture of the wider housing market, which take time to change.

“But there are things the institute can do independent of that, for example looking into how we can provide our members with better training and talking to the Planning Inspectorate about how rulings can give more ground to design,” Hills added.