Dave Shaw

Spatial planning, area action plans and the rural-urban fringe

Abstract The rural-urban fringe has been called ‘plannings last frontier’, and it is a frontier that is now receiving greater attention from policy makers. This is partly a result of ongoing reforms of the planning system—through the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004, and potentially through further legislation in 2007 or 2008—and the apparent opportunities that have been created to manage the inherent complexities of these near-urban interstitial landscapes through ‘spatial planning’. This may include landscape enhancement and the provision of green infrastructure to meet community needs, which past green belt policy has tended to overlook according to the recent Barker Review of Land-Use Planning. This paper examines how spatial planning delivered at the local level, through area action plans (AAP), provides the potential to carry forward a new set of objectives at the rural-urban fringe, essentially, to reflect the ‘multi-functional’ nature of the fringe to a greater extent than past land-use planning with its emphasis on policy control. Existing green belt policy has been, for the past 50 years, an expression of this policy control focus. But what potential now exists to do more than merely control and respond to development pressure? Do AAP offer a means of enhancing the rural-urban fringe for the benefit of nearby communities and the wider environment? Can they ‘bridge the gap’ between the ideas of spatial planning and the need for transformative and integrative projects on the ground? These questions are asked in the context of a recent project at St Helens, in the north of England, which has aimed to carry forward a more holistic approach to the planning and management of the rural-urban fringe through area action planning rolled out by a local strategic partnership of public and private bodies.

Introduction to rural planning.

Part 1: Ruruality, Planning and Governance 1. Introduction 2. Rural Governance and Spatial Planning Part 2: The Rural Economy 3. Economic Change 4. The Farming Economy 5. New Economies Part 3: The Needs of Rural Communities 6. Community Change 7. Rural Housing: Demand, Supply, Affordability and the Market 8. Living in the Countryside Part 4: Environmental Change and Planning 9. A Changing Environment 10. A Differentiated Environment Part 5: Governance, Coordination and Integration 11. (Re) Positioning Rural Areas 12. Conclusions: Integrating Agendas, Coordinating Responses

Reconceptualising territoriality and spatial planning: insights from the sea

The concept of territoriality and its relationship to the focus and substance of spatial planning is the subject of much interest at the present time and this paper seeks to contribute to the debate by stepping into the sea. The first part of the paper establishes a framework for considering the spatial planning implications of changing conceptions of territoriality, outlining key sources of territorial innovation and their implications in terms of the development of new units and styles of governance, new challenges for planning practice, and the potential for feedback informing the development of planning theory. The application of the framework is then illustrated in the second part of the paper with reference to the emerging field of maritime spatial planning and in particular to the pioneering work that is being undertaken in Europe. This work is testing established notions of territoriality by highlighting the strong and growing connections between the land and the sea. Here some of the key implications for future spatial planning practice are identified. These indicate that there is a growing recognition of the need for innovation in the territorial units of governance in maritime regions and in the themes, processes and methods of spatial planning in these areas. The paper concludes with some observations on the implications of these findings for the theory of spatial planning.

Introduction to rural planning: Economies, communities and landscapes

Introduction to Rural Planning provides a critical analysis of the key challenges facing rural places and the various ways that public policy and community action can shape outcomes, structured around three major themes: economies, communities and landscapes. Its thematic chapters examine key ideas influencing various forms of intervention before considering ‘rural planning’ processes and outcomes in Britain. The second edition of this student text book has been extensively re-written to provide far greater coverage of key policy areas and questions. New features include: • A re-examination of the mixed nature of rural planning, concluding that it is an amalgam of public land-use planning, spatial or territorial planning, community action, countryside management and the projects and programmes of national and supra-national agencies and organisations. Together, these components of ‘composite’ rural planning have a transformative influence on rural places; • A broader analysis of entrepreneurial social action as a shaper of outcomes, particularly in the fields of rural development, service provision, transport and housing. A far greater emphasis is placed on planning at a community scale, with particular coverage of the localism agenda and Neighbourhood Planning in England; • A focus on accessibility and rural transport provision, examining the governance arrangements needed to deliver integrated solutions spanning urban and rural places. Accessibility is re-presented as a major dilemma facing the countryside, leading to questions of rural sustainability and critical challenges around service access and delivery; • An examination of the ecosystem approach to environmental planning, linking the procurement of ecosystem services to the global challenges of habitat degradation and loss, climate change and resource scarcity and management. Important links are made between this approach and the re-emergence of food security questions; and • An evaluation of the currency of the ‘rural’ label in the context of global urbanisation, concluding that rural spaces are relational spaces characterised by critical production and consumption tensions. This book aims to make sense of current rural challenges and planning approaches. It will be a valuable resource for students on planning, rural development and rural geography courses. Nick Gallent is Professor of Housing and Planning and Head of the Bartlett School of Planning at UCL. Iqbal Hamiduddin is Lecturer in Transport and Housing at the Bartlett. Meri Juntti is Senior Lecturer in Environmental Governance and Rural Development in the Department of Law and Politics at Middlesex University. Sue Kidd and Dave Shaw are both in the Department of Geography and Planning at the University of Liverpool, where Sue is a Senior Lecturer and Head of Planning and Dave is a Professor of Planning.