Green Belt - what's it good for?

ukcarper

CLAPTON wrote: »

who then would be the planning authority?

The local authority would still be the planning authority working to a plan agreed by all interested local authorities with central government. The problem is all we have now is the government dictating the number of properties that each local authority should build.

ukcarper

princeofpounds wrote: »

Have you ever looked at brownfield planning applications?

This constant refrain you see that we 'should build on brownfield first' is something you hear a lot from commentators. But I don't think many of these people are aware that the planning system makes it almost as nightmarish as green belt.

If you buy under-utilised commercial space for conversion, councils often force you to try renting or selling it before they will even consider your intended residential use.

Buy industrial space and they won't give you change of use as 'people need employment'. As if they don't need housing.

Try to turn one house on a plot into more than one, it can be exceptionally hard as any increase in density gets refused as 'not in keeping with the local area'. And god forbid you try to build with a footprint or height any different to adjacent houses, violating the sacred roofline or building line.

Don't forget that a builder doing a single house on a brownfield site has to wade through exactly the same planning bureaucracy and pay exactly the same fees as a mega-development. That kills off so much that doesn't have economies of scale.

Brownfield development struggles because the system does not enable it; it's not about the costs of 'clearing up land'; only a fraction of urban land is contaminated, not every plot is a redundant petrol station. House prices are so high right in the SE that simple building economics is not remotely the problem.

Should those things not be addressed before we build on the green belt.

princeofpounds

Should those things not be addressed before we build on the green belt.

I'm not as sure about that as I used to be. The green belt doesn't actually do a very good job of meeting the objectives it's supposed to have. I'm not sure it's as valuable as it's made out to be.

That's not to say green space isn't valuable. But green belt might be a particularly unproductive way of preserving it.

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

ukcarper wrote: »

Should those things not be addressed before we build on the green belt.

I think you fail to appreciate the severity of the housing crisis.

We're well past the stage where we could afford to worry about the niceties of keeping the local nimby contingent happy, or asking councils to play nicely with each other, or waiting for years to build consensus in local areas.

We need the sort of emergency action that happened after the war, where all the red tape and bureaucratic barriers were pulled down and many hundreds of thousands of houses were built each year.

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

princeofpounds wrote: »

I'm not as sure about that as I used to be. The green belt doesn't actually do a very good job of meeting the objectives it's supposed to have. I'm not sure it's as valuable as it's made out to be.

That's not to say green space isn't valuable. But green belt might be a particularly unproductive way of preserving it.

The green belt has become a green noose.

Throttling the life out of growth and the younger generation's prospects for housing.

End the madness now, and build, baby, build......

I mean, look, I'm someone that loves high house prices more than a fat kid loves cake....

But when even I can see a housing crisis developing into a housing catastrophe if we don't get building on a massive scale it's well past time something was done about it.

ukcarper

HAMISH_MCTAVISH wrote: »

I think you fail to appreciate the severity of the housing crisis.

We're well past the stage where we could afford to worry about the niceties of keeping the local nimby contingent happy, or asking councils to play nicely with each other, or waiting for years to build consensus in local areas.

We need the sort of emergency action that happened after the war, where all the red tape and bureaucratic barriers were pulled down and many hundreds of thousands of houses were built each year.

Easy to say from Aberdeen. I agree we need more houses but If brown field sites are being left unused or other types of property are being left empty when the land could be used for housing then that is unacceptable. I also agree that there are plenty of fields being used for equine purposes that could be used for housing and some of those could be used for housing without having to much impact on the green belt but they are not always the areas put forward for new building.

CLAPTON

ukcarper wrote: »

The local authority would still be the planning authority working to a plan agreed by all interested local authorities with central government. The problem is all we have now is the government dictating the number of properties that each local authority should build.

what do you mean by 'agreed'

lets us say you and I need to agree

will you agree with me?

ukcarper

CLAPTON wrote: »

what do you mean by 'agreed'

lets us say you and I need to agree

will you agree with me?

A majority decision reached after consultation. I think it is unlikely I will agree with you as you seem to think planning is function ok apart from some of the restrictions although I agree some of the restrictions need to be lifted I want to see the effect of that building on the whole area taken into consideration.

CLAPTON

ukcarper wrote: »

A majority decision reached after consultation. I think it is unlikely I will agree with you as you seem to think planning is function ok apart from some of the restrictions although I agree some of the restrictions need to be lifted I want to see the effect of that building on the whole area taken into consideration.

A majority of who?
who gets to vote on a proposal to build houses in Kent say?
Every council in the SE? madness.

At the moment the system would be that Kent council would be responsible for the decision with the ability for business to appeal to the secretary of state.

ukcarper

CLAPTON wrote: »

A majority of who?
who gets to vote on a proposal to build houses in Kent say?
Every council in the SE? madness.

At the moment the system would be that Kent council would be responsible for the decision with the ability for business to appeal to the secretary of state.

Is it Kent council the way I understand it, it is down to borough. I live on the border between 2 councils the council I don't vote for has a bigger impact on my surrounding area than the council I do get to vote for. A piece meal solution is not the way forward I'm really surprised you think it is.