The transformative power of planning

Government sees planning as a drag on the economy – but have we lost sight of its true potential?  Sarah Longlands visited cities in south-east Asia and South America in search of a fresh perspective

What is planning, what is it for and what role does it play in supporting and shaping places both in a time of austerity and potentially in the future? Coming from an economic development perspective, I’ve long been interested in the sometimes fractious relationship between local economics and planning.

One way to get a new perspective is to take a look at some high profile exemplars from other parts of the world. Some fresh thinking on the subject is definitely required while we await the publication of the final National Planning Policy Framework.

Planning in the UK has been characterised by two main roles which can be described as spatial planning and regulatory planning. Spatially, it considers how a place will respond to change both now and in the future taking into account social, economic and environmental challenges. This is the development planning process which is encapsulated in the production of the local development framework (LDF). As a regulatory function, planning through the development management process ensures the smooth implementation of the LDF and the regulation of land use, building standards and urban design.

Current government rhetoric has chosen to characterise planning primarily as a regulatory function which in the coalition’s eyes, acts as a ‘drag anchor’ on growth (as Eric Pickles described). At a time when economic growth is conspicuously lacking, it appears that we can’t afford the luxury of planning; the role of planning in austerity is to deliver growth. A simple linear relationship is implied by government, that less planning control equals greater levels of economic growth.

So how do we differ from other countries and what can we learn?

The development of Songdo City in South Korea

SOUTH KOREA – USING PLANNING TO MAXIMISE GROWTH
South Korea stands out as an Asian tiger economy, relentlessly pursuing a neoliberal approach to planning with the express intention of freeing up and resources to sustain their rapid economic growth. Developments such as the six free economic zones springing up around the country are testament to this.

I visited the Incheon Economic Zone, 30km west of Seoul, which is a vast development stretching for more than 100km and boasting the latest in ‘ubiquitous’ technology, environmental design features and transport infrastructure, including South Korea’s primary international airport, Incheon.

Incheon is zoned into three main areas: Songdo, the best of global business; Yeongjong, the best of global logistics and Cheongna; and the best of global leisure (which includes Robot Land, ‘a mecca for high tech industries’!).

The appetite for investment and growth is also intensifying demand for land in Seoul itself with the government embarking on vast ‘reconstruction’ projects in the centre of the city. The Hang River is at the centre of many of these initiatives and while it may seem more efficient in the mind of Seoul’s planners to reconstruct the city’s existing architectural design in the name of efficiency, of being able to cram more residential blocks into a ever decreasing space, this ‘pork barrelling’ may be in danger of jeopardising the city’s distinctiveness.

What is striking about the approach to planning in South Korea is the use of land as a commodity to be maximised for the greater economic good and most importantly to ensure it’s perceived internationally as the latest place in which to do business.

A favela on the outskirts of Sao Paulo

SAO PAULO – MANAGING RAPID ECONOMIC GROWTH
The informal settlements that surround the periphery of Sao Paulo speak volumes about the city’s rate of growth. These vast settlements house up to 30% of the city’s residents. In contrast with Seoul, planners have to adopt a different planning approach in order to address the challenge of informal housing.

Rapid urbanisation in the post-war period has made Sao Paulo the fifth largest city in the world, the consequence of which is that demand for housing and services has not been able to keep pace with this rate of growth, resulting in the development of informal settlements within the city itself in corticos (slum tenements) and on the periphery in favelas (illegal occupation of public or private land).

Once upon a time, Sao Paulo had a similar approach to Seoul, whereby land was viewed purely as a commodity. People living in the favelas did not exist. They were not part of the city but an inconvenience to be moved on.

However, as time went on the approach changed.  Planning in Sao Paulo is now much more about a collaborative or transactional exercise whereby the city’s planners work with residents of informal settlements to redevelop these areas and integrate their communities and economy into the ‘formal’ city. This includes the development of basic infrastructure such as roads, sewage and health/school services, but within the existing slum. The slum is not replaced but retrofitted and improved from within.

What is really important about this approach is that it challenges the traditional approach to urban planning which views informal or illegal settlements negatively as undesirable and dangerous. These areas are perceived as a threat to the formal planning process in a city. However, in Sao Paulo, we see the opposite view, whereby the informal city actually provides an alternative forum for planning and designing a city which works with what is already present in the informal structure.

The rapid transit express busway in Curitiba

CURITIBA – AN INTEGRATED APPROACH
Of all the areas we visited, Curitiba gave us an example of a place where it appears the priorities of planning and growth have been, to some extent, integrated in public policy.

Like other Brazilian cities, it experienced rapid growth in the post-war period and used this challenge to develop a new approach to planning by setting out a bold masterplan which integrated economic development, land use and transport planning. Taken forward by the Instituo de Pesquisa e Planejamento Urbano de Curitiba (IPPUC), this planning authority has led the way for the last 40 years.

Curitiba’s vision for integrating growth and planning is characterised by a rapid bus transit system which ensures the city’s main thoroughfares are dominated, not by the private car, but by dedicated bus-only lanes which operate in much the same way as an underground rapid transit system. To facilitate this system and maximise its usefulness, planners developed the city in a linear way, that is, instead of concentrating development in and around the physical centre of the city, development is concentrated along the same linear routes taken by the transit.

This has the effect of reducing the pressure on the city centre as the focus for every day transport, helping to minimise congestion and ensuring public transport has priority over cars.

Innovation in Curitiba is not confined to transport and planning and the city has also encouraged the development of green space resulting in it having almost 51 square metres per head of population. It has also used its image as a ‘sustainable’ city to encourage new investment and economic growth from low carbon businesses.

The IPUCC’s latest initiative, the Linha Verde or ‘green line’ is a massive project to turn an existing interstate highway into a new rapid transit express bus way. It’s a difficult thing for someone in the UK to imagine as it’s the equivalent of taking the M6 and converting two lanes to bus only lanes with car transport either side.

The route is known as ‘the green way’ because it will literally be green with linear parks along one side comprising native plants and trees to support biodiversity along with bike lanes to encourage alternative forms of transport.

RE-EXAMINING THE PURPOSE OF PLANNING
My experiences in these countries challenged me to reflect on the purpose of planning in the UK and the role that it can play now and in the future. What was clear to me as an economic development professional was the sense that in the UK, despite having one of the best planning systems in the world, we’d forgotten the purpose of that system.

We’d started think of it simply as a dry regulatory burden which was in place to constrain rather than release ideas. While we might not agree with all of the approaches outlined in these projects, they remind us of the transformative power of planning and how it can act as a vital and energising force for places, people and their local economies.

• This article is based on an international research project supported by the Norfolk Trust and undertaken by Sarah Longlands. A report outlining the findings of this work is due later in 2012, published by CLES.
• A longer version of this article will be available in the New Start ezine at the end of Feburary.