Webinar –UK Green Building Council Planning

Syntegra Consulting took part on 25^th October at its first webinar on “UK Green Building Council Planning webinar”. The webinar explored how far planners should be going when requiring high quality, sustainable development and how far is too far. It brought together a panel of expert speakers to debate these issues as Martin Randall, Head of Planning and Public Protection at Brighton & Hove City Council, Sarah Cary, Sustainable Developments Executive at British Land, Dieter Gockmann, Director at EPR Architects and chair of the UK-GBC Planning task group and Joanne Wheeler, UK-GBC’s Senior Policy Advisor.

The National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) published on 27^th March 2012 is a reform to make the planning system less complex and more accessible and to promote sustainable growth. The planning system enhances and sustains a community’s quality of life. By informing forward planning, strategies and decisions with a solid understanding of sustainable development, it is increasingly demonstrated that better decision can be reached in the short, medium and long term. The new NPPF contains a “presumption in favour of sustainable development” and the Government hopes that the presumption will “encourage plan-making by councils and communities, giving them greater say in how they meet their development needs. It will also give communities, developers and investors more certainty about the types of applications that are likely to be approved and will help to speed up the planning process”.

The key issue now is how local authorities will put the guidance in the NPPF into practice. The webinar concluded that sustainability needs to be integrated at the very start of the project and the planning process. It should also implicate joined-up working and collaboration from all parties involved and it was pointed that a lack of resources and support for planners was a key issue to be addressed.

Syntegra Consulting was pleased to participate at this webinar and for more information please visit http://www.ukgbc.org/content/advice-planners-and-developers