PLANNING COMMUNITY AND POLITICIANS CHALLENGED TO TAKE A NEW APPROACH TO CLIMATE CHANGE » Communities » 24dash.com

In a speech made to a fringe meeting at the Liberal Democrat Conference today, Kelvin MacDonald challenged the planning community, including politicians, to be bolder and more innovative on tackling climate change. His speech covered a new approach to carbon neutral development, wind farms and decentralised energy production.

MacDonald, Director of Policy and Research at the Royal Town Planning Institute said: “We must all adapt to the threats posed by global warming.  In some areas planning policy is leading the thinking but, overall, planning is yet to realise its full potential as a major player in both attacking the causes of climate change and reducing its consequences.  To do this, we need to change the way that we think about issues.”

MacDonald recognised that planning cannot take the full burden of addressing climate change alone but must work with such ideas as tax regimes, carbon trading and climate-aware design standards. MacDonald stressed that his list of examples alone showed the need for new innovative thinking and new actions by planners, communities and politicians at all levels. He stressed that this means abandoning some old ideas about the remit of planning. 

Quoting George Orwell, he said: “the past is fighting the future and we have two years, a year, possibly only a few months to see to it that the future wins”.

MacDonald quoted a number of examples of new thinking;

·         We, the planning community, should look to every development, no matter how large or small, to reduce emissions. Planners should meet the call for no carbon development rather than waiting for government edict;

·         we should recognise that the greatest threat to our landscapes comes form climate change and that applications for wind farms should be seen in that context;

·         we should no longer entertain the concept of stand alone business parks but should promote well designed live/work developments;

·         We need to speak out when changes in health provision means longer journeys to hospitals and surgeries – which both disadvantage those without access to cars and contributes to an increase in carbon emissions;

·         we should have a national spatial framework which, amongst other things spells out the different impacts of Government decisions in different parts of the country and should apply a ‘sequential test’ to major infrastructure (such as roads and airports) – requiring its promoters to demonstrate what steps have been taken to manage demand before they are allowed to increase supply;

·         Planning can and should encourage innovation in the use of technology and in supporting new enterprises (including community enterprises) in sustainable energy production. Planning should recognise new development’s potential not to be simply a consumer of energy but a net producer of energy and can help to develop the decentralised energy infrastructure necessary.

·         Planning must link health and development objectives that reduce energy use e.g. making walking to work or school and using public transport enjoyable experiences and to strengthen urban – rural links to reduce food miles.

Ends

Press release issued: September 18 2006