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Leading planning and housing charity, the Town and Country Planning Association (TCPA), published new guidance on protecting and enhancing biodiversity in eco-towns at its annual conference themed ‘Social Justice, Climate Change and Planning' yesterday.
TCPA Chief Executive Gideon Amos OBE said: "The TCPA celebrates the centenary of the first planning Act, a victory for the early Garden City days of the charity, by publishing exemplar biodiversity standards for eco-towns to follow. As part of this CLG / TCPA guidance, enhancing biodiversity through development becomes a key priority, as does protecting and promoting existing habitats. In the build up to the United Nations Copenhagen Climate Change Conference it's right to focus on how low carbon communities can also support rich and developing levels of biodiversity."
The Eco-towns Biodiversity worksheet, ‘biodiversity positive: eco-towns biodiversity worksheet', whose lead author is David Knight at Natural England, provides guidance in support of the Planning Policy Statement (PPS) on Eco-towns (CLG, 2009), identifying the essential steps required to ensure that their design, development and long term management result in a sustained positive outcome for biodiversity.
