PLANNING WALES Mark TewdwrJones, University College London John Osmond, IWA Time to Deliver

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PLANNING WALESMark Tewdwr-Jones, University
College LondonJohn Osmond, IWATime to Deliver
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WALES SPATIAL PLANObjectives? Establish
spatial context for social, economic and
environmental activity.? Provide strategic
framework for investment, resource allocation and
development decisions.? Explain the
differential impact of policies across Wales and
address the compatibility of different sectoral
policies.? Identify and express the character
of different functional areas across Wales.
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• SPATIAL PLAN PROBLEMS
• ? Insufficiently detailed
• ? Unrelated to funding programmes - though should
  provide a framework EU Convergence Fund 2006-11.
• ? Relies on informal working and
• ? Take-up of spatial planning not materialised
  into anything substantive within Wales.
• Does this failure reflect a problem with the
  spatial plan itself, or an inability for agencies
  and stakeholders to think outside their
  particular institutional boxes?

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• RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CARDIFF AND THE VALLEYS
• The spatial plan is being tested in the Valleys
  with the politics of the five local planning
  authorities in conflict
• ? Concern that Cardiff will export its lower cost
  housing to badly located sites in Rhondda Cynon
  Taff
• ? Llantrisant to Caerphilly corridor
  over-developed, with retailing and leisure
  complexes as well as housing.
• ? Bridgend Dragon film studios and developments
  around Capel Llaniltern hugging the M4 are
  creating a no mans land between Cardiff and
  the valleys.
• Would these sorts of spatial planning challenges
  be more easily resolved if there were fewer local
  planning authorities?

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• Grounding the Spatial Plan City Regions
• In the third term the concept of City Regions
  will need to be grasped
• ? Cardiff Newport and Swansea need a more
  creative relationship with their hinterlands.
• ? Transport policies at the core.
• ? Time to Deliver proposals for a light rail
  network for SE Wales will not be delivered
  without more effective collaboration on a
  city-region basis
• Cardiff Council must take a lead.

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• GROUNDING THE SPATIAL PLAN
• DEVELOPMENT DOMAINS IN RURAL WALES
• The Wales Spatial Plans vision of growth points
  conforms to Gareth Wyn Joness and Einir Youngs
  idea of development domains. These envisage two
  types of development domains
• ? Medium sized dispersed conurbations with
  populations in excess of 40,000.
• ? Smaller development domains with populations
  about 15,000 to 30,000.
• So, instead of thinking of Bangor or Caernarfon
  or Beaumaris, it is suggested that the domain
  should be all the communities on either side of
  the Menai Straits combining to give a total
  population, around 50,000.
• The large majority of rural Wales is within ten
  to 20 miles of the these domains.

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• LOCAL GOVERNMENT REFORM
• ? To deliver effective spatial planning will we
  need another change to the structure of local
  government
• ? The Beecham report and the Welsh Assembly
  Government have ruled this out
• ? Instead we are top have collaboration across
  boundaries, and especially between the 22 local
  authorities and 22 local health boards.
• ? Beecham has given 5 years for this to work. If
  not by then, then another structural change is on
  the agenda
• ? In the process could we lose ten years in
  produce an effective spatial planning system in
  Wales?