Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
There is no national spatial plan for England, but the system is - despite
devolution efforts - still strongly centralised. Central government can introduce
changes to planning policy and procedures quickly, which will then have to be
implemented by lower planning tiers. The most important body of government plan-
ning policy at national level is found in Planning Policy Guidance notes (PPGs),
which influence planning practice at regional and local levels (Box 4.5). These
notes, of which there are twenty-five, cover different aspects of planning and can
best be described as sectoral, although some deal with
procedural
rather than
substantive
issues. There is no reference to specific locations or 'spatial content' in
the national guidance. The recent planning reform means that PPGs are being
replaced by Planning Policy Statements (PPSs) (Box 4.6), though these appear to
remain largely non-spatial in character and hence continuing much along the lines
of PPGs
.
Despite the more 'spatial' intentions for planning, it is doubtful whether
the intended changes will actually have a major influence on the cartographic
representation of spatial policies in the short to medium term.
The reform of the planning system has also made provision to replace
Regional Planning Guidance (RPGs) and county structure plans by a single tier of
integrated and statutory Regional Spatial Strategies (RSSs) that are to be pre-
pared by Regional Planning Bodies (RPBs). County councils are to have a statu-
tory role in acting as agents for the RPBs in providing technical expertise on the
sub-regional aspects of the Regional Spatial Strategies. RSSs will provide the stra-
tegic spatial framework within which the new planning instruments at local level, i.e.
Local Development Frameworks (LDFs) and Local Transport Plans (LTPs) can
be prepared. They will - like the RPGs before them - identify the scale and dis-
tribution of provision for new housing and priorities for the environment, transport,
infrastructure, economic development, agriculture, minerals and waste treatment
and disposal. While RSSs are expected to increasingly take on the role of an
integrated regional spatial strategy, the exact differences between RPGs and
RSSs (besides the label and the statutory nature) are uncertain at this point in
time and the mechanisms for achieving integration in what has to date been a
largely sectoralised system are unclear. The draft national guidance on the prepara-
tion of RSSs sets out the same general criteria for the preparation of key diagrams,
which also implies that these might remain of much the same diagrammatic and
abstract character as previous RPGs, thus graphically not giving any clearer guid-
ance for lower planning levels. At the time of writing, work on RSSs was still under
way in most of the English regions, but the draft versions that are available rein-
force the impression that while considerable effort is aimed at a spatial planning
discourse and changing the planning system to become more spatially oriented
and more integrated, much will remain the same in the 'modernised planning
system'.
