Case studies

In recognition of the climate emergency, West Sussex County Council launched its Climate Change Strategy during 2020. This underpins their corporate plan, making climate change a fundamental consideration of all actions going forward and elevating progress on a wide variety of supporting projects.

In 2014, Telford & Wrekin Council became only the second local authority in the UK to build a publicly owned solar farm. It took less than 18 months between the initial plans being proposed and construction being completed.

The site is significant in contributing to both councils’ housing land requirement (but is appropriately recognised in NCC policy terms as a regeneration site and therefore not unduly relied upon for the purposes of housing delivery calculations). 

Established by endowment by the Milton Keynes Development Corporation at the outset of the New Town in 1967, the Parks Trust manage much of the green space within Milton Keynes, funded through the ownership of local assets as well as income from leisure and recreation uses within the city’s greenspace. 

The current East Devon Local Plan (adopted January 2016) defined the current extent and subsequent guidance for the new community and its expansion is set out in the Cranbrook DPD, the subject of an ongoing examination.   

The Core Strategy included a single criteria-based one-page policy (CS5) for the two urban extensions, cross referring to other district-wide policy requirements and without any plans other than the proposals map which showed the site boundary.

Akin to many of the councils in the Merseyside area, Knowsley’s urban area is constrained by Green Belt at its edges. 

It took 15 years of land promotion following the identified closure of its radio station activities before the site was allocated as a Sustainable Urban Extension in Rugby Borough Council’s Core Strategy, adopted in June 2011. 

As one of the largest development sites in the City, the decision to release the land from the Green Belt for approximately 6,000 homes was driven by the council’s desire to create new communities with all supporting infrastructure.   

As part of the preparation for the new city of Milton Keynes reaching its half century, the Milton Keynes Futures 2050 Commission - a group of nine individuals, chaired by the Vice Chair of Cranfield University, with other commissioners being either experts in their fields or local champions - produced a series of reports entitled ‘Milton Keynes: Making a Great City Greater’.