Specific issue: The wish to determine which sites are allocated within the neighbourhood area for any given use
Increasingly we are seeing neighbourhood groups where their local authority has an up-to-date local plan in place, wishing to undertake the process of allocating sites for particular uses. Most commonly this is for residential development but it could equally apply to employment or any other particular type of site allocation.
This could also apply to neighbourhoods where an LPA does not have an up-to-date local plan. Undertaking a form of sites assessment will help the LPA to establish what the potential housing requirement for that neighbourhood should be, which in turn will help to inform the overall housing requirement for the area.
In undertaking this task, it is important that the LPA agrees the process with the neighbourhood group which in turn agrees this with the community prior to undertaking the work. If there is agreement over the process, then there can be no complaint about the outcome.
It is likely that for many LPAs the process of evaluating sites as part of the Site Allocations process will already be established. There may be some work already undertaken which should be shared by the LPA or a site assessment toolkit already created. In these cases, it will be important to consider and agree with the neighbourhood groups whether and how the further assessment work is shared between the LPA and the neighbourhood group.
Topic |
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Site allocations |
Specific issues to be addressed |
The wish to determine which sites are allocated within the neighbourhood area for any given use |
What do neighbourhood groups have to be able to properly demonstrate with the evidence they collect in order to ensure that NP policy is robust? |
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What questions should they ask (either through a survey or focus group, etc) in order to gather effective evidence? |
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What evidence have you got to help neighbourhoods demonstrate the issue and develop policy? - How useful is it for them? - Is it in a useable form? |
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Evidence |
Useful? |
Useable format? |
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Strategic Housing Market Assessment (SHMA) |
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Affordable Housing Needs Assessment |
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Strategic Housing Land Availability Assessment (SHLAA) |
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Strategic Flood Risk Assessment (SFRA) |
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Landscape/Townscape Character Appraisals |
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Character area/settlement appraisals |
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Conservation area statements |
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Ecology/biodiversity studies |
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PPG17 study + green infrastructure |
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Historic Environment Records (HERs)/archaeology studies |
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Contaminated land register |
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Employment Land Review (ELR) – if employment allocations |
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Retail/town centre studies/appraisals |
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5-year supply of sites |
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Constraints mapping - GIS |
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Sites mapping – GIS + planning history (link with SHLAA) |
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Data from annual monitoring reports, e.g. densities |
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S106 viability appraisals on local schemes to support applications |
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Community Infrastructure Levy viability appraisals |
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Sustainability appraisal |
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Existing community plans |