We’ve got the space, so let’s use it
KEN DAVIS from Transition Town Hastings sets out the group’s innovative approach to solving the housing crisis in Hastings.
We need more homes, but homes of the right quality in the right place, and we need a way to pay for them.
The national government has various methods it could use, but locally we could make better use of under-used urban land: wasted land. Not by building on playing fields or other green spaces essential to good quality urban lives, but rather the bits left over after planning.
As Michael Caine would say, “Not a lot of people know this…”, but there is a lot of wasted or underused land in Hastings that is there to be used. Hastings, to people’s surprise, is a low-density urban area.
The small spaces left over by unimaginative standardised approaches to planning from when land was cheaper, some land that was considered unstable, or simply that the developer’s standard house types did not fit. This can be seen on even quite recent developments – small triangles of land are often left at the end of a row of houses. Why does our planning system not recognise and address such waste of a scarce resource?
The second category is land often held in public ownership or quasi-public ownership where its value is not recognised because development is not the primary business of the owner or the inflexible planning system rules out housing. HBC, ESCC, Network Rail, church authorities and housing associations own land that, with imagination and minor adjustments to policy, could be released for development – and primarily for local benefit rather than distant large commercial development firms.
WE NEED A CREATIVE POLICY
If a more creative policy on land use is to be considered, there are three issues that need to be better understood. The first is density, the second is ‘nimbyism’, and the third is benefit.
DENSITY
The notion of density in urban areas is misunderstood. Countryside is essential, and it’s clear that we do not want to encroach into the ‘area of outstanding natural beauty’ which surrounds our town. The density of Hastings is 3,100 people for every square kilometre (pp.km.sq) which translates to 300 square metres per person. That may not sound like a lot given we have to account for all the non-habitable spaces such as roads, offices, factories, schools, etc. It does mean something though when you think that five people can live in a two storey three-bedroomed house of 100 square metres. Interestingly, Brighton has a very similar density to Hastings while Eastbourne is considerably less. To compare – Mumbai has a peak density of 122,000 pp.km.sq or 40 times as dense as Hastings! Closer to home Islington is more than five times as dense as Hastings while the whole of Greater London, with all its many open spaces, is three times as dense as Hastings. Even the parish of Rye, with no high-rise, is about three times as dense. One of the most desirable parts of London, the leafy and affluent neighbourhood of Notting Hill, has an average density nearly twice that of Hastings and a peak of nearly six times!
So what is going on with density, because it’s clearly not about a little more housing using land that is wasted or underused? An acceptance of higher densities is about amenity, which includes employment opportunities as well as services availability. A seaside town such as Hastings benefits, of course, from the great natural amenity of the sea and surrounding countryside. There is space for development.
NIMBYISM
Early collaborative involvement between the applicant and adjoining property owners / occupiers should be an essential requirement of all applications. But above all else, when change is proposed, local people need some positive local examples to reference. Luckily, Hastings already has small-scale infill schemes of reasonable quality in terms of both design and sustainability that can be used as examples to compare and contrast with any new proposal. These could be placed on a website created by the local planning authority or a community group with comments invited about them not just centred on appearance – which is open to personal preference – but performance too. Of course, beyond Hastings there are many other good examples of using small infill sites.
One of the oft-heard refrains from planning objectors is that a proposal will lower the value of their property. While this is not a valid reason for a planning refusal, it is an issue that requires a response. When a high-density, very sustainable scheme was proposed in Sutton near Croydon some twenty years ago, there was huge local opposition but fortunately it was a very good design and supported by an enlightened local council. When the scheme was completed and well established, some of the objectors were queuing up to buy into the scheme. Difference is not an issue if the quality is good.
WHO BENEFITS
Commercial developers are often criticised for making profit, but they often take big risks and so should gain from that risk. But should that profit be limited? Most development profit is made from gaining planning permission rather than building houses, and that is a major reason why so many housing sites stand empty for years. We need a system for small sites that can stand outside the formalities of local planning approvals, where owners of small sites sign up voluntarily to not take an immediate profit from the land sale but rather to engage in a positive process to enable development. In other words, the land profit is only taken once the development is complete. Such a process could deliver long-term benefit rather than immediate financial profit.
CAPITAL
Finally, in the present financial crisis we hear a lot about taxes and expenditure but nothing about capital. We need more resources for all sorts of things in our society, and yet we sit on the hugely valuable capital available from unused, often public land because landowners are unaware of the resource they have. Furthermore, we miss out on ‘nest building’. Many years ago, people used to build their own houses, but successive and usually necessary standards have limited such opportunities. ‘Nest building’ is an incredibly powerful force which should be harnessed to create both social and financial capital, but this can only be achieved if public and private bodies work collaboratively. There are some really great third sector bodies in Hastings which can enable such work.
Development costs can very broadly be divided into land, build cost and profit or fees. If the land cost is defrayed, or only the pre-planning value taken until the project is completed, and if there is at least some self-build element to the scheme, then the initial cost challenge is greatly reduced. If, on public land, there is some offset of the land value for community benefit (which local authorities are allowed to do), then a scheme becomes instantly more viable.
Our aim at Transition Town Hastings is to explore cost options as well as provide details of possible sites around the town for small scale development once there has been some public feedback on these ideas. Those frustrated by the lack of housing in the town can join us to engage with innovative solutions and act collaboratively to bring them about.
Learn more or join us at www.transitiontownhastings or via our Facebook page.
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