.jpg "Image illustrating Calls for flexible zoning reforms to planning system")
According to a think tank, the government will struggle to fulfil its home building and growth ambitions unless it introduces flexible zoning and removes discretion from the planning system.
The Centre for Cities, an independent non-partisan urban policy research unit and charity, said that although forthcoming legislation will change planning rules, "they will still remain open to interpretation by planners".
It calls on ministers to pursue "option 3" of the government's planning reform working paper, which requires all proposals to be delegated to officers alongside a national scheme of delegation, setting out a prescriptive list of applications to be decided by committees.
The think tank's package of reforms includes activating National Development Management Policies, which would replace local planning policies and provide a "consistent national rulebook". It also calls for "material considerations" to be replaced by "material designations", providing special discretionary protections within designated locations.
The Centre for Cities says the reforms would "create a flexible zoning system similar to that in other common law countries where proposals that followed the rules would be guaranteed planning permission".
Zones ranging from suburban areas to city centres would contain a mix of allowed uses and limits on density and heights, with planning authorities deciding the types of development and material designations in each neighbourhood.
Ministers must also "change tack in their devolution agenda", as the think tank warns that the proposed two-tier "shire mayors" will repeat the fragmentation of the existing two-tier system and would struggle to increase housebuilding.
"Instead, single-tier county councils with all the powers of mayors and that match local economies should be how devolution is advanced outside the big cities".
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