By Michael Smith (Veshengro)
The Chartered Institution of Water and Environmental Management’s Contaminated Land Network has expressed relief that Greg Clark MP has confirmed that the Government will not do away with the current, forward thinking and sustainable policy of building on brownfield sites before open greenfield land.
In the draft National Planning Policy Framework, currently being consulted on, the intention is to remove detailed planning guidance and withdraw and replace PPS23 (and its Annex 2) on Planning and Pollution Control by a short and focussed note.
This direction aroused suspicion that the NPPF is a sop to the development lobby who can profit more from greenfield sites and to lawyers who will pounce on the lack of clarity for more appeals, challenges and inquiries.
Brownfield-first policies are eminently sensible and far better than allowing a developer-led free for all on greenfield sites. We have a legacy of brownfield land in this country and we need to ensure that there is sufficient legislation and guidance in place to protect against a massive potential increase in inappropriate and unregulated redevelopments.
Recently the planning minister Greg Clark conceded that the NPPF used a different phrase, "land of least environmental value" rather than brownfield. He added: “It was never my intention, and it certainly was not the Government’s intention, to depart from the obviously desirable situation in which derelict land should be brought back into use”. CIWEM welcomes this statement and urges the brownfield first policy to be carried into the final version.
Gary Winder, Chair of CIWEM’s Contaminated Land Network, says: “There is a current presumption to use brownfield sites first and this must be clearly spelled out in the final National Planning Policy Framework. Using previously developed sites has many significant recognised benefits - addressing neglected and disused land, recycling land back into sustainable use, improving the environment by addressing contamination issues and helping to enhance and regenerate local communities. It is essential that the opportunities and importance of regenerating brownfield land are recognised in the final policy document”.
It is, however, at times rather funny what, according to some councils and planning authorities was greenbelt land and which was not, such when a former scrapyard in Essex, with an (illegal) traveller site is declared a greenbelt site, while some greenbelt sites, when they want to put something there, is declared a former brownfield site. Time we seriously had a level playing field for all.
When it comes to development of housing, offices, etc., certainly brownfield sites should always be the first chosen and they then should also not be declared as greenbelt sites when one wants to object to a development, even for a private traveller site.
In Sheffield the go ahead was just given in the middle of October 2011 to build a housing project on the site of a former college campus which also, for some strange reason, was declared by everyone bar the council, as greenbelt land. You cannot greenwash brownfield into greenbelt, but this is what some try to do.
We must keep the distinction clear as to what is brownfield, namely land that once had been built on, and what is greenbelt.
Yes, you can green former industrial sites quite nicely as our old railroad tracks and converted factory sites show but they are not, when they became vacant, suddenly greenbelt land.
The truth is important, also in these matters, and homes are needed too.
© 2011
