Helping rural communities engage with the planning system
Helping rural communities engage with the planning system
CSE joins forces with ACRE to run a series of workshops
30 November 2009
Supported by a grant from the Department for Communities & Local Government, CSE is working with local communities to enable them to engage more effectively with the planning system, with a particular focus on renewable energy and climate change. (Find out more about the PlanLoCaL project here)
One of the ways we are addressing this challenge is to join forces with ACRE (Action for Communities in Rural England - www.acre.org.uk/). ACRE is a government-backed ‘umbrella group’ that operates at national, regional and local level in support of rural communities across the country. Among its many activities is supporting rural communities as they develop a vision for what they want done in their neighbourhood or parish through 'community-led planning’.
Through the PlanLoCaL project CSE is hoping to learn about some of the pitfalls and highlights of community-led planning as well as providing information and support to help low-carbon living and statutory planning to become more accessible to communities.
So far the workshops CSE has run with ACRE staff have provided us with a fantastic insight into what ‘floats the rural community boat’ (dog mess, road safety and play areas above all). Through two days of energetic and thought-provoking workshops and brain-storming, CSE is now developing materials and resources to support both ACRE and communities with planning policy and renewable energy questions they may face. These include a scale model of a community to stimulate discussion and provoke new thinking.
Louise Rutterford from CSE who led the workshops explained how the workshops have helped: “Our sessions have really highlighted some of the main stumbling blocks. These include: ‘low carbon’ issues not resonating with communities; a lack of awareness of low carbon issues at all levels of the planning system; the planning system providing limited support and opportunity for communities to engage; and both planning policy and low carbon issues being very complicated.
“Low carbon issues and engaging with the planning policy rarely emerge on their own account as priorities for communities. So there are plenty of challenges ahead. But with the support of the development workers and technical and planning specialists alongside our scale model of what a low carbon future may look like, we are hoping to eliminate at least some of the challenges faced by both communities and planners.”