New Towns? It’s not a real conversation if we’re not talking about communities

By Lucy Webb, Director

The New Towns agenda has got the built environment buzzing. Rightly so: it’s a once-in-a-generation opportunity not just to construct housing at the scale needed to respond to a deepening crisis but also to add meaningful new pieces to our urban fabric - new villages, new towns and new communities.

Don’t be fooled, though, into thinking that that last word, community, should sit last on the list. It’s not just nice to have. It’s the foundation that makes everything else work.

Government is right to focus on pace and scale. We badly need homes. ‘Deliverability’ has become the watchword that likely shaped the choice of the new town front-runners announced recently. But what does deliverability really mean? Who is it for, and on whose terms? In short: where are we making space in the conversation for the people who will and who already do live in these places?

In recent months I’ve found myself returning to the fate of the first new towns, and asking again why so many – once symbols of opportunity and optimism – have become shorthand for what can go wrong. Who hasn’t heard a disparaging remark about Thamesmead, Milton Keynes, Basildon, or any number of others?

Bad reputations start with scepticism from the outset. That can harden into opposition when suggested locations are confirmed without credible commitments to long-term care for existing communities that incorporates and understands their needs, their histories and their future. Drive around England and you’ll see decades’ worth of edge-of-town add-ons that feel disconnected and thinly served, cookie-cutter schemes delivered by volume housebuilders with little regard for local people. Planners do their best, but when targets and viability are the dominant measures, there is only so much they can do.

This is where stewardship matters. If we are serious about the future of a place once the builders’ cranes have gone, we dramatically increase the odds that it will subsequently thrive instead of just function. A clear programme of long-term care can build support and buy-in early, helping schemes move through the planning system and creating pace rather than delay. Understanding who will use new streets, parks and facilities, and how they will connect to what already exists, makes it more likely these assets will be used and valued. All of those things also support smarter service planning and help ensure residents can access the social, cultural and community infrastructure they need to thrive.

The expert stewards we need to do this work are local authorities, housing associations and elected officials. They are long-term landlords, investors and convenors, with a stake not just in how a place is designed and delivered, but in how it is managed, maintained and adapted over time.

They are also place convenors, with the opportunity to co-create a strong vision for a place in collaboration with the community, its key partners and its public institutions. This is a vital role too, because the new towns programme requires a clear place partnership to be built from the start - not imposed by central government as a matter of last resort, but proactively built from the bottom up.

Within this work is a further opportunity to think more creatively about the governance and management arrangements around developing designs and plans for the area and for overseeing the delivery of those plans over time. Social, community and cultural infrastructure cannot be accounted for by a square mile allowance against a quantum of homes on a spreadsheet. It needs serious and proper consideration about the needs of the community now and in the future.

The new towns programme gives us a rare chance to test, learn and improve; to build a blueprint for housing-led regeneration and the delivery of homes at scale for decades to come. But we can only benefit if we are willing to learn in the fullest sense: from local people, from the evidence, and from what we discover as these places evolve over time. Creating spaces that can naturally evolve and adapt to local need can finally halt the cycle of build, close, demolish, rebuild that we have seen time and again.

As we head to Leeds for the UKReiiF conference in a few weeks’ time, it’s critical therefore that we don’t just talk about how to deliver homes at speed and scale. As built environment leaders, we have an opportunity and responsibility to help shape communities we will be proud of in 30 years’ time, not just schemes that look good at completion. We must also be honest about what makes delivery stick. Community, stewardship and everyday infrastructure turn a development into a place.

At UKREiiF, we’re convening a discussion that brings together a range of people working across multiple aspects of the new towns agenda. My hope is that we use the moment not just to ask how we build faster, but to agree what we’re building for and how we will look after it long after the ribbon-cutting.