community led housing london

Shared learning on land and planning with Future of London

This week we were at Future of London’s latest CLH workshop which focused on Land and Planning, with talks on policy, social value, small sites and self-finish projects.

Jo Lavis, Rural Housing Solutions, opened with a keynote on the shared objectives CLH has with local authority plans and how policy can support its delivery. She will be releasing a national planning guide for CLH this month.

Justin Carr, GLA, shared how the Small Sites Small Builders programme has brought publicly owned sites forward for community led housing schemes and how public bodies can release sites through the portal.

Stephen Hill reflected on site disposal and ‘less than best consideration’; current legislation allows for a range of social, economic and environmental factors which can be taken into account in assessing market value, in line with council policies and strategies.

Jon Fitzmaurice shared how self-help housing can help residents get involved with housing management with a quicker turnaround than new build. It’s also an opportunity for local residents to contribute sweat equity and reduce the overall costs of the project

It was also great to tour Marklake Court with Leathmarket CBS, development managers igloo Community Builders and Bell Phillips Architects. Their strategy for allocating the news homes focused on downsizing, with those in larger properties moving and making them available to overcrowded families and others on the local waiting list. In-depth engagement and community support for the infill development and resulted in higher density than planners had anticipated.

A full write up of the day will be available on the Future of London website shortly, along with slides and videos.

The Foundations for Community Led Housing programme is particularly aimed at local authorities and potential development partners, who want to support community-led schemes. The next workshop will be on finance, to sign up and find out more information go to the Future of London website.