workshop briefing south downs local plan and the ecosystem approach
TRANSCRIPT
Using the Ecosystem Approach in a local plan process.
Alister Scott BA PhD MRTPI
Plan
• Boundaries of your planning concern
• Mainstreaming value of nature
• Ecosystem Approach and Planning
• Hooks for mainstreaming
• Discussion
What are our boundaries of concern?
Built Environment Natural Environment
Mainstreaming Value of Nature
• “In many cases nature is ignored or trumped by other economic or social priorities, or seen as a barrier to growth to be overcome.
• Ecosystem services and natural capital help re-frame nature as an asset to society that delivers many benefits”.
• Scott 2014
Ecosystem Services
1. National Parks vs Ecosystem Approach
Environment Act 1995 • To conserve and enhance the
natural beauty, wildlife and cultural heritage of the area.
• To promote opportunities for the understanding and enjoyment of the special qualities of the Park by the public.
---------------------------------------------• To seek to foster the economic
and social well-being of the local communities within the National Park.
Convention of Biological Diversity 1992
• The ecosystem approach is a strategy for the integrated management of land, water and living resources that promotes conservation and sustainable use in an equitable way.
2. Spatial Planning meets the Ecosystem Approach
• Strategy for the integrated management of land, water and living resources that promotes conservation and sustainable use in an equitable way.
• Convention of Biological Diversity 1992
Proactive, positive and integrated approaches involving multi-scalar and multi-sectoral perspectives for societal benefit
• Scott et al 2013 Sustainable Development
12 Guiding Principles
1:Policy and decision making are matters of societal CHOICE
2: DEVOLVE decisions to the lowest appropriate level
3: Consider any ADJACENT effects
4: Manage systems economically for MULTIPLE BENEFITS
5: Maintain structure and function of ECOSYSTEM SERVICES
6: Manage systems within their LIMITS
Contd.
7: Manage at appropriate spatial and temporal SCALES
8: Recognize different TEMPORAL scales and lag-effects
9: Recognize the CHANGE is inevitable.
10: Seek BALANCE between conservation & use
11: Consider all relevant INFORMATION SOURCES
12: INVOLVE all relevant sectors of society
Built Environment Hooks
• Value Ecosystem Services (p109) 4 5 6 10 – Green/Blue Infrastructure– Ecological networks– Biodiversity Offsetting
• Duty to Cooperate 2 3 7 11 12
• Viability 4• Regulation 1 6 7 8 • Incentives 1 4 9 10 • Localism 2 7 8 12
Value Ecosystem Services
109 The planning system should contribute to and enhance the natural and local environment by:• recognising the wider
benefits of ecosystem services;
• Redefining your evidence base
• Baselines
Value Ecosystem Services
Baseline Mapping
National Character Areas
Opportunity Mapping
National Character Areas
Green Living Spaces Plan 2014
Spatial Layers 1.aesthetics and mobility 2.flood risk 3.local climate 4.education 5.recreation6.biodiversity
Nature Improvement Area
• Bigger Better More Joined up
• Landscape scale• Enhanced
involvement, education and cultural services
• Optional planning policy protection
BUT How Not to Value Nature
• Selective cherry picking of ecosystem services
• Using financial values alone
Biodiversity Offsetting Doncaster
Duty to Cooperate “To engage constructively,
actively and on an ongoing
basis to maximise the effectiveness
of Local Plan preparation
in the context of strategic
cross boundary matters”.
Housing Fetish
• IDENTIFY Objectively assessed housing need
• 5 year housing supply • REVISE via
constraints or neighbours
CatchmentManagement Source: Jim Davies Env Agency
Partnerships
Viability
• Economic – Developer driven based on hidden models of delivery costs
• BUT need to incoporate • Social – e.g Affordable housing • Environmental – e.g limits and thresholds
Regulatory Tools
• Strategic Environmental Assessment – Scottish Rural Develo
pment plan
• Environmental Impact Assessment
• Community Infrastructure levy
• SuDs
Incentives: Payments for Ecosystem Services
Exmoor National Park
N Devon &Torridge Plan
• Policy ST11: Enhancing
Environmental Assets: The quality of northern Devon’s natural environment will be protected and enhanced by: … (g) conserving and enhancing the robustness of northern Devon’s ecosystems and the range of ecosystem services they provide;” (North Devon and Torridge Local Plan, 2013: 54
Case Studies using ecosystem services
Ecosystems and Planning
• Built vs Natural Environment Divide
• Complex academic ecosystem vocabulary
BUT
1. Planning and Ecosystem Approach principles meet
2. Hooks as starting point for tool development and use
3. Partnerships as key delivery vehicles
4. Shared language of multiple benefits unites stakeholders.
5. Importance of using principles collectively to inform plan and decisions
Lets All be NEATer
• @bcualisterscott