Through the 1990s environmental concerns became central to the vision of what kind of city London should become. Environment policy shifted from a siloed issue largely to do with tackling pollution by addressing London’s toxic industrial past to a holistic approach to delivering sustainable development and a better quality of life.
In her foreword to the first State of the Environment Report (1995), Nicky wrote
“At any level, sustainability is strong stuff. Many of the principles which have guided development and how we lead our professional and personal lives need to be reviewed and, in some cases, reversed. This applies to land use and transport planners, developers, transport operators, manufacturers, retailers – all of us. Sustainability can be viewed from different perspectives – global, national, city-wide, local and personal. LPAC has taken a major role in helping to co-ordinate the approach to greater sustainability on a London strategic level.”
A sustainable future lay at the heart of LPAC’s vision for London.
In setting out its approach to the environment, the GLC’s 1984 Greater London Development Plan (GLDP) argued that “almost all activities affect the environment. Particular examples are refuse from homes, factories, shops and hospitals; fumes, smoke, noise, dirt and vibration from road traffic, aircraft, trains and industry; and traffic congestion. But environmental considerations also include the visual effect of buildings on both town and countryside, and the impact of people’s activities on the balance of nature. While much has been done to improve and protect the environment, more remains to be done. In particular, increasing care is needed in the use of finite natural resources, including energy; of hazardous processes and substances such as nuclear materials; and of the limited supply of land. Environmental policies must, therefore, form an integral part of the structural plan for London.”[1]
London’s unique character with its ancient monuments, historic squares and houses was vulnerable to destruction and decay and needed constant attention. Following the drawn-out process of de-industrialisation, large areas of land in London were vacant, derelict or underused, and while some land required special treatment to decontaminate it, much could be more readily brought into beneficial use and the GLDP set out specific policies for dealing with such land.
The GLC was also the waste disposal authority for Greater London and responsible for disposing of over three million tonnes of domestic refuse each year. Its strategic objective was to increase resource recovery and reduce landfill.
While the GLDP policies on waste disposal and pollution were still important, LPAC’s early work on the environment placed increasing emphasis on the protection and promotion of open spaces (including the green belt and open metropolitan land) and the desire to create a high-quality environment for residents and visitors to enjoy and investors to be drawn to. While there were many related issues to be covered by policy, four were of particular importance for LPAC’s later work: urban landscape, derelict, damaged and vacant land, waste disposal and pollution.
The aims of the environment section of LPAC’s 1988 strategic advice can be broadly put as ‘preservation, accessibility and cleaning-up.’ There was a view implicit in the advice that London was struggling to deal with the aftermath of its long, toxic, industrial past. The Abercrombie and Buchanan futuristic vision of rebuilding the city around the car, heedless of the financial cost or the extent of the destruction and displacement involved had faded under a tide of local opposition and fears about the mounting costs. A vision of a city was starting to emerge that was people-centred, clean, safe, easy to move about, with access to green space and the rivers and canals.
The first steps in a long journey.
The advice set out its vision: “the environment shares, with the economy, housing and the transport system, a dominating influence over the quality of life in London. A truly “Civilised City” should be able to boast an environment that enriches its inhabitants’ experiences, entices the investor and endears itself to the visitor’s memory. If that sounds ambitious, it merely demonstrates the extent to which many people’s expectations of London have faded. Many have become conditioned to accepting a poor urban environment, particularly in Inner London.”[2]
“Guidance and the UDPs ought to emphasise three strands of action in relation to the environment. The first will invest in environmental improvement where the environment is deficient or starting to deteriorate. The second will invest in the conservation of London’s higher quality features. The third will seek to ensure that all new development takes account of London’s diversity, contributes to, rather than detracts from, its surrounding environment and is accessible to all.”[3]
A set of guidelines for waste disposal in the south-east agreed by SERPLAN set the framework for London-wide policies for waste transfer and disposal. But at this stage noise and air pollution were only mentioned in very general terms.
The government’s 1989 strategic guidance recognised a number of LPAC’s concerns but in its de minimis approach failed to articulate the role active environmental policy could have to drive growth and improve quality of life. Protection of the green belt was given the highest priority to prevent urban sprawl and contain growth within London’s boundaries, but there was no desire to support any attempts to achieve broader economic and social objectives such as the need to maintain and increase public access to the countryside for recreation activities. Historical buildings were to be identified and conserved and boroughs encouraged to pay attention to any development proposals near to the River Thames and access to the foreshore was to be supported.
While certain members of LPAC, including Nicky, were vociferous in their criticisms of the government’s approach to strategic planning for London, work continued to develop a set of integrated policies for transport, land use and the environment to recast London as a modern, dynamic and “civilised” city for all.
At the centre of LPAC’s investigation into London’s status and future as a world city lay some simple questions:
What is London’s future competitiveness as a world city and how can this position be sustained and enhanced by the appropriate urban policy framework?
From those three subsidiary questions followed:
LPAC argued that the elements which comprise the quality of life in a city are diverse and imprecise. A number of indicators were used to quantify the principal dimensions of the quality of life–these include:
These factors were identified in surveys of business organisations, including of the London Forum.
Drawing on a range of surveys and other evidence LPAC argued that its analysis would focus on the following quality of life elements:
The World City Report sought to rank London against other world cities in terms of levels of emissions. Using data from the 1990 report of the Population Crisis Committee, London broadly ranked in the middle order of world cities – on par with Tokyo, below Paris but above Berlin and New York.
Green space was defined as a combination of two concepts – the availability and quality of green space and the ease of access to it. The metric used for availability of green space was to compare the amount of parkland and other green areas with the floor area of office stock in the central area. On this ratio only Berlin had a greater amount of park provision to office space than London.
“According to the London-based firms and other organisations in our survey, London’s position was rated inferior to that of the other world cities on two of the four key quality of life attributes – namely intra-city mobility and a clean and pleasant environment.”[4]
These findings corresponded to similar findings from other surveys which suggested that London’s quality of life in general terms was perceived as poor and deteriorating. Many survey respondents had considered moving away and few felt that things would improve over the next decade.
“This generally poor perception of London was reiterated in our [LPAC’s] survey of London Forum members…apart from a favourable assessment of cultural provision, London was seen as providing a poor quality of life across the spectrum of attributes.” [5]
LPAC concluded that “we have in our capital all the necessary ingredients of a self-fulfilling prognosis for relative decline. London must find a way to make its perception of itself and by others more fairly reflect its relative strengths compared with other world cities.”[6]
In terms of policy recommendation–or ‘supporting priorities’ as the report calls them– the main planning priority was to create a clean, pleasant and safe environment for all movement in London, including pedestrians and cyclists. More efficient inter-city mobility combined with traffic calming and other traffic management methods would contribute to safety and cleanliness of the environment. “We would add the need for land-use planning to give priority to improvement in the quality and care of existing areas of public space, the development of new areas of public space for recreational, amenity and ecological purposes, and the protection of individual safety. We think it would be desirable to develop a London-wide approach to environmental monitoring and impact assessment so that action can be taken in a systematic way on consistent criteria at local level.”[7]
LPAC’s approach to environmentally sustainable development was based on the Brundtland Commission’s definition of “development which meets present needs without compromising the ability of future generations to achieve their own needs and aspirations”.
Following the 1992 Rio ‘Earth Summit’, the UK endorsed Agenda 21 which recognised local authorities as crucial to the success of its environmental action plan. While the UK government’s strategy for sustainable development stressed the importance of setting sustainability targets and the means of achieving them, it failed to do that. Instead, the strategy relied on economic instruments and individuals’ actions to promote sustainable development in the UK.
LPAC took up these challenges and in its 1994 strategic advice applied the concept of environmentally sustainable development to London.
There were several ways in which land use and transport planning in London, if properly coordinated could make a real contribution to supporting the government’s international commitments including:
Key to LPAC’s approach was the need to develop a common basis for monitoring the environment. Progress towards agreeing and achieving targets needed to be assessed, so a “State of the Environment Report for London” was prepared to follow the 1994 Advice.
LPAC recognised that pollution was regarded by many as the prime environmental issue in London. The setting of targets and the monitoring of existing pollution types and levels was a key element in measuring progress towards reducing toxicity levels and contributing towards environmental sustainability. LPAC’s development of key environmental indicators and the State of the Environment Report (see below) were designed to coordinate a London-wide approach to monitoring all aspects, once targets had been agreed.
From the four-fold vision for London (a strong economy, a good quality of life, a sustainable future, opportunities for all), LPAC set 20 objectives to achieve that vision.
These included:
Environmental policy in the advice was divided into four separate chapters: Thames Waterways and Water Issues; Open Space and leisure; the Built Environment; Waste Minerals and Energy.
LPAC recommended that government in guidance and boroughs when reviewing UDPs should ensure that all proposals for development affecting the River Thames, other waterways and canals:
Guidance and UDPs needed to encourage the use of the Thames and other navigable waterways for freight, commuter passengers and tourism and to identify the River Thames and its associated open spaces and buildings as London’s prime “area of special character”.
The advice noted how since 1945 London had been largely successful in preserving its green framework from development, although pressure for the development of private open space and on school playing fields remained high. Less successful had been the maintenance or improvement of the landscape character and quality of the green framework, improving public access to the green belt or metropolitan open land (MOL), and the creation of new open spaces in areas where there was a shortage in strategic terms. London’s open spaces had not always been managed to reflect fully Londoners’ changing needs for formal or informal recreation.
The preservation and qualitative improvement of London’s open spaces network was a widely supported aim for LPAC. To this end LPAC pressed government and the boroughs to agree policies to maintain and improve the character and quality of the green belt and MOL, enhance accessibility and improve damaged or derelict land. In terms of public open space LPAC was aware that open space was distributed unevenly across London. LPAC wanted boroughs to identify areas of public open space deficiency using its hierarchy and techniques it had previously set out in published research.
LPAC argued that urban quality was a matter which strategic policy should address. “The need for policy extends from those affecting individual buildings, to the network of footways, streets, roads, the public realm and the whole landscape. Urban design can help create, sustain and improve urban quality and must take account of individual choice within public good…all new developments should make a positive contribution to the environment, the communities which live within it and the landscape within which it is set.”[8] To this end LPAC, with the boroughs “may agree Additional Advice on urban design principles for London later in 1994, extending the thinking already included in some UDPs.”[9]
LPAC called for policies to preserve the ten strategic views of St Paul’s and the Palace of Westminster and around high buildings (eg architectural quality and appropriate height) to be included in UDPs.
According to the strategic advice “the relationships between the operational, local planning and strategic planning elements of waste disposal are more difficult to define in London than in non-metropolitan areas, where County Structure Plans provide the strategic planning context for the Operational County-wide Waste Local Plans. London lacks a strategic planning and transport perspective on waste disposal issues. The problem is only partially addressed in the Advice. LPAC intends to issue Supplementary Advice at the end of 1994 after consultation.”[10][11]
In 1990, London produced a third of the south-east region’s waste but disposed of only 6% within its boundaries. About 80% of London’s waste was exported to counties in the south-east for disposal by landfill. While disposal of London’s waste had to be planned within a regional context because it had an impact on other areas, the capital needed to be considered a sub-region in waste disposal planning terms. This was a growing concern for national government.
The Advice detailed the need to switch away from the current reliance on landfill–hence reduce, reuse, recycle. But, in order for this shift in behaviour to be viable, government needed to find ways to foster new markets for recycled materials.
While proposals for waste handling needed to be facilitated in UDPs, to meet boroughs own and their neighbours’ needs, this required London-wide coordination.
With the government requiring boroughs to produce recycling plans to set a target to recycle 25% of domestic waste by the year 2000, LPAC suggested that there could be London-wide coordination of recycling efforts, since boroughs would require land both for the collection of materials and for large-scale storage, distribution and treatment.
This was a policy proposal ahead of its time and one which, in various guises, has been skirted around a number of times.
LPAC’s State of the Environment Report for London (1995) was a systematic approach to incorporate environmental considerations into land use planning, transport and other policy decision making for the capital. It reflected LPAC’s belief that to achieve sustainability, a broader agenda than traditional strategic land use and transport planning was required.
The report was an innovative collaboration between LPAC and London’s 33 local authorities, assisted by English Heritage, National Rivers Authority, English Nature, London Ecology Committee, London Transport, the Local Government Management Board and others.
The report defined global sustainability (primarily London’s impact on atmospheric, climate change and natural diversity), natural and semi-natural resources (in other words London’s impact on the natural elements of the environment) and London’s environmental quality as its three main areas of concern. To highlight the impact of London on these three categories, 18 criteria which describe significant environmental issues were adopted. In turn, the trends associated with these criteria were illustrated by information and targets presented within 111 key indicators. The key indicators selected described and were used to monitor the state of London’s environment and set a context for considering the effect of policy.
The report was updated and published again in 1996 and 1999.
In the secretary of state’s foreword, Rt Hon. John Gummer MP (now Lord Deben), wrote “Sustainable development is the key to creating a better London in the twentieth century and it is a foundation upon which this Guidance is based. We must ensure that London remains an internationally competitive city, generating wealth and jobs, whilst at the same time enhancing the quality of life and reducing the city’s impact on the environment. We must recognise that these goals are not alternatives, but complementary.”
The secretary of state picked up on LPAC’s primary point about the necessity of renewal, noting that “a sustainable future means improving the quality of London’s natural and built environment. London’s heritage of outstanding buildings, parks and open spaces reflect a confident and glorious past. They must be protected and preserved, and we should be adding to it and enhancing it.”
Further replicating LPAC language, his foreword stated that “London needs to develop more sustainable patterns of transport in order to safeguard its status as a world city and an attractive place to live. Local authorities, transport providers and operators should seek to coordinate land use planning with decisions on transport provision to reduce the need to travel, especially by car, and to promote public transport, walking and cycling.”
The secretary of state recognised the need for a holistic approach to tackling London’s problems “a holistic approach towards London’s future must address a wide range of issues – employment and regeneration, education and competitiveness, transportation and the environment – and the inter-relationships between them.” Three chapters of the guidance were dedicated to tackling environment issues.
Much of the language used in this chapter was similar to that in LPAC’s work. Government paraphrased LPAC advice in terms of boroughs setting out strategic policies for the long-term future of the green belt, reviewing the designation of Metropolitan Open Land (MOL), setting out in detail green belt and MOL boundaries, supporting efforts to improve the nature conservation and landscape character and quality of the green belt and MOL and enhancing opportunities for the outdoor recreational use of the green belt and MOL.
Walking routes and “green chains” were to be encouraged, trees should be protected and proposals for sites which should be used for planting should be identified. The guidance accepted that boroughs should draw up their own standards for open space provision based on those recommended by LPAC’s 1994 Advice, aiming to reduce deficiencies in open space provision, either through the creation of new open space or by widening accessibility where it might be restricted.
Government accepted LPAC’s work that showed increased environmental quality had an accepted social and environmental value and that it could be recognised and implemented at a variety of levels from the very detailed to the strategic. LPAC’s research on conservation was quoted in support of the use of conservation objectives as a focus for urban regeneration.
The strategic guidance included a specific section on residential quality which was a core LPAC planning principle, covering urban design and how higher densities, and a more economical use of space, could be achieved through better attention to design. The strategic guidance also supported planning controls on new developments to improve local environments by restricting parking provision and encouraging the use of more sustainable means of transport.
The strategic guidance noted that the government’s waste strategy ‘Making Waste Work’ set out the waste hierarchy of reduce, reuse, recover (including recycle), disposal. The government accepted that the south-east should aim to make adequate provision within the region for the disposal of its own waste. The guidance spoke vaguely of the need for boroughs to work collectively with their neighbours, LPAC, SERPLAN, the Environment Agency (EA) and with the waste disposal industry to provide an acceptable comprehensive policy framework for the disposal of London’s waste.
LPAC was requested to cooperate with the boroughs, SERPLAN, the EA and the waste management industry to report regularly on the results of studies into the reduction, recycling, treatment and disposal of waste – with the possibility of further guidance to follow if appropriate.
The strategic guidance noted how the change in London’s economic base and the reduction in the amount of lead allowed in petrol had reduced significantly airborne lead concentrations, and lead to the banishment of smog and to cleaner waterways.
The Environment Act 1995 introduced a new framework for tackling air pollution at national and local levels. Boroughs therefore need to take into account the planning and transport implications of the Act and the National Air Quality Strategy.
The strategic guidance focused on exhaust emissions noting that technological changes (for example, tighter emissions standards and catalytic converters) would help secure some improvements. Policies to encourage the use of public transport, walking and cycling, to reduce the need to travel and to remove through-traffic from residential and shopping areas were also needed to make an important contribution to meeting air quality standards. Rather weakly, the strategic guidance noted however that in many areas of London traffic levels would still mean that emissions of pollutants may continue to be undesirably high. Traffic management measures may then have to be taken to help meet the prescribed standards, with possibly traffic regulation orders to be made on air quality management grounds. Despite LPAC lobbying and a bank of research there was no mention of active travel restraint measures.
The strategic guidance gave LPAC a significant role in monitoring and reporting on the main issues considered by the London boroughs in the implementation and review of UDPs. This included issues around land reuse, safeguarding land, the supply of new dwellings, transport infrastructure, the provision and quality of green belt, MOL and other open space, amongst other things.
Many of the papers in Nicky’s archive that cover environment matters date from 1995 onwards. They cover a wide range of issues, including Heathrow airport, waste and individual planning applications. There are papers on London’s boatyards too.
Numerous papers from 1997 onwards touch on the relationship with the Association of London Government (ALG)[12] and Nicky’s concerns of overlapping responsibilities and of LPAC being sidelined by an organisation of borough leaders with their own environment and transport committees. Nicky’s archive attests to the, at times, tetchy relationship between the ALG and LPAC. She devoted considerable energies to thinking through how strategic planning would work at the regional level, the relationship between the likely new GLA planning functions and the boroughs (which would signal a shift from consensus to policy conformity) and also the relationship between a London Plan and the relationship with the wider south-east. Much of LPAC’s work would prove to be an invaluable resource for the GLA and its strategic planning framework, a vital stepping stone for what the future London Plan would cover and contain.
The key point for Nicky was that LPAC’s position as the London boroughs’ joint planning committee with a statutory duty to advise on the planning and development of London should not be undermined by some leaders on the ALG (those that Nicky believed held an ex-LBA mentality who wanted to assert their own policy position but without the required evidence base). Nicky therefore set out a clear division of responsibilities between LPAC and the boroughs in terms of what was strategic and fell under LPAC’s remit and what was operational and hence a borough responsibility.
The other large collection of papers in the archive cover protection and revitalised use of the Thames, which was a particular priority for Nicky. In 1988, LPAC took up the challenge of organising the Thames-side working party to co-ordinate, at an officer level, planning issues and work affecting the River Thames and the Thames-side. All riparian boroughs were represented, together with statutory bodies such as the Government Office for London, English heritage, The Environment Agency, London Tourist Board. Countryside Agency, the Port of London Authority and representatives of river users, for example the Watermans Company. This working party addressed a wide variety of issues ranging from current planning applications to the development of piers and river transport, to the Thames path.
In the mid 1990s, the working party played a key role in advising on the Thames Strategy, produced by consultants for the government and which led to the publication in 1997 of the ‘Strategic Planning Guidance for the River Thames’ (RPG3B). This guidance set out the government’s planning policies for the Thames and provided the context for boroughs in reviewing policies for the Thames and for reviewing their UDP policies. The government identified a key co-ordination role for the Thames-side working party in taking forward the provisions of RPG3B with the London boroughs. In particular, LPAC had been working to develop the identification of the Thames policy area as the riparian boroughs produced their UDP reviews.
Work was commissioned on assessing demand for facilities for boat users and the need to safeguard boat yards and the moorings that are often associated with them. LPAC was also involved with other partners in the development of Thames strategies to act as appraisals supporting UDP policies and setting out visions, in consultation with residents and other stakeholders, for the future of the river that all could identify with.
The success of LPAC’s Thames-side working party in gaining recognition of the holistic approach needed to planning along the river was eventually taken forward by the mayor. The working party provided a collaborative model to be followed and developed, both by continuing work on translating guidance into the review of the UDP policies and through involvement in contributions to the mayoral strategies.
LPAC played a significant role in shaping recycling and waste management strategies in London during the 1990s. Its most high-profile work came through its role in advising government on London’s waste management policies and so shaping policies including the 1995 UK waste strategy. At the time there was explicit pressure from government to find ways to curb London’s reliance on sending its waste to land fill sites in east England and to come up with waste processing solutions in London. Nicky was very proud of the work she led on to support recycling through commissioning technical papers to support the boroughs in their recycling efforts and sustainable disposal policies. Working closely with economist Robin Murray, they pioneered a paradigm shift in the way waste should be viewed, turning it into a resource that could be repaired, reused, or recycled, rather than simply discarded. Then Secretary of State for the Environment, Rt. Hon. John Gummer MP, allocated £12 million to LPAC to act as a catalyst to jump-start household recycling initiatives. But this wasn’t without some controversy as ALG leaders felt that the money should come to them and for them to lead on the programme. To find a way of out of this dispute, Nicky used the money to establish the London Pride Waste Action partnership, co-chaired by Nicky and Sir Allen Sheppard, chair of London First. In this way LPAC’s work laid the foundation for London’s later integrated waste management strategies, influencing how recycling became a core priority for the GLA from 2000 onwards.
LPAC’s environment chapter in its endowment document focused principally on open space and its work in mapping open space deficiency across London, and in identifying ways of creating and enhancing public open space to support boroughs with their UDPs. On the built environment, LPAC’s priorities were set out in its supplementary advice on high buildings and strategic views.
LPAC highlighted its State of the Environment Report which was first produced in 1995 (with two subsequent updates in 1996 and 1999). The report was the result of a unique collaboration between LPAC, the boroughs and wide range of environmentally focused organisations. It took as its starting point contributing to the environmental appraisal of planning policies in boroughs UDPs and the development of Local Agenda 21.
Three categories of concern for the environment were identified. These were – global sustainability, natural and semi-natural resources and London’s environmental quality. The report identified 19 criteria or themes of key sustainability issues which related to these categories. To each of these categories, sustainability indicators were ascribed, and wherever feasible targets identified so that London’s progress towards or away from sustainability could be assessed over time.
The endowment document noted how under the GLA Act 1999, the mayor was required to produce a state of the environment report. Given that LPAC’s state of the environment report had proceeded on the basis of establishing and building on a holistic and collaborative method, it provided a model which reflected the essence of the approach enshrined in the Act.
LPAC’s impact on future strategies and the London Plan was widespread with many of its recommendations and research feeding into the development of the London Plan, particularly in areas like environmental sustainability, transport, housing, and urban development.
In particular, the London Air Quality Strategy (2002) built upon LPAC’s earlier research and policy work on air pollution and most significantly its technical work and its consensus building around reducing vehicle emissions, which later contributed to the congestion charge and the ultra-low emission zones (ULEZ).
[1] GLC, The Greater London Development Plan, (1984), GLC page 9
[2] LPAC, Strategic Planning Advice for London, (1988), LPAC, page 50
[3] Ibid.
[4] LPAC, London: World City, (1991), HMSO, p118
[5] 66 per cent of respondents to a London Weekend Television survey stating that London was a “dirty place to live”.
[6] Op.cit LPAC p121
[7] Op.cit. LPAC p204
[8] LPAC, Strategic Planning Advice (1994), LPAC, p107
[9] Ibid.
[10] Op.cit LPAC p 114
[11] Background papers on this issue, including work with SRERPLAN can be found in the Archive
[12] The Association of London Government came together out of a merger of the London Boroughs Association and the Association of London Authorities in 1995.
