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The UK government is planning to reveal the sites for at least 10 new towns this year, each of which is expected to have over 10,000 homes, with some having significantly more than that. While this represents a revival of new town construction, bringing with it many challenges, it is also an opportunity to dramatically change how delivery works.

Such a large government-led programme of placemaking and housebuilding has the potential to provide a unique level of long-term certainty. If harnessed correctly, that certainty could be used by investors, planners, engineers and developers to rethink how housing development happens in the UK.

Indeed, one of the five stated aims of the government’s new town policy is that it should contribute to transforming the way large settlements are delivered, partly through longer-term planning and the approach to infrastructure provision. This includes support for industry and its supply chains to expand capacity and improve efficiency.

Achieving that is not guaranteed, but there is optimism that it can happen. Mace managing director for infrastructure in Europe Andy Beard says that “placemaking at this scale has the potential to have a fundamental impact if we put our minds to it, because it could create a blueprint for future programmes.”

“To be transformative, it will need backing for the pipeline and we need to see real confidence in that pipeline. We also need to ask a fundamental question here: Do we look at 10 new towns programmatically or as one-off individual projects?”

Beard believes that if they are treated as individual new towns, that would be a very big, missed opportunity.

“As an industry, we are very good at reinventing the wheel and treating everything as bespoke, but that can hinder economies of scale. Even an individual new town is small compared to a programme of 10 towns across the country. So why not have a one-client model for this and see how far we can go with standardisation of masterplans and structures? We don’t want uninspiring places. We want sustainable environments that have enduring success, but that doesn’t mean repeatability isn’t an option. We can do both.”

This approach would need to be put in place ahead of the development of any individual masterplan, but if it were done right, the potential benefits might span the whole development sector, not just the delivery of the new towns themselves.

Mace director for local government and communities, consultancy, UK & Europe Lesha Chetty points out that there is a strong precedent for this approach.

“It’s right that the taskforce looks at where the new towns go, but we should also look at the big picture. We have very fragmented local government, uncertainty about local authority reform and we have capacity and skills gaps alongside a need to design and build better places. All of that could make delivery difficult and hinder the kinds of changes our industry should welcome.

“What we want to see is a dedicated delivery body, like the London 2012 board. That would allow for faster decision making and offer a long-term solution that is resilient to political changes. For example, we are looking at one site that has six different local authorities. To manage that, you need a central body looking across the whole piece.

“New towns will need extensive infrastructure, with connectivity to nearby communities and facilities like schools and shops if we are to make them sustainable places long after they’re built. That is something that we know can be done well with the right leadership and structures at the top.”

Whatever shape such national leadership takes, others in the industry see a similar opportunity derived from scale.

Systra is working on the huge City Edge project in Dublin, a new neighbourhood that by 2070 may have as many as 40,000 new homes and 75,000 jobs within it.

Systra director of data, modelling and analytics for Ireland Paul Hussey explains: “The scale allows you to interact with national agencies, so there is an opportunity to get the big players in the room together to make decisions, and make good data-driven
decisions, which is really important.”

Systra director David Alderson, based in the UK, suggests that this leadership has to embrace a vision. “We should put amenities for new communities in place from the outset. But if you do that, there won’t be sufficient numbers of people living there at first to, for example, fill the school you’ve built. So you might have students travelling in from a wider area, and you have to manage that with short-term plans that aren’t where you want to get to in 20 years. But you can do that and still hold to the vision for 20 years time if you’ve got strong leadership politically and at an office level.”

Pell Frischmann land development sector director Paul Smith notes that the scale involved in having a number of new towns makes this all the more important. “New towns require integration into regional transport networks. If too many towns are planned without proper
coordination, cumulative impacts on transport corridors could go unaddressed. That would have big implications for increased demand on rail lines, roads and public transport corridors, leading to congestion, reduced service quality and inefficient infrastructure investment.

“To mitigate these risks, we can look to strategic spatial planning at a regional or sub-regional level. This could be achieved through mechanisms such as combined authorities, subnational transport bodies and guidance and oversight from the National Infrastructure Commission’s successor.

“What’s clear is the need for a robust governance model. A dedicated development corporation or similar body with a strong mandate could help streamline decision-
making and ensure consistent, coordinated planning across all stakeholders.”

The Brent Cross West station is London’s first new mainline train station in over a decade and has helped to transform transport links for the surrounding area and catalyse development

Big opportunities for change

While it may be tempting to look at such an approach as a solution to specific problems, the real prize is potentially much bigger. If done right, the certainty created by a very long-lasting national programme of placemaking could generate not just better communities, but a better industry too.

Beard explains: “We absolutely advocate for the best possible solution, which means great design and architecture that creates a legacy. There is a perception that housing stock has fallen below standards that people consider inspiring in recent times.

“One of the fundamental differences with the new town programme is the scale. If we can get the alignment and scale with government backing, we create the confidence for capital markets to back standardisation of high-quality construction. The public sector won’t go out and build lots of factories for this, but it can create the momentum for private investment, excellent standards and repeatable design produced at scale.

“If we do that, we can radically change the industry. The impression of a builder on a housing site wearing PPE and laying brick can be changed to something very different – assembling the kit of parts on site far more efficiently and effectively. This could deliver great outcomes in terms of really sustainable communities, a more effective sector and more attractive careers for people. So, we have to create the confidence for everyone in that ecosystem to see this as a great opportunity.”

Smith agrees. “A properly coordinated programme of new towns could create opportunities for economies of scale in procurement and strategic infrastructure investment with long-term certainty. Furthermore, the scale of these developments could support national skills programmes specifically tailored to the delivery of large projects.

“There is also a significant opportunity when development occurs at a strategic scale. Large-scale developments can enable a step change in infrastructure delivery that smaller, piecemeal projects cannot achieve.”

This will be important to other aims the Government has for its new town programme. The Government hopes its policy will provide housing for strong communities with all the necessary infrastructure, services and amenities to ensure residents have access to education, healthcare, transportation, cultural and sporting facilities and green spaces.

At the same time, it intends these to be environmentally resilient places based on sustainable design, nature enhancement, low-carbon infrastructure and responsible development, including flood risk mitigation.

Chetty points out that the communities created by new towns should help to demonstrate these benefits and can best be achieved through a strategic approach. “This isn’t just about the bricks and mortar, it’s about physical and social infrastructure and placemaking, including the energy grid, water solutions, transport, schools, medical facilities and retail. So, we won’t just be building homes for the future, we’re building futures for people in those communities. And for that, a strategic approach to community co-design can help ensure lasting social value and civic pride in these places.”

Systra transport planning director Alison Pickett emphasises that this comes down to a strong vision being in place early. “It is hard to change habits once they exist, so in transport planning for a new community, you don’t want to lock in high levels of car use at the beginning because there isn’t yet sufficient population to justify local, walkable amenities or public transport services. You need to commit to the vision and ensure those things are in place when people move in.”

This is evident now with modern changes underway in older new towns, with improved liveability possible thanks to what has been learned over many years.

Stevenage Borough Council set out some years ago to redevelop its town centre with a phased approach. While this programme was designed to open up nearly 2,000 homes and more commercial and retail capacity, creating a more vibrant place was central to the plans.

However, financial viability of such changes can be a challenge. Mace worked with the local authority to help secure funding and optimise financial modelling for the plans, as issues like the pandemic and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine drove up inflation and uncertainty. So, while retrofitting is possible, the incentive has to be to get things right first time, spanning cost, programme and placemaking.

Beard emphasises that by getting this right, the places themselves will create their own economic wellbeing and contribute more widely. “The core of these new towns must be at a minimum self-sufficient and arguably add value to wider communities. Industry cannot afford to do what happens too often, which is to be late, be over budget and worse than that, miss the benefit realisation ambitions set out early on.”

Those benefits will be highly diverse and intertwined within a large new community. Pickett offers examples. “You want amenities and transport to be available to all, safe and easy to use. People will want their seven year old child to be safe cycling on a cycle lane or playing outside their house. And people will want areas where the community congregates, without over-specifying areas for that. These things intertwine and need to be part of a strong vision.” Hussey ellaborates.

“The Dublin transport strategy and others seek to ensure all all future growth in transport demand will be catered for by sustainable modes – not growth in car use. And we can use our tools and models to work out the demand and thus how many buses are needed, the level of provision with light rail and rail – so on a strategic level that’s what we look at.

“But that then feeds into co-benefits for health, clean air and potentially reallocated road space, which can in turn feed into parents feeling their children are safe playing outside their homes, and can create organic areas in which communities spend time.”

Stevenage Borough Council set out to redevelop its town centre and open up nearly 2,000 homes and more commercial and retail capacity

Financial opportunities

The scale involved in building so many new towns at once may also open up opportunities to address the financial challenges that have held back housing development in the past. As a largely private sector endeavour, housebuilding has to offer a return on investment, and it has to do so at a level of risk that investors are comfortable with.

That presents a challenge when so much of the housing in new towns will take a long time to come to market, with so much infrastructure investment needing to be committed to first, in order to facilitate it.

Chetty explains that government has a key role as a stimulus for the market. “Grant funding can serve as a trigger for ongoing investment and can give investors confidence to invest further in a development. This confidence is strengthened by having a guaranteed investor in that space, and government is probably the best financial backer you can have for that because it is solid, it is long-term and it can bring certainty. That is the role the government is going to have to play.

“If we really want to stimulate development in certain areas, especially areas with negative land values, government has that potential to turn it around and that’s where things like land value capture start to play a really crucial role. This acts as a funding mechanism that will allow public authorities to recover some of the increase in land value that results from that public spending.

“And then, aligning that with public-private investment becomes critical to how we unblock up-front capital and unlock the potential of those sites. Because once you’ve triggered that, the ongoing phases become a lot easier.”

Such investment in infrastructure as a catalyst is already evident in other places. The Brent Cross West station, London’s first new mainline train station in over a decade, sits on the Midland Mainline and has helped to transform transport links for the surrounding area. But more than that, it is catalysing development.

Along with providing a connection to central London that takes as little as 12 minutes, it is central to £8bn of regeneration in the area that will include nearly 7,000 new homes and 3M sq.ft (279,000m2) of office space. And on the other side of London, we have already seen what can be achieved from strong similar investment in the past.

“Looking back at London 2012, what you’ve got now is universities, arts and culture spaces, housing and commercial office development,” explains Chetty.

“And while there was an original masterplan, the masterplan changed over time and invited the inward investment by universities and commercial developments.

“I must say that while people talk a lot about the housing element of new towns, we need to re-emphasise that before we start to look at housing, we need to get the infrastructure right, and that is very much about connectivity to that space. The investment in the infrastructure has to stimulate that growth.”

Smith agrees. “We have experienced significant challenges when seeking to deliver multiple strategic sites within either single or adjoining authorities. When seeking to deliver multiple strategic sites, there is often an interdependency on the delivery of strategic off-site infrastructure, and there is a requirement for pooled or centralised funding of this infrastructure. This is because there is no individual developer with the ability or desire to fund these improvements.

“With the delivery of the new towns, there will need to be a clearly defined route to the identification, design and procurement of the required infrastructure provision, and this cannot simply be pushed onto the private sector to deliver.”

Beard emphasises the same point but with a wider focus. “We have to bring a lot of different partners together to make a success of the new town policy. But we cannot expect different partners to do what they are not specialised in or don’t have the capacity to do best. We need to ensure that each responsibility sits where it is best placed to be delivered on.”

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