8 Components of regional planning
8.5 Some sub-regional examples
overall logic to the process, the importance of a regional employment land survey, and the sequential approach to the allocation of particular sites.
companies from its science base, and the county also has several major govern- ment research laboratories – including the UK Atomic Energy Authority, the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, the Medical Research Council and others, sitting astride the north–south A34 through the county. But technology trans- fer needs both the technology to transfer, and supportive organisations to facili- tate that transfer. Oxfordshire has been very fortunate to have the Oxford Trust, a charitable body set up in the 1980s by the Woods to encourage the study and application of science and technology. It has pioneered business incu- bation centres in the county, of which there are now ten. Another of its initi- atives is the Oxfordshire Investment Opportunity Network (OION) Ltd which provides venture capital funding.
Much of the ‘management’ of the high-tech growth appears to have come from the ‘grassroots’ (Simmie et al. 2004). But what has been the role of the public sector planning system? A particular attraction to entrepreneurs is the quality of life of the county – its natural, built and socio-cultural environment.
Yet, therein lies the conflict. Oxford is a relatively small (population 150,000) and compact city, and both the city and the surrounding countryside are under pressure from development. The planning response has been to protect the city from spread with a greenbelt, to divert growth to a set of country towns (such as Banbury and Witney) and to seek to manage commuting to Oxford with, for example, a well-developed Park and Ride policy. Figure 8.5 illustrates some of the key building blocks of this strategy. High-tech activity is now supported through the location of two science parks, north and south of the city, plus the
Network of Supportive Organisations
Universities, Government Laboratories and Hospitals
Entrepreneurs
The Big Firms
The Planning System
The Future
Figure 8.4 Some key elements in the virtuous circle of activity in the Oxfordshire high- tech economy. (Source:Glasson et al.(2006).)
major ‘high-tech’ business park at Milton Park on the A34 in the south of the county.
The Oxfordshire high-tech economy is likely to continue to grow, but such growth will give rise to a number of collective externality effects, related to eco- nomic, environmental and social sustainability, that raise important issues for policy makers. These include shortages of skilled labour, and of land and build- ings – all necessary if incubated firms are to grow larger in the county rather than outside it. A legacy of past planning policies is increasing traffic conges- tion as a result of the dislocation of much new housing in the country towns but much of the employment growth in Oxford itself. There is also a shortage of affordable housing and the danger of a ‘dual-economy’ with plenty of opportun- ities for those with high-level qualifications but fewer well-paid opportunities for those less skilled. Nevertheless, unemployment rates are some of the lowest in the EU. Some of the future challenges, and potential responses, are set out in Components of regional planning: economy 171
KEY Roads Railways
District boundaries Country town (new dwellings) Greenbelt
Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty
Figure 8.5 Key building blocks in the Oxfordshire planning framework. (Source:
Oxfordshire County Council (2002).)
the sub-regional planning section of the South East Plan (SEERA 2006a).
There are major choices to be made about the level of housing growth (see Chapter 9), the future shape of the Oxfordshire Greenbelt and the provision of better transport infrastructure. Oxfordshire’s economic dynamism comes at a price and, in the contemporary parlance, needs a ‘smart planning’ solution. A fundamental strategic question is whether the county is happy to retain its incu- bator identity or whether it would like to be more like its twin town, Grenoble in France, and allow the large-scale units of major companies to locate and grow locally, create employment and provide training of scientists, managers and pro- fessionals to local small firms, a process which is part of the success of Silicon Valley in the USA.
8.5.2 Reversing economic decline: the case of the ‘Black Country sub-region’ in the UK’s West Midlands
The West Midlands Regional Planning Guidance (RPG11; GOWM 2004) set out the region’s future development opportunities and priorities until 2021.
There is a focus on promoting the urban renaissance of its major urban areas.
Part of the government response to RPG11 was to ask the region to give priority to setting out the key actions for the renaissance of the Black Country. To achieve this, a Black Country Study (BCS) has been carried out, which consti- tutes a Draft Phase One Revision of the RPG (now RSS), and which will provide a framework for the preparation of Local Development Frameworks for the area (BCC 2006a).
The Black Country is a significant area in the west of the West Midlands. It includes the major metropolitan areas of Dudley, Sandwell, Wolverhampton and Walsall. Its reputation is reflected in its name; as a centre of the UK indus- trial revolution, with a heavy metal and engineering history, it has suffered from the ravages of industry. Interestingly, the sub-title of the BCS is ‘See it in colour’. In 2006, 1,100,000 people lived, and 500,000 people worked, in the Black Country. But the area is one of only three sub-regions in the UK experi- encing net population decline. Since 1990, population has fallen by over 20,000 and net out-migration has approached 4000 people per annum. While the area retains a substantial manufacturing sector supporting 22 per cent of total employment, it has failed to sufficiently attract new knowledge-based industries that are driving economic growth elsewhere in the UK. It has low numbers of high-skilled, high-earning people living in the sub-region, and some of the most severe concentrations of deprivation. There were 100,000 fewer jobs in 2006 than in the 1970s.
The challenge is formidable, but the innovative BCS has set itself four key headline objectives to 2031: to reverse net out-migration and grow the popu- lation to 1,200,000; to raise income levels to 90 per cent of the UK average from 81 per cent in 2006; to accommodate a more balanced population, achiev- ing parity with the national social grade profile; and to create high-quality, sus- tainable environments. A modern economy, generating high value-added jobs,
is seen as the first key to the prosperity of the sub-region. The area must move from a relatively low-wage economy to a high-skilled, well-paid knowledge economy where both service and manufacturing companies are competing suc- cessfully in the global economy. Some of the key elements and planned employ- ment outcomes in strategy are set out in Box 8.2.
The BCS was carried out by the Black Country Consortium (BCC), the cross-sectoral sub-regional partnership for the four local authorities in the area.
A continuation of such innovative joint working will be essential to deliver this ambitious economic development strategy in a sub-region which in the past has been too driven by narrow individual agency interests and occasional damaging local rivalries.