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REVIEW OF GREEN BELT POLICY IN SCOTLAND

APPENDIX 3
ANALYSIS OF PLANNING DECISIONS FOR NORTH LANARKSHIRE

A3.1 This Appendix presents an analysis of data on planning decisions in Green Belt areas of Lanarkshire over a two-year period. It is partly intended to draw attention to the nature of the data and analysis which can be undertaken for recent development in the Glasgow & Clyde Valley (GCV) Green Belt area as a whole. North Lanarkshire was singled out for analysis because the dataset was larger than in the other GCV case study areas, covering a longer period and a wider area, but also apparently reflecting a higher level of activity.

A3.2 The data reported here are derived from a standard spreadsheet reporting format which all the GCV authorities use in reporting cases to the GCV Joint SP Team. This has been in operation for two years so we have two years' data (2001-2 and 2002-3). These data exclude householder applications.

A3.3 The main purposes of this analysis are twofold:

1. To provide some measure of the development pressure or demand in different G B areas
2. To assess the way policy is being implemented in terms of the kinds of development which do or do not get approved

A3.4 The analysis groups categories together so as to focus on the main types of case. Tables A3.1 to A3.6 provide information to a common format on number of applications determined, the sum of the area of the sites involved (in hectares), and the sum of dwelling units proposed for all schemes involving residential development; and the percentage 'success rate' (approved over total decisions) in each type of unit, broken down in a number of different ways. We have tried to boil the results down to show the key findings, with the number and scale of schemes representing point 1. above (development pressure) and the approval rate providing a key policy implementation indicator.

A3.5 It should be noted that GCV distinguishes three main zones relating to Green Belt: Green Belt at the Urban Edge, Green Belt Isolated, and 'Countryside Around Towns' (alias CAT). The original database supplied comprised sites within all of these three categories. However, for most of the analyses we concentrate on the first two, which constitute 'Green Belt' proper. The data for CAT areas is of some interest as a comparator.

A3.6 The number of nonhouseholder cases included is 199, of which 151 were in Green Belt proper and 48 in the Countryside Around Towns (CAT) areas. Thus there are roughly 75 nonhouseholder decisions per year in North Lanarkshire Green Belt areas. These Green Belt cases represent 9-12% of the local authority's overall caseload of 720-845 applications per year.

A3.7 Table A3.1 breaks numbers down by the type of application, with the main distinction between decisions on detailed applications and those on outline application. The majority of applications by number go to detailed level, but this is only a smallish minority of the volume of applications measured by land area or dwelling units. So this group of applications tend to be smaller. A large majority (four-fifths) of these applications are approved. The proportion approved at detailed stage falls, however, when expressed in terms of housing units, indicating that a majority of housing units proposed and reaching detailed stage are rejected at this stage.

Table A3.1:Volume of decisions and approval rates by type of application

A3.8 Just under a quarter of cases are determined at outline level. These are much less likely to be approved, and this tendency is more pronounced for larger schemes. This is not surprising - outline stage is used to test the principle of development and where this is rejected there is no detailed application. The 'other' category is a miscellaneous set of special application types including advertisements, amendments, listed buildings, reserved matters and minerals. They have an intermediate level of approval rate.

A3.9 Overall, the 'success rate' of applications in the North Lanarkshire Green Belt is 71%, but this is only 60% expressed in terms of land area and lower still, at 46%, when counting housing units (see discussion below of different land uses).

A3.10 Table A3.2 looks at two aspects of how the decisions relate to planning policy: the current status of the Local Plan, and whether the decision made was consistent with the operative Development Plans (Structure and Local), as opposed to being a 'departure' from the plan. The decisions are split evenly between cases where the Local Plan is adopted and cases where it is at Finalised Draft stage, although rather more housing units fall into the latter category. Approval rates are higher where local plans are adopted, and this is markedly so when expressed in terms of area or dwelling units. There may be several explanations for this; the areas with approved plans might have a different development profile from those with only draft plans; alternatively, having a (recently) adopted local plan may reduce nonconforming/speculative applications while focussing on sites which both planners and landowners/developers agree are ripe for development.

Table A3.2:Volume of decisions and approval rates by status of Local Plan and consistency with Development Plans

A3.11 Overall, rather under half of the applications (in number terms), but a majority (in terms of area or housing units) are 'departures' from the development plans. Presumably these are proposals that would infringe the Circular, other guidance and local planning policy specification of what development is permitted in these Green Belt areas. Presumably the remainder, a majority of applications although on average smaller, are considered to be consistent with planning policies including the Green Belt. The interpretation of these data in terms of local policies is discussed further in Chapter 5. However, ignoring any other policies which might be regarded as material, these data suggest that applications which represent Departures are quite common within North Lanarkshire Green Belt. Part of the reason for this may be the fact that the Local Plan had not yet been adopted in some areas.

A3.12 As would be expected, the success rate for 'departures' is much lower than that for applications deemed consistent with Development Plans. Most consistent applications are approved (88% by number and housing units, 93% by land area). The success rate for 'departures' ranges from 31% in terms of housing units up to 51% in terms of numbers of applications. Again, this implies that some of the larger applications are more problematic. This evidence suggests that the 'plan -led' system is working to some extent. However, it does not suggest that Green Belt policy in is an impermeable one in North Lanarkshire. A significant number and proportion of applications are getting approval despite being at variance with the Plans.

A3.13 Table A3.3 looks at the geography of activity. The larger proportions of cases are in Monklands and the Southern Area. The other areas may have less simply because they contain smaller amounts of G B. Approval rates are generally highest in Monklands (in the 75-85% range) and lower in the Southern Area. There is quite a big difference in the approval rates for housing between these areas. The largest volume of residential applications is in the Southern L P area and these have a fairly low success rate.

Table A3.3:Volume of decisions and approval rates by Local Plan Area

A3.14 Table 4 complements this geographical focus by looking at the differences between the two main categories of Green Belt and the Countryside Around Towns area for comparison. As indicators of development pressure, the largest number of applications is in the Greenbelt Isolated, but the largest area of sites and, in particularly, the vast bulk of the residential units applied for, are in the Greenbelt Urban Edge. There seems to be a clear message here about the development industry's demand and urban form.

Table A3.4:Volume of decisions and approval rates by Green Belt Zone Category (alias 'Locus')

A3.15 When size of site or number of housing units are considered, it is clear that approval rates are higher in the urban edge situations than in the isolated or CAT areas. This suggests that the planning authority to some extent concurs with the development industry in favouring sites at the urban edge.

A3.15 A crucial question to be addressed when evaluating Green Belt performance is, to the extent that development is taking place, what kind of former land uses are involved? Is it mainly greenfield land, or is it the recycling bits of brownfield land or redundant premises which happen to be located in the Belt? Table A3.5 analyses performance by former land uses grouped very crudely into 'greenfield' and 'brownfield' categories. It has to be said that the majority of demand as measured by applications, land or housing units is on 'greenfields', and most of this is former agricultural land. Much of the brownfield land was formerly in 'minerals' use.

Table A3.5: Volume of decisions and approval rates by broad category of previous land use

A3.16 There is little difference between the approval rates for greenfield and brownfield sites, although when expressed in terms of land area the approval rate is higher for greenfield sites. This applies to land in the various 'green' categories such as 'Community, Garden, Forestry, Woodland, etc' as well as to agricultural land (not shown separately in the table). One might have expected a higher level of resistance to development on greenfield sites in general, or the 'community, garden, forestry, woodland, etc' category in particular, although as always other material considerations may account for these patterns.

A3.17 Finally in Table A3.6 we look at the proposed uses, again focusing on the main categories. The major land uses proposed are housing, business and leisure/sport etc. Housing accounts for 44% of the land area involved. Next in importance comes the 'other category', including leisure/sport/tourism. The third significant category is business/industry/storage/distribution, perhaps partly reflecting North Lanarkshire's specialism in this kind of activity based on its central location and communications. Minerals and waste are of some importance in the Green Belt, but rather more significant in the Countryside areas beyond the Belt.

Table A3.6:Volume of decisions and approval rates by new land use

A3.18 There is a particularly high approval rate for telecoms, reflecting their previous privileged planning status. The rate is also very high for business/industry etc. - this reflects local policy priorities - and quite high for leisure, etc, much of which would presumably fall within the categories of allowable development in GB. Approval rates are lower for minerals and lower still for housing. Only 25% of housing applications by area, but 46% by units, were approved (implying that higher density schemes had a better chance). This evidence confirms that planning control policy in the North Lanarkshire Belt appears to be more restrictive in the case of housing than in the case of economic development. This may be unsurprising in a district with the history of industrial change experienced by North Lanarkshire, but it is a wider phenomenon - see also Bramley & Kirk (forthcoming) for a wider discussion of planning attitudes to business vs housing development.

Concluding Comment

A3.19 Some evidence from the North Lanarkshire case study interviews suggests that Green Belt policy is not very high profile in this authority, and that there are other priorities, for example to do with economic development. The evidence from the applications and decisions data is of a piece with this, indicating a fair level of development activity in the Green Belt and a willingness to approve development in quite a number of instances. The main sector where this seems to be less the case is housing, particularly larger housing applications, which are concentrated more on the urban edge. Here Green Belt control is biting to a degree, although it is far from being an impermeable barrier to development. Also, as was clear from the GCVSPT interviews, there are periodic (every 10 years or so) major housing releases which effectively redraw the Green Belt boundaries. So there is some support here for the Housebuilders' contention that Green Belt is an 'anti housing policy', but perhaps not as strongly as in some other areas. There does not seem to be much evidence of decisions strongly discriminating in favour of brownfield sites and against greenfield or other 'green' sites, within the Green Belt area.

MAPS FOLLOW (all applications shown on the following maps are within the green belt).

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