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SPP OBJECTIVES
13. This SPP sets out how the planning system should help create and safeguard a range of attractive open spaces and places where people can take part in sport and other forms of physical activity. Urban and rural areas have different challenges, opportunities and needs. In urban areas green networks may be particularly important; in rural areas, there may be greater opportunities for direct access to the open countryside, and potentially less pressure for redevelopment of existing open spaces. In both urban and rural areas there is a need to maintain the quality of the settings that people use for physical activity and recreation.
14. The key objectives of this SPP are:
- To ensure local authorities take a strategic approach to sport and open space provision;
- To protect and enhance networks of open space;
- To support opportunities for active and passive recreation;
- To set standards for the quantity and quality of open space in new developments and provide for its long-term maintenance; and
- To provide guidance on planning for development of new sports and recreation facilities.
15. This SPP aims to ensure that local authorities take a strategic, long-term approach to managing the open space within their areas, objectively assessing both current and future needs, and protecting spaces which can help to meet those needs. Open space frequently comes under great pressure for development. This policy document aims to provide protection to open spaces and ensure that existing areas of open space and sports facilities, which are valued and used or have the potential to be used, are not permanently lost to other forms of development.
16. Where new development is planned in and around towns and cities, open space should be included as part of the design proposals. This SPP explains how developers, planners and other decision-makers should work towards achieving better quality open spaces and more opportunities for people to build exercise into their daily routine.
17. The current reforms to the planning system (introduced by the Planning etc. (Scotland) Bill) reinforce the role and importance of development plans and introduce a requirement to review plans at least every five years. Open space audits and strategies should be updated on a regular basis to feed into development plan reviews.
18. Development plans will play a key role in setting out the requirements for open space provision and quality in new developments, based on the national standards set out in Table 1 and explained in detail in paragraphs 42-44. PAN 65 provides additional advice on standards and on the potential role of supplementary guidance in setting out more detailed guidance, for example on design or specific types of open space provision.
19. Development plans will set the framework for open space and sports provision in an area. They will be informed by the local authority's open space strategy. Local plans (and in future, local development plans) will identify sites for recreational uses as well as the open spaces which are to be protected and enhanced. Where the open space strategy identifies open spaces that are likely to be surplus to requirements for their original use both now and in the future, then the development plan may identify other appropriate uses. Identification in the development plan ensures that there is an opportunity at an early stage for engagement by landowners, developers, public bodies and local people.
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