Assetz® News - New proposal challenges eco town ethos

New proposal challenges eco town ethos

12th September 2008 |

Today has been another big news day for eco towns, coming as it does on the eve of the party conference season, when no doubt the issue will get an airing in conference centres up and down the land.

Halfway up England, a group called Bard, which is opposing one of the towns, at Middle Quinton in Warwickshire, applied for a judicial review in June. To the delight of the Campaign for the Protection of Rural England (CPRE), it was approved today, with judge Mr Justice Collins suggesting that the bias in favour of the eco towns scheme by the secretary of state Hazel Blears would disqualify her from making a judgement on the scheme.

Welcoming these words, CPRE senior planner Kate Gordon said: "The way the government has gone about designating eco-towns, bypassing established planning procedures, we believe to be fundamentally flawed. It is worrying that the government appears to have little confidence in local communities or in its own planning system."

While this one challenge may deal a blow to the plans, a separate idea was being proposed. This came from the Empty Homes Agency (EHA), which suggested a novel new site for an eco town - Liverpool. However, the suggestion was not about placing giant solar panels on the Liver Building but the suggestion that for the same amount of building work it would take to build a controversial 15,000 home development in the country, the same net gain in housing could be achieved - at a much lower carbon footprint - by restoring the 14,825 homes in the city currently lying idle.

Chief executive David Ireland stated: "The greenest way of providing new homes is to recycle wasted homes. Cities like Liverpool have huge potential for recycling their housing stock. I would far rather see resources channelled into regenerating homes there than building new towns in the countryside."

The EHA has argued this case on the basis of a report it produced earlier this year stating that building a new home produces four times the carbon emissions of restoring an existing one.

Added to the potential that the judicial review over Middle Quinton could throw a spanner in the works, it is possible that a new vision could emerge, which, even if not taken up by the present government, may interest opposition parties.

Such a vision could work on the basis that by restoring more empty homes, not only would there be a possible eco-benefit and an alternative means of providing more housing; there could also be a potential catalytic effect, as the elimination of the visible urban blight of boarded-up houses could help make areas affected in such a way look more attractive.

The new figures from Halifax showing how Liverpool had benefited from having European Capital of Culture 2008 status (a 76 per cent rise in the five years since the announcement, seven per cent more than the north-west regional average), is an indication that new development can help even a city with a bad reputation for urban decay. For those investing in property, the potential beneficial effects of restoring empty properties - in Liverpool as well as other cities - could be substantial.

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