{"id":496982,"date":"2026-03-26T20:18:11","date_gmt":"2026-03-26T20:18:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/496982\/"},"modified":"2026-03-26T20:18:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-26T20:18:11","slug":"lords-call-for-galvanising-vision-for-well-designed-new-towns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/496982\/","title":{"rendered":"Lords call for \u2018galvanising vision\u2019 for well-designed new towns"},"content":{"rendered":"

A report by the House of Lords Built Environment Committee, New Towns: Creating Communities, makes a series of recommendations urging the government to look beyond hitting numerical housing targets and work with design experts and local stakeholders to build lasting communities.<\/p>\n

Industry figures consulted during the second phase of the committee\u2019s new town inquiry included former RIBA president and chair at HTA Design Ben Derbyshire, architecture critic Phineas Harper, managing director at Levitt Bernstein, Matthew Goulcher, founding director at research and urban design practice Publica, Lucy Musgrove, Classical designer Ben Pentreath, and the Financial Times\u2019 Edwin Heathcote.<\/p>\n

The publication of report comes just days after the announcement of the seven new town sites by the government earlier this week \u2013 a reduction from the 12 originally put forward \u2013 which aim to provide 191,000 homes.<\/p>\n

Among the recommendations was an emphasis on green spaces in all the new town masterplans and the need for social and health amenities to be adequately funded and in place from the start.<\/p>\n

It reads: \u2018The government must demonstrate and articulate a clear, inspiring, long-term vision for this next generation of new towns with high-quality design and placemaking at its heart.\u2019<\/p>\n

Across all witness and contributors consulted in the inquiry, the committee reported that the evidence received was \u2018remarkably consistent\u2019 and that there was broad support for the new towns programme.<\/p>\n

This support came with a warning, however, that without a \u2018galvanising vision\u2019, good placemaking and early social, health and green infrastructure, the new towns would \u2018struggle to live up to their promise and create healthy, sustainable communities\u2019.<\/p>\n

The committee also called for the creation of a centralised planning agency which reports to a dedicated cabinet minister to co-ordinate the design and delivery of the new towns.<\/p>\n

The chair of the committee, Lord Gascoigne, said in an interview with the AJ there needed to be \u2018someone to co-ordinate all the departments and different moving parts\u2019, to ensure that a central vision is not lost amid the multitude of different government departments, local authorities and industry experts.<\/p>\n

The report reads: \u2018We welcome the government\u2019s desire to give full rein to the skills and talents of local communities, but this must not become an excuse to relinquish central government leadership, coordination and vision.<\/p>\n

\u2018We continue to stress the need for a single, autonomous, extra-departmental body, analogous to the post-war New Towns Commission, to oversee and manage the operational delivery of the new towns programme.\u2019<\/p>\n

The committee concluded that retrofit and reuse should be a priority for new town developments citing consultations with industry experts and a visit to Copenhagen to see how industrial structures had been retained and refurbished into mixed-use buildings.<\/p>\n

Phineas Harper was quoted arguing that the built environment sector had an \u2018addiction to demolition\u2019 and that \u2018love and care\u2019 could effectively transform old buildings into something \u2018really useful and beautiful\u2019.<\/p>\n

The report said that: \u2018Where possible, existing structures and buildings should be retained or refurbished to support heritage and imbue the new towns with an identity connected to a sense of place.\u2019<\/p>\n

The first part of the inquiry, titled New towns: Laying the Foundations<\/a> was published 25 October and focused on the legal, regulatory, and planning frameworks as well as funding and delivery mechanisms need to create major new settlements. The third and final report which will look into the issues of housing and infrastructure and will be published later in 2026.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Mark Hall North, Harlow, Essex<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A report by the House of Lords Built Environment Committee, New Towns: Creating Communities, makes a series of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":496983,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[6225,6485,6486,1120,96,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-496982","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arts-and-design","tag-arts","tag-arts-and-design","tag-artsanddesign","tag-design","tag-entertainment","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/496982","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=496982"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/496982\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/496983"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=496982"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=496982"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=496982"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}