A3.1: Front Loading Effort

The planning, design and implementation of a large development project is a long and intensive process. Such projects need proactive support and input over the long term, rather than being viewed merely as the process of determining a planning application. Whilst the planning application stage is extremely important, this is only one stage in a much longer process.

Government guidance stresses the importance of the pre-application stage, especially in relation to large complex development projects as these are likely to introduce many different issues that need to be fully investigated and resolved. The ability to do this will need early involvement of a range of stakeholders to ensure that all the issues are correctly identified and are addressed through creative solutions. Without active pre-application discussion to resolve key issues, delay and uncertainty would inevitably be caused later in the process.

In advance of beginning to evolve solutions it is vital that a shared project  vision and set of objectives are established to guide the project going forward. In a number of ATLAS cases, progress has been constrained by a lack of understanding between the various stakeholders on what the project is trying to achieve. The process of agreeing a shared project vision and set of objectives has been fundamental in building a collaborative process, focussing on critical issues and guiding projects through the design process.

When a sound policy base is already in place the key objectives of the Local Authority are likely to already be set. It will also be crucial to understand the objectives of the private sector, in particular the commercial considerations of development (such as land cost, the required rate of return and level of project risk) as these will underpin emerging proposals

A vision and set of objectives should be established at the start of the project and agreed to by all key parties. This will also help clarify areas of potential competing objectives or expectations. It may be the case that as the evidence base for a project is gathered, objectives will need to be reconsidered and/or modified. Monitoring and altering the vision and objectives must be done through a sound, rational and transparent process.