Learning from Local Place Plans

Sharing community experiences

Communities have a new right to produce their own land use plans called “Local Place Plans”. Kinning Park Complex and Wester Hailes Community Trust completed some of the first Local Place Plans in 2022. While there are guides on preparing a local place plan, the community perspective has been absent.

We were delighted to work with Kinning Park Complex and Wester Hailes Community Trust as they shared their experience of completing local places. We hosted an event (summarised below), and have published  short guidance: Creating Local Place Plan, By Communities, For Communities (link below).

Events

On Fri 19 May and Monday 22 May 2023, Kinning Park Complex and Wester Hailes Community Trust shared their experiences in a two-part event Learning from Local Place Plans.   The slides from their presentations are available to view at the document links below.

The event was a pleasure to support – there were over 60 engaged attendees, with communities from across Scotland (Pairc Estate in the Outer Hebrides to Drumchapel in Outer Glasgow, Peebles to Grantown to Stranraer and more!) and planners from local councils, the Scottish Government, consultancy, academia and the third sector.

The Wester Hailes Community Trust and Kinning Park Complex teams explained their experiences of producing local place plans, which we explored in detail through discussion.  Key points we discussed were:

1. Tensions between the widely scoped community action planning which can come out of local place planning, and narrow land use planning scope provided in the legislation.
2. Links to other community empowerment legislation such as Community Right to Buy.
3. Challenges with validation by local authorities, with both community bodies and local authority officers requiring support on the technical process of validation.
4. Lack of funding for completion or implementation.
5. How to keep up the momentum (particularly when completing a plan on a limited budget), and the need for easy wins deliverable on the ground before the planning process is complete.
6. Differences in methodology– community development approaches, artistic approaches, consultant centred approaches, etc.
7. Lack of clarity on how conflicts between a Local Place Plan and a Local Development Plan will be resolved for planning applications and in development plans.
8. Who are the experts? How is community expertise being used and acknowledged?
9. If validation and adoption are difficult and not guaranteed, there is a risk of wasted effort and frustration by communities. How can we redefine success for Local Place Plan authors to better embed empowerment?