Planning policy, sustainability and housebuilder practices: The move into (and out of?) the redevelopment of previously developed land

This paper explores the transformations of the housebuilding industry under the policy requirement to build on previously developed land (PDL). This requirement was a key lever in promoting the sustainable urban development agenda of UK governments from the early 1990s to 2010 and has survived albeit somewhat relaxed and permutated in the latest National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF). The paper therefore looks at the way in which the policy push towards densification and mixed use affected housebuilders’ business strategy and practices and their ability to cope with the 2007 downturn of the housing market and its aftermath. It also points out the eventual feedback of some of these practices into planning policy. Following the gradual shift of British urban policy focus towards sustainability which started in the early 1990s, new configurations of actors, new skills, strategies and approaches to managing risk emerged in property development and housebuilding. There were at least two ways in which housebuilders could have responded to the requirements of developing long term mixed use high density projects on PDL. One way was to develop new products and to employ practices and combinations of practices involving phasing, a flexible approach to planning applications and innovative production methods. Alternatively, they could approach PDL development as a temporary turn of policy or view mixed use high density schemes as a niche market to be explored without drastically overhauling the business model of the entire firm. These transformations of the UK housebuilding sector were unfolding during a long period of buoyancy in the housing market which came to an end in 2007. Very little is known both about how housebuilder strategies and production practices evolved during the boom years as well as about how these firms coped with the effects of the 2007 market downturn. The paper draws on published data (company annual reports, government statistics) and primary material (stakeholder interviews, planning applications, unpublished project specific information) to explore two different approaches that two major housebuilders (the Berkeley Group and George Wimpey – now Taylor Wimpey) followed during the boom years in response to the changing requirements, risks and uncertainties embedded in the residential development process. The recent turmoil in the property markets acted as an ‘acid test’ to business models and practices and not all firms survived it. What is more, the UK government is now embedding some of those business practices into policy, thus completing one loop in a co-evolving feedback spiral between planning policy and business strategy.