ANNUAL CONGRESS 2025

Failing to densify: What can complex mental maps say about why suburban densification is so difficult in England?

Not scheduled

20m

Yildiz Technical University, Istanbul

Oral Track 15 | PROPERTY MARKET ACTORS

Speaker

Dr Mark Smith (University of Liverpool)

Description

Spatial policies are increasingly concerned with both expanding the supply of residential units due to growing housing shortages in addition to preventing urban sprawl by limiting the use of undeveloped land. Urban densification offers a solution here by repurposing and revitalising underused land and property in urban areas through a sustainable intensification. While there has been much interest both academically and in practice on densification via large-scale urban regeneration in city centres, densification of suburban areas remains under researched and yet has considerable potential to deliver sustainable development. Suburban densification presents several unique development aspects by featuring smaller scale schemes taking place on smaller sites and is typically pursued by SME (small to medium enterprise) developers.
Suburban densification has proven particularly challenging in England. It notably occurs in the absence of specific planning policy directives and is tackled as speculative ventures by SME developers who are required to navigate a complicated, interconnected web of thorny issues. These include acquiring land, raising finance, understanding housing market demands, devising development proposals and seeking their approval through a discretionary planning system. English suburbs are decidedly ‘sleepy’ with over half reported to have added no more than one new dwelling since 2011 while the proportion of new homes delivered by SME developers has significantly diminished. Yet the complex development process for suburban densification means it is not immediately obvious why this is so.
In this paper, we report the outcome of Fuzzy Cognitive Mapping (FCM) exercise to produce a mental map charting the complicated, multi-dimensional process of suburban densification and so explain why more homes have not been delivered in England’s suburbs over the last 10 years. To draw this map, we engaged with and collected testimony of 20 individuals from planning (public and private practice), design, finance, development and academic backgrounds and who could thus offer alternative perspectives from across England. We asked our contributors to identify elements in the development process for small suburban sites and determine their relationship to one another (both positive and negative) in developing a mental map which we then combined into a single, overarching map. Data was collected through either a focus group or semi-structured interviews conducted during 2023-24.
We found the pathway to suburban densification to be inherently multifaceted, systemic and riddled with uncertainty for SME developers who are frequently finding the risks too great and/or rewards insufficient. In so doing, we paint a picture of contemporary planning practice in England being in a ‘failing state’, particularly in how it directly and indirectly restricts and hampers efforts at smaller scale suburban redevelopment which could be making a significant contribution to addressing wider spatial policy concerns on housing shortages and preventing urban sprawl.

References

Dembski, S., Hartmann, T., Hengstermann, A. & Dunning, R. (2020) Enhancing understanding of strategies of land policy for urban densification, Town Planning Review, 91(3): pp.209-216.
Dunning, R., Hickman, H. & While, A. (2020) Planning control and the policies of soft densification, Town Planning Review, 91(3): pp.305-324.
Hartmann, T., Dembski, S., Hengstermann, A. & Dunning, R. (2023) Land for densification: how land policy and property matter, Town Planning Review, 94(5): pp.465-473.