LARGE-SCALE URBAN REGENERATION AND SUSTAINABILITY: REFLECTIONS ON THE ‘BARRIERS’ TYPOLOGY
WORKING PAPER 05/01
Rossa Donovan1∗, James Evans1, John Bryson1, Libby Porter2 and Dexter Hunt3
1
School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Birmingham 2
Centre for Urban and Regional Studies, University of Birmingham 3
School of Civil Engineering, University of Birmingham *
Corresponding author R.G. Donovan, School of Geography, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham, B15 2TT. Tel: +44 121 414 5523; E-mail:
[email protected]
ISBN: 07044 25262
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The authors would like to acknowledge the support of the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council grant no. GR/S20482/01.
© The University of Birmingham, 2005.
TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 1 The typology of barriers............................................................................................................. 3 (i) Perceptual barriers ............................................................................................................ 4 (ii) Institutional barriers ......................................................................................................... 5 (iii) Economic barriers ........................................................................................................... 6 Birmingham’s Eastside: Planning for Sustainability ................................................................. 7 Methodology ............................................................................................................................ 11 Barriers to Achieving Sustainability in Eastside...................................................................... 12 Perceptual Barriers ........................................................................................................... 14 Institutional Barriers......................................................................................................... 16 Economic Barriers............................................................................................................ 19 Barriers Revisited..................................................................................................................... 21 Conclusions .............................................................................................................................. 23 References ................................................................................................................................ 24
Large-scale Urban Regeneration and Sustainability: Reflections on the ‘Barriers’ Typology
Abstract: This paper explores the barriers to large-scale sustainable urban regeneration.
Recent
research has identified a clear typology of institutional, perceptual and economic ‘barriers’ to sustainability within regeneration projects. We provide a detailed review of this typology in light of recent research in the area, and then apply it to a real-time urban regeneration programme in the UK, currently being undertaken in Birmingham’s Eastside district. A reflexive methodology was deployed that incorporated the views of practitioners into questionnaire and interview design through a series of focus group meetings. The resulting data suggest that the typology fits the concerns of actors within the Eastside programme, and supports recent research in this area that emphasises the over-riding importance of economic factors within regeneration partnerships. A key theme that emerges is the tendency for actors to adopt tried and tested patterns of behaviour in the face of uncertainties surrounding the interpretation and incorporation of sustainability into their agendas.
This risk-averse
behaviour is highlighted by the barriers approach, which pre-figures failure by assuming some ideal end-point for sustainability. We argue that the debate needs to shift from descriptive barriers to more prescriptive enablers by focusing upon the potential opportunities that the challenges of sustainable development offer. This approach is developed in a follow-on paper.
Introduction Sustainable development and urban regeneration constitute the two main strands of current urban policy in the UK (DETR, 1999a; 2000). Their successful implementation is seen as critical if UK cities are to attract economic development within a global context (Hudson, 2001; Oatley, 1998; Gibbs et al., 1996), and for the creation of sustainable civic and commercial spaces capable of supporting socially, culturally and ecologically vibrant populations (ODPM, 2004). Four aims support the British Government’s sustainable development strategy:
1
“social progress which recognizes the needs of everyone; effective protection of the environment; the prudent use of resources; and, the maintenance of high and stable levels of economic growth and employment. These aims should be pursued in an integrated way through a sustainable, innovative and productive economy that delivers high levels of employment, and a just society that promotes social inclusion, sustainable communities and personal well being, in ways that protect and enhance the physical environment and optimise resource and energy use” (ODPM, 2005: 2). This vision of an all inclusive sustainable development is an ideal that requires major alterations in the activities and perceptions of national and local government and private sector organisations. Established working practices, technologies and perceptions of profitability undermine attempts to integrate sustainability practices into urban development schemes. This paper explores the barriers to sustainable development in the UK through a detailed case study of Eastside, Birmingham, a major urban regeneration scheme. Under an umbrella of policy initiatives the British planning system has been charged with ensuring that future urban regeneration is sustainable (DETR, 1998; 1999b; DTLR, 2001). The framework for achieving this has been large-scale, long-term design-led planning, leading to the creation of urban regeneration teams; new configurations of public, private and NGO groups that extend traditional planning functions spatially and temporally, requiring high levels of collaborative planning (Healey, 1997) between organisations with different characteristics, motivations, and resources. However, a growing body of research suggests that the policy goals of urban regeneration and sustainable development are failing to be integrated in practice (Couch and Denneman, 2000). Within the literature this failure has most often been interpreted through the notion of ‘barriers’ to sustainability within regeneration projects. A clear typology of barriers has been identified in recent research: perceptual (Cooper and Palmer, 1999), institutional (Rydin et al., 2003) and economic (Gibbs et al., 2002). Existing studies have tended to explore one type of barrier rather than explore all three types as they operate in the same regeneration project. This paper applies this typology of barriers to a real-time urban regeneration programme in the UK, currently being undertaken in Birmingham’s Eastside district.
The so-called
‘Eastside’ project is a particularly suitable test case, representing a large-scale, long-term 2
development that is explicitly aiming to be a flagship example of sustainable regeneration within the European context.
We review the typology of barriers to sustainable urban
regeneration, and then explore the Eastside case study. The final section reflects upon the typology of barriers. We argue that while it captures the range of obstacles to sustainability identified by practitioners, it tends to highlight failures to achieve some ‘ideal’ end-point for sustainability. By focusing upon the potential opportunities that the challenges of sustainable development offer, the debate shifts from descriptive barriers (and the language of failure) to more prescriptive enablers that are explored in a follow-on paper (Donovan et al., forthcoming).
The typology of barriers The dimensions of sustainability set down by the UK Government in its Sustainable Development Strategy address social progress, protection of the environment, prudent use of natural resources, and maintenance of stable economic growth and employment (DETR, 1999a). Moffatt identifies four related aspects: the elimination of poverty and deprivation; the conservation and enhancement of natural resources; a broadening of the concept of development to include social and cultural aspects; and the unification of economics and ecology in decision-making (1995, p.27). This integrated and holistic concept has become widely accepted, diverging from earlier definitions which focused more centrally on achieving environmental goals (Elliott, 1994). Achieving sustainable development in UK cities, then, requires policy and practical innovation that sits at the nexus of environmental protection, social justice and economic progress. It is this notion of sustainability that underpins this paper. Barriers to achieving sustainability range from complex, cross-cutting (indeed, philosophical) issues, through the specificities of governance and inter-organisational relations, right down to the detailed practicalities of delivering the built form. Although each urban regeneration project is in many ways unique in terms of the place in which it occurs, the specific problems and aims involved, and the constellation of actors engaged in the project, the picture of barriers to sustainability that emerges from the literature is remarkably consistent.
For
example, the three barriers identified in the introduction (institutional, perceptual, and 3
economic) from high profile projects in the UK were identified in a study that examined the barriers to implementing the ‘Clouds of Change’ initiative in Vancouver. Through interviews with government officials and citizens, Moore (1994) identified three categories of barrier: perceptual/behavioural; institutional/structural; and economic/financial. This consistency in the identification of these categories is partly explained by the institutional frameworks that support and drive the development process. These frameworks include perceptions of profitability held by long-term property investors as well as acceptable profits margins expected from the development process (Bryson, 1997). These categories provide a common means of conceptualising barriers to sustainable development and are used in this paper to reflect upon the barriers to achieving sustainability in Eastside. However, closer examination of the typology of barriers reveals a number of complexities within each. (i) Perceptual barriers Perceptual (and behavioural) barriers to implementing sustainability concern definitions and information, as well as deeper socio-cultural issues. Some authors point to a lack of knowledge about and understanding of sustainability issues, both within decision-making organisations, and the wider population (Moore, 1994; Mittler, 1999; Vigar, 2000). Lack of information about key environmental issues can leave people unable to translate large environmental issues into necessary alterations in personal or organisational behaviour. In a study of environmentally sustainable transport planning in the UK, Vigar found that some politicians were simply unaware that road schemes had environmentally detrimental effects (Vigar, 2000). Other authors have noted a disconnection between people’s individual lives and behaviours, with wider and even global problems, leaving people disempowered to act in the face of such challenges (Moore, 1994; Mackay, 1999). The sheer plethora of definitions of sustainability (one study counted more than 70 in circulation – see Elliott, 1994) gives rise to debate and division, even amongst those who advocate sustainability principles, about exactly what should be achieved and how. Definitions range from the broadly conceived ideas encapsulated in the Brundtland report (WCED, 1987), to more specific and technical meanings (Mebratu, 1998). The former are useful to enable a greater integration of the different pillars of sustainability, yet they are difficult to measure and open to interpretation (Pezzoli, 1997). The latter are useful to enable implementation and monitoring of specific changes, yet they tend to reduce a complex 4
concept to a set of technical and proscriptive solutions. One schism particular to publicprivate collaborations is that between ‘sustainable development’, more often used by private industry as it retains an emphasis upon development, and ‘sustainability’, more often used by public bodies, as it emphasises integration (Robinson, 2004). This also points to a much deeper problem than merely lack of information to citizens and governments. Here, failure to act is seen less as a problem of knowledge deficit, than one of a gap between knowledge and action. Sustainability, as many authors argue, is integrally linked to everyday production and consumption processes and indeed the way we conceptualise and value growth (see Rydin, 2002; Reid, 1995). If achieving sustainability requires fundamental changes to those social values and methods of social organisation and consumption, then this challenges entrenched social and economic power relations, which are even more difficult to change than individual behaviours. Much of this entrenchment is built into the economic system. Most retail, office and industrial buildings in the UK are created by property development companies and owned by institutional investors (life insurance companies, pension funds etc). This means that developers’ profit margins and the long-term returns on property investments are largely determined by the perceptions and actions of key institutional investors (Bryson, 1997). Altering these perceptions is difficult as the developers and investors must safeguard the interests of their shareholders as well as other key stakeholders and are only able or willing to incorporate sustainable elements into the development process as long as they do not impact on profit margins. (ii) Institutional barriers A key barrier to achieving sustainability that has been identified in many studies is the requirement to integrate objectives and activities between and within institutions. The majority of public and private sector institutions have been established to undertake a discrete function rather than to support inter-linkages between functions (Moore, 1994; Mittler, 1999). As a result, it is notoriously difficult to achieve inter-departmental, let alone interorganisational, cooperation in order to implement urban sustainability outcomes. Pinfield noted that integrated decision-making ‘can challenge the status quo and run counter to the power structures and cultures of many political institutions’ (Pinfield, 1996). A study of implementation of sustainability policies in the City of Edinburgh identified that different departments within the council had diverging agenda (Mittler, 1999). This problem has been 5
examined in terms of the capacity of institutions to cooperate and learn from one another (de Magalhaes et al., 2004), and in terms of the governance of organizations that may facilitate or hinder cross-institutional working in urban regeneration (Davies, 2004).
Building upon
Rhodes’ work in the mid-nineties (1996), this debate has most recently focused upon the importance of the state, and whether projects are best viewed as partnerships driven by local government (Davies, 2002), or networks of actors operating relatively autonomously from the state (Jones and Evans, forthcoming). The cultures of organisations have also been found to operate as barriers to achieving sustainable solutions. In a study of Hackney Borough Council, Jones (1996) found that an entrenched ‘culture of blame’ within the organisation meant that officers were unwilling to set targets for fear of retribution if they were not achieved. In local authority institutions political support for change and innovation is crucial (Jones, 1996; Brugman, 1996). Further, as Moore (1994) observed, the range of competing issues faced within organisations, and the limitations of their jurisdiction, often serves to limit the extent to which innovation and change can occur in order to allow more sustainable solutions and policies to emerge. Public participation in processes that attempt to achieve sustainable urban development is widely seen as crucial to the very achievement of sustainability itself. This is because sustainability is by nature a set of value choices, and thus inherently political (see Throgmorton, 2003; Beauregard, 2003; Rydin, 1995; Reid, 1995; Owens and Cowell, 2002; Moffatt, 1995; and Sandercock, 2003). Some studies have noted that increasing alienation of the public from political institutions and processes is serving as a major barrier to achieving sustainability, because genuine public participation is increasingly difficult to engender when there are weak linkages between governments and their constituents (Pinfield, 1996; Moore, 1994). (iii) Economic barriers These constitute some of the most tangible barriers to achieving sustainability, and range from questions of structure through to the detail of funding arrangements and availability. The growing disparity between rich and poor, in both global and local contexts, is highlighted as a key barrier to achieving sustainability. Studies have shown that the relative wealth and economic growth potential of a particular place can affect how sustainability is actually 6
defined (Counsell and Haughton, 2003). Other commentators also point to this factor underpinning a greater concentration on economic growth at the expense of other aspects (such as redistribution of wealth, or protection of the natural environment) (Pinfield, 1996; Mittler, 1999). The health of the economy (whether national or local) is viewed by most politicians as a fundamental policy issue, one that ultimately determines voting patterns (Vigar, 2000). This further fuels an over-emphasis on economic development at the expense of other aspects of sustainable development (Cooper and Palmer, 1999). Significant financial barriers to implementing sustainability also arise, particularly in the way arrangements for funding are made and the small amount of (usually public) funds available to implement innovative solutions (Moore, 1994). Mittler (1999) found that groups seeking to implement practical actions for sustainability were impeded because they would have to compete against each other for scarce funds. Often, funding would be withdrawn too early, or activities would have to cease because of funding insecurity. Smerdon et al. (1997) reported that there were more than 66 barriers to the implementation of sustainable construction in the UK. In the private sector especially, perceptions about the higher cost of sustainable construction options often weighed against their decisions, such that more conventional models are preferred. The bottom line often means that delivering enhanced sustainable construction requires alterations to the mandatory regulatory mechanisms (planning and building regulations) that are wrapped around the development process.
Birmingham’s Eastside: Planning for Sustainability The three barriers must be understood as a simple conceptual framework for identifying rigidities in the development process that undermine sustainability. These three barriers are interrelated in complex ways and, in many cases, it is difficult to isolate perceptional barriers from institutional and economic ones as all three barriers are combined in different ways depending on the timing and nature of the development or regeneration project. Eastside provides an unusual opportunity to explore these barriers in practice. Eastside is an urban area of 170 hectares (420 acres) located immediately to the east of Birmingham’s city centre and newly developed Bullring retail precinct (Figure 1). Until recently, this predominantly industrial area had remained largely untouched by the regeneration initiatives undertaken in Birmingham’s western quarters (ICC, Brindley Place and the redeveloped Jewellery Quarter) 7
since the 1980s (Bryson, 2003). Whilst heavy industry continues to dominate land use and activity in the area, which has very few residents, Eastside bears the scars of deindustrialisation and economic restructuring. The area includes the heritage precincts of Digbeth and Deritend, and the canal system and River Rea are also prominent features of the urban fabric (Figure 1).
Sustainability became part of the agenda for Eastside through the efforts of key Council officers and the successful bid for Objective 2 funding from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), which required clear environmental targets to be set. Key 8
planning frameworks governing redevelopment of the area attempt to centralise the principles of sustainability (Porter and Hunt, 2005). The down-scaling of the ring road broke the concrete collar that separated the city centre from Eastside, and the pedestrianisation of the boundary between Eastside and the centre stimulated investment and developer interest in the area. Figure 2 is a simplified diagram of the relative power relationships between the organisations involved in the regeneration of Eastside. Birmingham City Council (BCC) and Advantage West Midlands (AWM) form the nucleus of the regeneration process each playing a different role in the process. AWM is the regional development agency, whose primary interest lies in the economic regeneration of Eastside and the wider region. BCC has a conflict of interests as it is responsible for regulating the regeneration process through the planning system but also is concerned with facilitating successful economic development and ensuring some societal gains in the form of an improved public realm and new opportunities for learning and leisure. Both AWM and BCC own land in the area. An important role of AWM in the redevelopment process has been in the acquisition of land to the north of the area through compulsory purchase which has been necessary to facilitate the area-based regeneration. Groundwork, a charity concerned with sustainable environmental regeneration, is focusing on environmental aspects of the project. Groundwork is collaborating with BCC through the secondment of two sustainability advisors that act as conduits for information and as catalysts for environmental (though also social and economic) gains. In this way sustainability is intended to be kept at the heart of the decision-making process. The sustainable framework for Eastside is being forged through an on-going process of interactions between these three actors supported by the Eastside Sustainability Advisory Group (ESAG). ESAG sits on the periphery of the process, the purpose of which is to advise the sustainability advisors and BCC on sustainability issues. ESAG is composed of 17 representatives of NGOs, environmental charities and interested public bodies (e.g. EA) who have a common interest in promoting sustainability in Eastside and beyond. Numerous NGOs and community groups also play a role in the regeneration process though in many cases a minimal one. AWM and BCC have encouraged property developers to invest in Eastside by creating an overall planning vision for the area that provides opportunities to enhance profit margins that might accrue from property speculation in this area. The developers have been outside the planning framework but have engaged with BCC, AWM and other relevant public bodies 9
(Environment Agency, British Waterways) in an attempt to unlock development opportunities.
Public Bodies (landowners)
BCC Developers
Eastside
Private landowners
Sustainability
Investors
Sustainability
Advisors
AWM
Advisory Group
NGOs Community Groups
Figure 2: A simplified representation of the relative organisational power structure in the Eastside urban regeneration scheme. The inner ring represents the policy making community and the outer ring represents the other actors involved in the redevelopment programme. The arrows indicate the magnitude of interaction between the different actors. The diverse network of key players and stakeholders described above represents a typical cross-section of actors involved in many urban regeneration schemes throughout the UK. The complex relationships and interactions between the key players and their stakeholders are subject to pressure from many of the barriers already identified.
This study uses this
organisational framework to explore the importance of the different barriers and enablers that act at different temporal and spatial scales in the redevelopment of a city quarter such as Eastside.
10
Methodology A range of qualitative methods were used to access the opinions of key stakeholders in the Eastside project focusing on barriers to sustainability.
Core data were provided by
questionnaires and complemented by data obtained from workshops, semi-structured interviews (Brenner et al., 1985) and institutional ethnographic material (Cassel and Symon, 1994) collected through attendance at meetings, seminars and workshops between June 2003 and March 2005. The questionnaire, based on the work of Moore (1994), was used to rank the importance of different barriers to sustainable regeneration encountered thus far in the Eastside development. The exact wording, format and content of the questionnaire was formulated reflexively at workshops attended by key individuals involved in the regeneration process drawn from Birmingham City Council, Advantage West Midlands and Groundwork (Birmingham). A follow-up workshop explored the complete range of barriers encountered by a larger audience of urban regeneration professionals taken from the same organisations. This workshop was used to inform and revise the content of the questionnaire before it was distributed to respondents. A copy of the questionnaire was posted in January 2004 to more than 100 individuals directly involved in the Eastside regeneration initiative. The questionnaire was returned by 20 respondents from 14 organisations in the public, private and NGO sectors (Table 1). Respondents were asked to rank the significance of each barrier (with reference to the Eastside development) with a value from 1 to 5, where 1 indicated not significant and 5 indicated highly significant. Cumulative scores are given in this paper (i.e. 20% indicates not significant and 100% indicates highly significant). Respondents were also asked to identify the three most important barriers and to suggest any other barriers not covered in the questionnaire. A series of interviews were then arranged to follow up issues highlighted by the respondents in more detail. All participants were given partial anonymity so that only their organisation is identified.
11
Table 1: Organisations which responded to the questionnaire. Sector
Organisation
Activities
Public
Advantage West Midlands
Regional Development Agency
Birmingham City Council
Local Authority
British Waterways
Inland waterways management
ARUP
Sustainability consultancy
Drivers Jonas
Commercial property consultants
MACE
Construction and project management
Natural Building Technologies
Sustainable construction technologies
Birmingham Association of
Promote devolved decision-making
Private
NGO
Neighbourhood Forums Birmingham and Black Country
Nature conservation
Wildlife Trust Friends of the Earth
Environmental campaigners
Groundwork (Birmingham)
Environmental regeneration
Localise West Midlands
Promoting sustainable local economies
National Urban Forestry Unit
Promoting the benefits of trees
Optima
Registered social landlord
Attendance at workshops, seminars and meetings held between decision-making networks and wider participatory groups was used to conduct informal interviews and gather institutional ethnographical material. Through this process it was possible to gain access to a wide range of organisations and people actively participating in Eastside’s decision-making process. The data gathered in this way has been used to place the barriers identified by the questionnaires into context. Barriers to Achieving Sustainability in Eastside The methodology used allows direct comparisons to be made between the importance of a particular barrier within each barrier group, but also between barrier groups. Such an approach is useful because it allows barriers to be ranked according to their perceived importance (Table 2). There are problems with this type of analysis as some of the individual barriers are more important than others. The most important barriers relate to an emphasis on economic growth, short-term decision making by politicians, government fear of unpopularity and an absence of regulations. The first three factors reflect short-termism that would be difficult to overcome without fundamental alterations to the economic and political systems. 12
Table 2: The relative importance of the twenty most important barriers arranged by barrier type. Economic. 1.Too much emphasis on economic growth. (83%) 3.Unwillingness to pay for sustainability. (81%) 6.Insufficient funding for sustainability in projects. (79%) 9.Insufficient information on costs and savings. (78%)
Perceptual. 2.Short-term decisionmaking. (82%) 3.Government fear of unpopularity. (81%) 6.Too many competing issues to deal with. (79%)
Institutional.
3.Lack of sustainability regulations. (81%)
6.Difficult to change established behaviour. (79%) 9.Professional mindsets. (78%) 11.Short political terms favour short-term goals. (76%) 12.Lack of a ‘champion’. (73%) 13.Insufficient information. (72%)
14.Time taken for planning approval. (70%)
14.Unequal councilcommunity power balance. (70%)
14.Inability to charge for natural assets. (70%) 18.Slow inertia of builtenvironment. (69%)
14.Weak decision-maker diversity. (70%) 18.Poor information sharing. (69%)
20.Funds allocated to other schemes. (67%) These types of alterations would be impossible, yet gradual incremental alterations might result in enhanced sustainability. It is worth noting that all three barrier groups have barriers that could be addressed by policy interventions and all contain barriers that reflect institutional, economic and political practices that would be difficult to overcome.
13
Perceptual Barriers Table 3: Respondents rating of the importance of perceptual barriers to sustainable development in Eastside
Perceptual Barriers 1. Politicians prefer short term policies, more likely to win votes 2. Government/council afraid to make changes that might be unpopular
Total (%)
Perceptual Barriers 10. Decision makers are afraid to take
82
risks due to mistakes made in the past
Total (%) 68
11. Differences in opinion between people making it difficult to reach an
81
67
agreement
3. Dealing with several issues while under pressure favours the easily solvable issues rather than the most
12. Catering for the needs of the
79
minority rather than everyone
64
important ones 13. Uncertainty about how to
4. People are happy to support a sustainability initiative until it requires
incorporate sustainability results in
79
following accepted practice or only
them to change their behaviour/practice 5. Professional mindsets that follow accepted wisdom
62
making small changes 14. Sustainability as a concept is
78
difficult to understand
59
15. Competing issues - when two or 6. Lack of a 'champion' for sustainability issues
more issues compete it is sometimes
73
difficult to decide which one is more
59
important 7. Not enough information to base decisions on
16. Individual issues are difficult to
72
understand
8. Things take a long time to change within the built environment which
56
17. Why be concerned about sustainability in Eastside and not the
69
may frustrate short-term goals
49
rest of the city
9. The belief that changes for the good made by an individual will have little
68
effect so why bother
The responses indicate that the most significant barriers to achieving sustainability are structural systems of governance, in that decision-making is perceived to be limited by shorttermist political strategies (1). There is a belief amongst respondents that politicians tend to 14
opt for policies that will provide results within their term of office, which can be a barrier to achieving longer-term goals. For example, “Many developers have no intention of being the managers of sites…they [planners] should make a preferred choice for those developers who have a longer term interest in the site” (New Economic Foundation, 2/9/04). This is linked with a perception of risk-averse behaviour in decision-making generally, whereby professionals are limited to certain kinds of mindsets and accepted wisdom (5) and unwilling or unable to take new, possibly riskier steps (10). It also reflects the complexity of the development process with some developers being concerned with short-term development profits while others are interested in development as part of a longer term investment strategy. A regeneration scheme the size of Eastside will have within it a range of developers and investors each with slightly different motivations for working in the area. Respondents perceived that the nature of decision-making within urban regeneration schemes such as Eastside hampered the achievement of sustainability.
Pressures associated with
dealing with several competing and complex issues at once tends to favour the most easily solvable problems first (3), and the level of uncertainty around sustainability (13) and its perceived competing issues often work in the same way (15). This is partially linked to a perceived lack of leadership on sustainable urban development (6), confirming the findings of Birmingham City Council’s Peer Review European Sustainable Urban Development (PRESUD) study (BCC, 2003). As a result, decision-makers are perceived to be generally averse to the less familiar decision-making processes and outcomes required to achieve sustainability. The study showed that people are generally in favour of sustainable initiatives, seeing them as intrinsically good. However, this support usually evaporates when it requires a change in their behaviour (4). This applies to both individuals, who might, for example, prefer the luxury and solitude of using their car rather than using public transport, and corporations who might use organisational constraints as an argument against changing their procedures. Related to this is the belief that there is little point in changing one’s behaviour if nobody else is prepared to change theirs (9) and that the amount of difference that one person can make is not considered to be significant so there is little point in changing one’s behaviour.
15
Institutional Barriers Table 4: Respondents rating of the importance of institutional barriers to sustainable development in Eastside Total
Institutional Barriers
(%)
1. Regulations which do not insist on a higher standard of sustainability
Total
Institutional Barriers
(%)
5. Lack of information (or knowledge or skills) sharing between different
81
69
agencies
2. Short political term favours shortterm initiatives rather than long-term
6. Lack of clear government policy
76
63
goals 7.
3. Unequal balance of power and resources between local government
The
departments
(e.g.
local/national government)employed
70
to implement change aren't the most
and community organisations
59
suitable
4. Decision-makers tend to have the same background therefore tend to make
the
same
judgements
and
70
decisions
The absence of regulations which insist on a higher standard of sustainability was considered by respondents to be a major institutional barrier to the sustainable development of Eastside (1). This is apparent from recently completed buildings (e.g. Bullring, Millennium Point) and those due to start (e.g. Masshouse). As a representative of Crest Nicholson, one of the main developers involved with Eastside, stated, “We need to be forced to do sustainability” (26/10/04). By contrast, BCC’s developer selection process for City Park Gate was based on a 50% weighting for design and sustainability. Whilst it is too early to tell whether this will have a major impact on the final building, at the early planning stage, there was some evidence of progress in the planned implementation of sustainability principles (Porter and Hunt, 2005). BCC as land owner has been able to force developers to incorporate sustainable design and technology into the design of City Park Gates. This reflects the Sustainable Buildings Task Group belief that ‘Higher standards of building design, output and process to improve sustainability of performance will not come through repeated application of traditional 16
techniques and thinking. They call for an innovative approach from all concerned, and the sensible commissioning and application of research work throughout the industry’ (DTI, 2004: 13).
Respondents considered that there should be better regulations for all aspects of sustainability, not just buildings. A sustainability checklist for developers has been produced by the Building Research Establishment’s (BRE) Centre for Sustainable Construction (BRE, 2002) which is designed to help developers and local authorities assess the environmental, social and economic issues associated with a development with a view to achieving either good or best practice. Such toolkits can be an excellent means of overcoming some of the barriers to sustainable development and provide decision-makers with a practical framework for achieving success. While not perfect, the checklist is described by the authors as ‘a significant first step’ in helping decision-makers assess the three pillars of sustainability in proposed developments. Though such toolkits exist, national government regulations do not insist on their use although local government could adopt them as Supplementary Planning Guidance, though this is not the case in Eastside. The relationships between the different agencies operating in Eastside were seen as being important for a number of reasons. A common perception held by respondents was that an unequal balance of power and resources existed between the local government and community organisations in Eastside with the balance of power and resources being in favour of local government (3). As one consultant stated, “the City Council does its consultation through consultants rather than directly [with the public] which results in the opinions, wants and needs of the public being filtered out” (ARUP, 15/2/05).
Returning to issues of
governance, these views seem to support Davies’ (2002) view of regeneration as a set of partnerships with a strong local government, rather than Rhodes’ (1996) ideal of networks in which the local government is merely another actor in the process. The movement of information around the networks was perceived to be a barrier with some agencies refusing to share or only limiting the knowledge they share with others (5). Furthermore it was considered that, in some cases, these agencies were not the most suitable for implementing the change that they were employed to do (7). Respondents also perceived that the relative homogeneity of decision-makers in terms of their background and outlook
17
could prove a barrier to sustainability (4), as accepted wisdom and standard methods provided easy fallback positions within institutional structures. One example that was highlighted was the lack of imagination in achieving mixed-use developments, particularly in terms of residential construction, “There are lots of small flats being built in the city centre instead of other house types. The indicator used by the government to prescribe housing needs is density which is greater for the city centre than the suburbs. This is the wrong way round, there should be larger houses in the city centre (and therefore a lower density) to ensure mixed housing” (New Economics Foundation, 7/10/04). The danger from a sustainability point of view is that rather than creating communities that are viable in the long-term, such design principles create homogeneity of tenure, as “these small flats are likely to be corporate-buy-to-lets and second homes” (ibid). The problem of decision-makers reverting to established methods of working and design underpins a number of structural issues, but also resonates with issues raised in the previous section concerning the importance of pre-established perceptions in interpreting sustainability. This point is returned to in the next section.
18
Economic Barriers Table 5: Respondents rating of the importance of economic barriers to sustainable development in Eastside
Economic Barrier
Total (%)
83
environmental issues 2. People or companies are unwilling to pay for the luxury of sustainability
time to approve an application which inhibits the inclusion of innovative 6. The inability of any institution to
81
control and charge for the use (or 7. Existing regeneration funds are
79
already allocated to other initiatives preventing new schemes happening
4. Many people don't know how
8.
building and how much money it will save them
70
abuse) of a natural asset
in the short-term much it costs to build a sustainable
70
features
3. Not enough money to fund sustainability initiatives at all, or only
(%)
5. The planning system takes a long
1. Economic growth is often seen as being more important than social or
Total
Economic Barrier
78
The
benefits
development
may
of be
67
sustainable city-wide,
while the costs are paid by a few
59
people
The most important economic barrier to sustainable development was a belief that decisionmakers perceived economic development as being more important than social or environmental issues (1). This was the most significant barrier found during this study and supports the findings of Mittler (1999) and Vigar (2000). Closely related to this was the fact that people (i.e. the taxpayer) or companies involved in development were not prepared to pay for sustainable features viewing them as luxuries rather than necessities (2). For example, “Speculative builders still don’t see the benefit of building in sustainability” (New Economics Foundation, 15/2/05). The bottom line considerations that drive private companies lead to an inevitable preference for designs that maximise profit margins on invested capital. As a representative from Groundwork claimed, “developers would rather have separate entrances for private housing and pay for social housing elsewhere” (Groundwork, 7/10/04). The lack of funding to support sustainability initiatives at all, or only in the short-term (3), was also seen as a major barrier to sustainable development. This is particularly true for the proposed Eastside Library development, where lack of funding currently jeopardises a 19
sustainable exemplar project. Discussions with one senior Birmingham City Council officer revealed that while it was relatively easy to get capital for a project, securing revenue to sustain that project was more difficult (BCC, December 2003). While it is important to have funding available to pump-prime sustainable development projects, it is also vitally important that funding is available to perpetuate those projects and this funding should come from the public sector (as it can be directed to the right areas) rather than leaving it for the private sector to take the initiative. Respondents considered that inadequate information was available in relation to the cost of building a ‘sustainable building’, and how much money is likely to be saved during the lifetime of that building through reduced energy and water usage (4), reiterating the findings of the European Green Building Forum (EGBF, 2004). This represents a major disincentive for developers who construct buildings to sell on to long-term institutional investors. As a representative of the New Economics Foundation remarked: “Investors are unlikely to want to buy a ‘novel’ building to generate a rental income if they are unsure of the running costs (i.e. specialist maintenance needs) when contracting out management duties or, more rarely, managing these themselves” (New Economics Foundation, September 2004). Given this “it is important that we get a fiscal value for the different elements of sustainability that will stand up in court” (representative of AWM, 25/8/04). The shortage of planning officers experienced in sustainable design acts as a barrier to the approval of buildings that have been designed with unfamiliar elements that support sustainability. Planning approval is likely to take longer for buildings that incorporate novel technologies (5) especially if building control officers are inexperienced in such technologies. Planning delays increase the overall cost of a development project as the developer must support the interest on borrowed capital as well as the opportunity costs. Delays encourage developers to avoid risk by submitting conventional designs. In this way, the planning system can be considered to be a significant barrier to sustainable housing (Wheeler, 2003), building and development. The inability of any institution to control and charge for the use (or abuse) of a natural asset was considered to be important as a barrier to the sustainable development of Eastside (6). As there is no institution that monitors (or charges for) the release of pollutants, such as CO2, to the atmosphere, there is no incentive to reduce those emissions.
As one respondent
commented: “if energy prices were higher people would insist on more energy-efficient 20
buildings which, in turn, would result in reduced CO2 emissions and would enable CO2 emission reduction targets to be more easily met,” (representative of ARUP, March 2004). While energy prices remain low then there is no incentive to change the way buildings are designed. Whilst it is possible to buy electricity produced from a renewable source through the national grid it is more expensive than that produced from other methods. With the relatively high costs of renewable energy technologies, such as solar panels, this type of behaviour is likely to continue unless higher standards are enforced in Eastside or until current energy supplies can no longer meet demand (Rogers and Hunt, forthcoming). Half of the respondents considered that the allocation of existing regeneration funds to other initiatives (7) was either very or highly significant as a barrier to new sustainability initiatives. Clearly, this barrier is linked to points (2) and (3) in Table 4. In the wider context, Eastside is a small part of the East Birmingham and North Solihull regeneration zone, one of six regeneration zones in the area. A significant proportion of regeneration funding for these areas comes from the European Regional Development Fund Objective 2 programme, which has sustainability outputs attached to it. These outputs include: the remediation of brownfield sites; promotion of energy and water efficient designs; measures to promote local sourcing and recruitment; and waste reduction and recycling schemes (Ecotec, no date). The outputs are mostly environmental and therefore do not cover the provision of affordable housing and the involvement of the community in the decision making process, issues which are particularly relevant to a ‘sustainable’ Eastside. Barriers Revisited The typology of perceptual, institutional and economic barriers seems to fit the range of challenges to sustainability identified by urban development practitioners. Like many other studies that focus on the range of factors preventing sustainable development, this study indicates that the fundamental requirement for economic growth continues to drive key urban regeneration decisions, even when sustainability is generally upheld as a laudable principle within that process. In Eastside, as in other areas, the push to restructure an old industrial urban economy, thereby creating jobs and improving investment in the physical fabric of the city, tends to constitute a barrier to other public policy agendas. Economic imperatives exacerbate the institutional and perceptual barriers to sustainability, as actors fall back into established ways of working and designing rather than trying to engage with the plethora of 21
possibilities that sustainable development offers. For example, where sustainability does play a role in Eastside it is in a rather limited application of technologies to the built form to enhance the environmental performance of individual buildings. On this understanding, truly sustainable urban development, according to the definitions provided by Brundtland (WCED, 1987) and the UK Government (ODPM, 2005) outlined earlier in the paper, will never be achieved. A key theme that emerges across the barriers is the tendency for actors to adopt tried and tested patterns of behaviour in the face of uncertainties surrounding how to interpret sustainability. This risk-averse behaviour is highlighted by the barriers approach, which suggests that there is an ultimate end-point of sustainability that it is possible to reach. This is not the best approach with which to facilitate the integration of regeneration and sustainability agendas, especially in Eastside, which aims to be a European model of best practice as it prefigures failure by assuming some ideal end-point for sustainability. This tendency to judge projects a failure particularly afflicts environmental commentators because there is an inbuilt disciplinary emphasis upon environmental considerations (Couch and Denneman, 2000; Hanson and Lake, 2000), which are so often the least influential aspect of sustainability tools in practice. Given this analytic bias in the barriers typology, it is necessary to disengage from the language of ‘barriers’ that permeates research in this area, and re-frame them as opportunities. In this context it is worth noting that sustainability is an active on-going process. The completion of the Eastside regeneration project is only the end of the beginning of this area’s sustainability agenda. This means that the buildings and open spaces need to be actively managed to ensure that they maximise the benefits that will come from developments in sustainable technologies as well as management practices. By focusing upon the potential opportunities that the challenges of sustainable development offer, the debate shifts from descriptive barriers (and the language of failure) to more prescriptive enablers and the ‘actually existing sustainabilities’ that link it to ‘actual practices rather than… guiding principles’ (Krueger and Agyeman, in press, p.1). Indeed, this approach is more in keeping with the tenets of sustainable development itself, which does not aim to offer a ‘one size fits all’ model, but rather, emphasises the need to interpret its principles in relation to local needs and contexts. This approach is developed in Donovan et al. (forthcoming) by exploring how
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opportunites to enhance sustainability can be applied in practice in an urban regeneration scheme such as Eastside (Donovan et al., forthcoming). Conclusions This paper used a range of questionnaire and interview data to explore the typology of barriers through a real-time urban regeneration programme in the UK. The typology of perceptual, institutional and economic barriers reflected the range of challenges to sustainability identified by urban development practitioners. Like many other studies that focus on the range of factors preventing sustainable development, this study indicates that the fundamental requirement for economic growth continues to drive key urban regeneration decisions, even when sustainability is generally upheld as a laudable principle within that process. The economic imperative exacerbates the institutional and perceptual barriers to sustainability, as actors fall back into established ways of working and designing rather than trying to engage with the plethora of possibilities that sustainable development offers. On this understanding, sustainable urban development, according to the definitions provided by Brundtland and the UK Government outlined earlier in the paper, will never be achieved. However, we argue that the typology of barriers may not be the most suitable tool with which to approach sustainable urban regeneration, especially in Eastside, which aims to be a European model of best practice, because they pre-figure failure by assuming that some ‘ideal’ end-point for sustainability exists. By focusing upon the potential opportunities that the challenges of sustainable development offer, we argue that it is necessary to shift the debate from descriptive barriers (and the language of failure) to more prescriptive enablers capable of capturing innovative best practice. The next paper (Donovan et al., forthcoming) develops this approach.
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