Looking back over the work of the Joint Committee since 1996, I’d like to pay tribute to all Members, to our constituent local authorities and to my predecessors in the role of Chair of the Joint Committee. Together, we have set in train a sustainable long-term development strategy for the Glasgow city-region, driving forward regeneration and essential new development, which is actively taking shape on the ground as I write.

We have committed ourselves to keeping the Strategy fit-for-purpose and up-to-date and therefore welcome the Scottish Ministers’ commitment to the 2006

Updated Strategy and its Growth Agenda as detailed above.

At the same time, we are looking forward to our responsibilities under the new Scottish Planning System, expected to take effect in late 2008. We note, with humility, the Scottish Government’s intended adoption of our working model for the other city-regions of Scotland, and we welcome the opportunity to create the first-ever Strategic Development Plan (SDP) for this key city-region under the new legislation.

Early in 2008, we will publish our intended programme for the first SDP and we will take the opportunity to ask all stakeholders how they wish to become involved in this key task.

It’s an exciting time to be undertaking this, with Glasgow securing the 2014

Commonwealth Games, but also in the context of climate change, one of the greatest challenges facing mankind. It will be our responsibility to shape a strategic planning response to this challenge and to ensure that our Strategy delivers a sustainable future for the metropolitan area.

The Joint Committee’s ethos demands that it works with a wide range of partners regionally, nationally and across the EU, and under my guidance, we will seek to develop that approach further and seek an even wider engagement with all our stakeholders.

Graham ScottChair of the Joint Committee

The Scottish Ministers, in November 2007, released their provisional view of the Joint Committee’s 2006 Strategic Plan.

As part of the approval process, they have put together a list of suggested Modifications to the Plan, the vast majority of which are non-substantive in nature. These Draft Modifications are currently part of a consultation process which will close on the 25th January 2008.

Essentially, the Ministers have confirmed the Joint Committee’s overall strategic thinking and its up-dated growth agenda, with its constituent economic and demographic assumptions.The original long-term development strategy, focused on metropolitan re-generation and approved in 2002, remains at the heart of strategic thinking, but now its new growth-oriented settlement strategy has received provisional approval as well.

This new arm of the strategy will see expanded development by 2018 of thirteen selected communities around the metropolitan area.

The communities which will be subject to long-term growth were selected on a strict sustainability approach, which is reflected in their potential to re-use previously developed land, in their potential to integrate with existing communities and in their alignment along major public transport corridors. The

Joint Committee’s philosophy in this regard looks for such community growth to be guided by detailed master-planning with a strong input from the existing communities.

A key aspect of the growth agenda will be investment in the necessary infrastructure to support that growth.

The Plan identifies the key priorities in this respect – new rail, road and sub-surface infrastructure. The metropolitan area is already starting to see the delivery of some of these priorities, particularly in terms of the rail network, whilst the Scottish Government has made commitment to deliver elements of the national motorway network.

Glasgow City Council and the Joint Committee, along with key agencies, have established a major strategic partnership – the Metropolitan Glasgow Strategic Drainage Plan Board – to drive forward long-term delivery of the necessary sub-surface infrastructure.

GLASGOW AND THE CLYDE VALLEY JOINT STRUCTURE PLAN

annual review 2007Green Light for Growth

Convener’scolumn

In October Riverside Inverclyde, the Urban Regeneration Company set up by Inverclyde Council and Scottish Enterprise Renfrewshire to drive the delivery of an integrated regeneration programme for the area, secured an additional £3 million early action funding from the Scottish Government.

This funding will complement existing investment from the URC’s partners and allow a number of key early action works at Victoria and East India Harbours, works at the Grade ‘A’ listed Sugar Warehouse, site investigation work at James Watt Dock and the purchase of key sites. In December 2007 the Scottish Government announced a further £19 million over the next three years to 2011 to Riverside Inverclyde to assist delivery of its Business Plan.

Also in December Clydebank Re-built, the Urban Regeneration Company set up by West Dunbartonshire Council and Scottish Enterprise Dunbartonshire to deliver a high quality location for people and businesses, also benefited from a further £5 million funding form the Scottish Government which will support for the town’s regeneration projects, plans on the riverside and for a transport hub in the town centre over the next two years.

November 2007 saw the first tangible signs of new development of the site of the former steelworks at Ravenscraig, one of Europe’s largest urban brownfield sites, when the first sod was cut at the site of the new Motherwell College campus.

The new campus is being funded by the Scottish Funding Council and the College’s own resources and set to open in August 2009.

The college campus will provide range of new facilities including a five storey teaching block and a two storey workshop block, halls of residence, nursery facility providing 300 nursery placements for pre-school children and after school care conference facilities, a public learning centre, a training restaurant and bar, performing arts space, and a job shop.

In addition, in October the go-ahead was given for the construction of a new £29 million sports facility on an 18 acre site. This facility, funded by SportsScotland, North Lanarkshire Council and Ravenscraig Limited, will feature a full-size indoor synthetic football pitch, a six-lane athletics track with associated field event training areas, a regional nine-court indoor sports hall, a full-size floodlit outdoor synthetic grass pitch and six floodlit synthetic five-a-side outdoor pitches.

It is anticipated construction work will commence early in 2008.

The Joint Committee’s Clyde Gateway Metropolitan Flagship Initiative, a multi-agency project to tackle the economic, physical and social renewal of the East End of Glasgow and parts of South Lanarkshire, took three more giants steps forward during 2007.

In November, Glasgow City Council was successful in its bid to host the 2014 Commonwealth Games which will see the construction of a range of new facilities within the project area, including a Games Village catering for up to 6,500 athletes and officials in Dalmarnock, a National Indoor Sports Arena and National Velodrome to be built next to Celtic Park and the Glasgow 2014 Hockey Centre to be built on Glasgow Green.

In December, Glasgow City Council, South Lanarkshire Council and Scottish Enterprise agreed to establish the Clyde Gateway Urban Regeneration Company to deliver the Business Plan for the project. To assist this newly created company the Scottish Government announced it would provide £62 million to start to deliver the first phase of the Business Plan.

These announcements will undoubtedly give a major boost to the delivery of the Clyde Gateway project.

National Velodrome and Cycling Complex image courtesy of Designhive / Glasgow 2014

major projects

First major development starts at Ravenscraig with more to come

Good news for Riverside Inverclyde and Clydebank Rebuilt

Major boost for Clyde Gateway Project

In 2008, Scotland’s Planning System will undergo a major renewal. The Scottish Government has already passed the necessary legislation under the Planning etc. (Scotland) Act 2006. Presently, all local authorities in Scotland are both strategic and local planning authorities, although in the former case, their powers are combined with other local authorities to produce Structure Plans (strategic documents) for areas designated in legislation by Scottish Ministers.

Under the new system, strategic plans, to be entitled Strategic Development Plans (SDPs), will replace Structure Plans and will only be required for the four Scottish city-regions - Glasgow, Edinburgh, Dundee and Aberdeen. Within that structure local authorities also will be responsible for Local Development Plans, while those outwith the city-regions take responsibility for a single tier system of Development Plans.

Scottish Ministers are currently consulting on the structure of which Authorities will require to work in partnership on SDPs, and have mooted the Joint Committee’s own model of joint working as the most appropriate model for organising the delivery of the strategic planning of the other city-regions.

Stakeholders, from partner organisations to the wider public, can expect a revised approach to Plan production, differing markedly from the current approach. Ministers intend fewer steps in the process of developing the Plan, but intend greater engagement of stakeholders from the outset, and a mandatory use of public examination, following submission to them, if objections to the Plan remain unresolved.

Interested parties and individuals should watch the Joint Committee’s website in early Spring of 2008, for a publication detailing the Joint Committee’s future intentions vis-à-vis the various stages of the new SDP process. Included in that publication will be an opportunity for all stakeholders to express their preference as to how they see themselves engage in the development of the Strategic Development Plan.

View the Planning etc. (Scotland) Act 2006 online at www.opsi.gov.uk/legislation/scotland/acts2006/asp_20060017_en_1

or see the implications for strategic planning in this area at www.gcvcore.gov.uk/legislation

The Joint Committee’s work is long-term and strategic, looking twenty or more years into the future, timespans needed to effect major structural change in metropolitan areas.

The Joint Committee has decided to develop further its earlier futures work from the late-1990s as awareness of emerging issues and the potential for change will help develop an increased robustness to its own planning against risks associated with such change.

No one can know the future and therefore this work is not about predicting the future, but about understanding a range of potential futures and their associated risks to the Joint Committee’s Strategic Development Planning.

Futures work, common in government circles and in major global companies, provides that perspective.

Current work is focused around horizon-scanning to spot emerging trends, using extensive information-gathering techniques from a wide range of sources, whilst other techniques such as structured questions and scenario analysis, are under development with a view to engaging partners and stakeholders. Partnership and combined capacity are fundamental to delivering the Development Strategy, as has been amply demonstrated by the Joint Committee approach during the period since 1996. These futures techniques will be used to develop common views of the future and its range of potential risks for and impacts upon the Joint Committee and its stakeholders’ shared agendas.

Underpinning this work has been a move to create a more robust monitoring and risk assessment framework for the Strategic Development Plan. This framework aims for the firsttime to integrate risk assessment, risk management and spatial planning.

In preparation for the new

Planning System in 2008

the Joint Committee introduced

a major innovation into its

work programme in 2007 –

systematic Futures Analysis

future focusScotland’s new Planning System

Groundwork for 2008

Strategic Spatial Planning and Climate ChangeClimate change is a hot topic globally. Indeed, it has been described recently as mankind’s most pressing challenge, more so than even international terrorism. Whilst the origins of climate change and man’s role therein are open to debate, the fact of climate change is not disputed, nor is the need for man to maximise his efforts to mitigate its causes and its impacts. However, it is accepted that a partnership approach, from the local level to the global, is required to address it, as a single organisation or government is unlikely to adopt unilateral comprehensive action, especially where there are fears related to compromised competitiveness.

The ChallengeFrom the United Nations’ 1992 Rio Conference and the Kyoto Accord of 1997, the issue of addressing climate change has risen in awareness to become a global issue requiring global solutions.

The primary focus is upon reducing levels of emitted greenhouse gases which are seen as contributing to the general rise in global temperatures through the greenhouse effect in the atmosphere.

Some scientists estimate that at current emission levels, the world’s climate will reach a tipping point within twenty years beyond which irreparable damage will have been done.

In response to the need for action, inter alia, the EU’s Green Paper on Energy, March 2006, the UK Government’s Stern Report, October 2006, the UK Government’s legislative commitment in November 2006 to mandatory climate change mitigation targets of 60% reduction in greenhouse gases by 2050, and the Scottish

Government’s commitment in June 2007 to a mandatory 80% reduction by 2050, each raise greenhouse gas reduction to a legislative requirement with mandatory targets.

The role of Strategic Spatial PlanningTo date, little comprehensive work has been done on evaluating the potential contribution of strategic spatial planning to reducing greenhouse gases and mitigating their adverse impacts. Yet both the EU Green Paper and the UK’s Stern Report each identify spatial planning as one of the five or six potentially most significant tools available to governments to achieve these greenhouse gas reduction targets. As a result, it is incumbent upon the Joint Committee and its constituent local authorities to address that challenge and to incorporate greenhouse gas reduction and climate change mitigation as key aims of the future Strategic Development Plan.

Pilot work by the Joint Committee and PartnersThe Joint Committee recognised this challenge at an early stage and is ahead of mandatory legislative demands. In 2007 the Joint Committee, in partnership with the UK’s Tyndall Institute for Climate Change Research, the METREX network of metropolitan regions, Stockholm County, and the Italian Regional Governments of Veneto and Emilia-Romagna, pilot work on greenhouse gas emissions within a spatial planning context. That work has resulted in the first-ever Greenhouse Gas Emissions Audit for the Glasgow and the Clyde Valley metropolitan area.

The 2004-based GHG inventory outlines the level of six main emissions: Carbon Dioxide (CO2), Methane (CH4), Nitrous Oxide (N20), Hydrofluorocarbons (HFC), Perflourocarbons (PFC)

and Sulphur Hexafluoride (SF6). Table 1 outlines the emissions for each of the four sectors of the Glasgow and the Clyde Valley GHG inventory: Energy, Industrial Processes, Waste and Agriculture.

The energy sector accounts for 89% of regional CO2 equivalent emissions (12,827 thousand tonnes), with CH4 and N20 emissions adding an additional 1,129 thousand tonnes of CO2 equivalent. The energy sector includes all domestic, services, agricultural sector and industrial energy uses, plus energy use in the energy industry itself; and transport (all modes).

Additionally, the Joint Committee convened, with a wide range of regional partners and stakeholders over three days, the first ever set of workshops dedicated to preparing specific mitigation scenarios for greenhouse gas reduction within the terms of the Scottish Government’s 80/50 targets (80% by 2050).

The three workshops each reached a consensus on the emissions reduction possible by 2050, whilst the resultant reduction in energy usage was also calculated:

Day 1

Emissions reduction 78%Energy consumption change -37%

Day 2

Emissions reduction 77%Energy consumption change -29%

Day 3

Emissions reduction 78%Energy consumption change -34%

climate change

EU CO2 80/50 A Trans-national European Partnership Project

Given this need for stakeholder engagement and using this 2007 pilot work as a platform, a major project – EU CO2 80/50 – is being prepared for submission to the EU for approved funding under the new INTERREG IVC programme.

The project is being prepared by the METREX network of metropolitan regions as sponsor, with Hamburg, Germany as the Lead Partner of the project and the UK’s Tyndall Institute for Climate Change Research as Expert Advisors. The Joint Committee has committed itself to the project, should it be approved, as one of its Steering Partners. Interest in participation in the project has been expressed by metropolitan regions across the EU – from Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Greece, Poland, Netherlands, Sweden, Finland, UK and others.

The objective of the project is to develop a profile of the greenhouse gas emissions of different metropolitan regions, and to develop mitigation scenarios for each region, with a preferred Strategy for each as a primary outcome. It will involve considerable trans-national exchange of information and technique and a shared perspective on how the spatial planning of metropolitan regions can contribute to greenhouse gas emissions mitigation.

Already links are being made with the US, where 633 cities across 50 states have signed up to meeting the demands of the Kyoto Accord.

One of the key outcomes for the Joint Committee will be an expansion of its pilot workshops on Mitigation Scenarios to include a wider and more influential range of stakeholders within the metropolitan area, with a view to moving towards a preferred Mitigation Strategy for greenhouse gas reduction that can be incorporated into its metropolitan spatial planning strategy.

InterMETREX project extension final report is available to download fromwww.gcvcore.gov.uk/downloads/GRIP_InterMETREXPlus.pdf

Overall, none of the workshops managed to reach the stated aim of an 80% reduction and each workshop took a slightly different approach to reaching the target in terms of differing proportions of the overall GHG emissions reduction being sourced from energy efficiency measures or from an increasing proportion of energy supplies of less-carbon

intensive energy sources, within a context of overall energy usage.

These scenarios are now under analysis to define those areas of potential where strategic spatial planning may have a key role in greenhouse gas mitigation. Yet much more needs to be done. The Joint Committee has recognised the need to engage a much

wider range of stakeholders and decision-makers in the scenario and strategy process, before a meaningful spatial planning response can be incorporated into its Strategic Development Plan for the metropolitan area.

Glasgow and the Clyde Valley Metropolitan Area 2004 Total emissions x1,000 tonnes

Source CO2 CH4 N2O HFC PFC SF6

Total CO2 equivalent

Energy sector total 12,827 40.49 0.28 0 0 0 13,841 (89%)

Industrial sector total 0 0 0 242.86 2.65 0 322 (2%)

Waste total 12.53 24.10 0.13 0 0 0 750 (5%)

Agriculture total 14.24 1.36 0 0 0 0 606 (4%)

Total 12,852 66 0.41 243 2.65 0 15,520

GCV population: 1,747,080

Per capita (tonnes) 7.34 0.77 0.30 0.14 0.002 0 8.8

climate change

2007 Vacant and Derelict LandThe Glasgow and Clyde Valley area had 4,572 hectares of vacant and derelict land (44% of Scotland’s total) of which 3,352 hectares is within the urban area.

Glasgow, North Lanarkshire and South Lanarkshire account for 80% (2,680 hectares) of the total urban vacant and derelict land in the Structure Plan area.

34% of all sites, amounting to 1,156 hectares, have been vacant and derelict since 1985.

There were 260 hectares of take up for development, residential development accounts for 143 hectares, industrial / business for 40 hectares and 12 hectares for retailing.

2006 Housing LandTotal housing completions in the Glasgow and Clyde Valley area were 6,838 units, 735 more units than 2004/05. Total completions are at their highest recorded level 11% above the average of the previous 5 years.

The housing land supply for the area is 96,165 units, an increase of 19,000 on the 2004/05 position and its highest recorded level. The considerable increase in the land supply can be partly attributed to the introduction of Community Growth areas outlined in the 2006 Structure Plan into the 2006 land supply.

A total of 4,968 units were completed on brownfield land, whilst 1,852 units were on greenfield land.

Brownfield completions have been sustained at around 70% reflecting the long term success of Structure Plan policies for urban renewal.

4,7

80

4,2

02

3,95

3

4,6

76

4,2

69

4,1

31

4,4

19

4,3

70

4,2

70

4,9

86

1,53

5 2,4

04

2,1

32

2,1

39

1,91

2

2,0

47

1,89

0

1,66

1

1,83

3

1,85

2

Bro

wnf

ield

Gre

enfie

ld

1996/97 1997/98 1998/99 1999/00 2000/01 2001/02 2002/03 2003/04 2004/05 2005/06

Glasgow City 1,286ha 38%

North Lanarkshire 1,122ha 33%

South Lanarkshire 290ha 9%

Renfrewshire 244ha 7%

West Dunbartonshire 202ha 6%

East Dunbartonshire 64ha 2%

Inverclyde 105ha 3%

East Renfrewshire 56ha 2%

Glasgow and the Clyde Valley

Urban Vacant and Derelict Land 2007

total 3,352ha

land use monitor

The Joint Committee and EU Programmes

Last year, this article set out the Joint Committee’s role as a founding member of METREX, a fast-growing and increasingly influential network of metropolitan cities in Europe. It highlighted the Joint Committee’s leadership and partnership role in a number of significant EU projects sponsored by the METREX network, as well as the Joint Committee’s role in other EU programmes. These projects are nearing completion.

As last year’s Review commented, the Joint Committee, with Italian and Swedish partners, and with the UK Government’s Tyndall Centre for Climate Change research, looked set to venture into uncharted territory to explore an approach to establishing the potential for strategic spatial planning to mitigate the effects of climate change. With EU approval, and funding from METREX and the Joint Committee, a pilot was launched by this partnership which has created a platform for cutting-edge analysis of spatial planning’s role.

Currently, under the leadership of Hamburg and sponsored by METREX, a major project, entitled EU CO2 80/50, is under development to take forward the work of the pilot into a fully-fledged project under the EU’s INTERREG IV programme (more of this in the centre-fold article). If approved by the EU, this project will see the Joint Committee as the UK’s Steering Partner in the project.

Already, this project and sponsorship, although as yet unapproved, is leading to strong international interaction in the field of Climate Change, with the METREX network’s budding partnership with the North Virginia Regional Commission in the USA.

METREX – the network of Metropolitan Regions

Founded in Glasgow in 1995, the METREX network is now a highly regarded political and professional network within the EU. The network focuses on the specific spatial planning challenges of metropolitan cities, now established globally as the main economic drivers of the world economy.

The network now numbers, within its membership, over fifty metropolitan regions from across Europe. It is impossible to list all members here, but examples include Stockholm and Helsinki in Scandinavia, Moscow in Russia, Krakow and Katowice in Poland, Berlin – Brandenburg, Hamburg, and Nuremberg in Germany, Emilia-Romagna and the Veneto in Italy, Madrid, Barcelona and Zaragoza in Spain, Oporto in Portugal, Paris in France and Amsterdam and Rotterdam within The Netherlands. In the UK, the Joint Committee and Greater London Council provide further examples.

For more information visit www.eurometrex.org

The XXII meeting of the METREX network was held in Vicenza, Italy in May 2007

international context

Under a Scottish Ministerial Direction, the eight Planning Authorities of the Glasgow and Clyde Valley area – East Dunbartonshire, East Renfrewshire, Glasgow City, Inverclyde, North Lanarkshire, Renfrewshire, South Lanarkshire and West Dunbartonshire – are required jointly to produce a long-term strategic development plan for the area. The Authorities constituted the Joint Committee for this purpose.

At the core of its remit is the preparation, monitoring and review of the Structure Plan/Strategic Development Plan for the city-region; its approval by the constituent Authorities and its submission to and approval by the Scottish Ministers. The Joint Committee views this role as central to integrated public policy and action and therefore has built its Strategy work upon partnership and capacity-building with a wide range of agencies and organisations.

South Lanarkshire currently holds the convenership of the Joint Committee, following that of Renfrewshire, North Lanarkshire and Glasgow City. The Joint Committee is supported by a Management Team of the senior Directors of the Authorities and its own professional Executive Team. Secretariat and support services are provided by Renfrewshire Council.

In April and May 2007, the Joint Committee’s designation of Bishopton, a village in Renfrewshire, as a growth area catering for future metropolitan demand, was the central focus of an Examination in Public (EIP) – a form of public inquiry. This EIP was the first to be held in Scotland since the early 1980s. But, under the new Planning legislation in Scotland, the EIP will become a mandatory part of the strategic development plan (SDP) system, and will inform Scottish Ministers’ ability to approve SDPs.

The Joint Committee therefore welcomed the decision of the Scottish Ministers to hold the EIP in 2007, believing it to be an open and transparent method of discussing difficult strategic issues, but also a method of enquiry which introduced a new less legalistic approach to such proceedings - in effect, a strategic discussion amongst relevant parties with open public access. The EIP proved to be a successful event and was widely acknowledged as setting new standards in pubic transparency around such strategic planning issues.

It comprised the Joint Committee, Renfrewshire Council, Land-owners, Developers, Consultants, Regulatory Bodies, Transport Bodies, Community Councils, Local Action Groups and associated expert witnesses undertaking a strategic dialogue about the policy of expanding that particular community. The dialogue was chaired and structured by a Senior Reporter from the Scottish Government’s Planning and Environmental Appeals Unit.

The Joint Committee welcomed its central role in creating a new model of professional and political enquiry which should provide the basis for the forthcoming mandatory EIPs for Strategic Development Plans across Scotland.

The work of the Joint Committee

Pilot for the new Examination In Public

joint committee

Glasgow and the Clyde Valley Structure Plan Joint CommitteeLower Ground Floor, 125 West Regent Street, Glasgow G2 2SAtel 0141 229 7730 fax 0141 221 4518email info@gcvcore.gov.uk web www.gcvcore.gov.uk/annualreview2007

John DempseyEast Dunbartonshire

ConvenerGraham ScottSouth Lanarkshire

Vice ConvenerHarry CurranNorth Lanarkshire

Bill HendryEast Dunbartonshire

Barbara GrantEast Renfrewshire

Eddie Phillips East Renfrewshire

George RedmondGlasgow City

George RyanGlasgow City

Chris OsbourneInverclyde

David WilsonInverclyde

James CoyleNorth Lanarkshire

Iain NicolsonRenfrewshire

Bruce McFeeRenfrewshire

Chris ThompsonSouth Lanarkshire

Ronnie McCollWest Dunbartonshire

Margaret BootlandWest Dunbartonshire