CAPITAL GAINS: A BETTER LAND ASSEMBLY MODEL FOR LONDON 2000 1950 1900 Research commissioned by the Greater London Authority FRONT COVER: The illustration shows how the built-up area of the Capital has evolved over a century (Source URBED: City of Villages, GLA, 2002) This report has been produced for the GLA by Dr Nicholas Falk (BA, MBA, Hon FRIBA, Hon MRTPI, FRSA) drawing on support from URBED, Housing Futures Ltd, Dentons, and Gerald Eve. February 2018 Contact: Nicholas Falk [email protected] URBED (Urbanism Environment and Design) Ltd, Fifth Floor, 10 Little Lever Street, Manchester, M1 1HR The URBED Trust, The Building Centre, 26 Store Street, London, WC1E 7BT CONTENTS - French ZAC’s EXECUTIVE SUMMARY I - - Introduction Incentivising land assembly - - Methodology German urban development measures - - Why land assembly matters for house Resourcing land assembly - building German municipal independence - - What London can learn from it’s past French transport charge - - What London can learn from elsewhere American development commissions - - Implementing alternative measures Lessons for London - The advantages a better model would bring 4.HOW ALTERNATIVE MEASURES - Land assembly action list COULD BE IMPLEMENTED 51 - Planning for strategic housing - INTRODUCTION 1 Acquiring land - - The brief The impact of a better land assembly - Methodology model - Incentivising land assembly - Resourcing land assembly 1.WHY LAND ASSEMBLY MATTERS FOR HOUSE 5.THE ADVANTAGES OF A BUILDING 5 BETTER MODEL 67 - - Building more affordable homes The test cases - - Sharing land value uplift Potential impacts - - Recognising environmental constraints Testing the impacts - - Finding enough suitable sites for new Benefits of the recommendations homes - - The advantages of a better model The realities of land economics - The challenges of land assembly CASE STUDIES - London - 2.WHAT LONDON CAN LEARN 15 Croydon 20 FROM IT’S PAST - - King’s Cross 21 Development frameworks (19th Century) - - London Docklands 22 Piecemeal development (1930s) - - International New Towns (1950s-90s) - - Vathorst, Amersfoort 44 Comprehensive development - - ZAC Claude Bernard, Paris 45 Public-led partnerships (1980-2008) - - Pearl District, Portland 46 The present situation - - Toronto 47 Lessons from London’s past - Rieselfeld, Freiburg 48 3.WHAT LONDON CAN LEARN APPENDICES FROM ELSEWHERE 25 - - A: Barriers to speedier housing Planning for strategic housing - delivery 78 Dutch VINEX housing policy - - B: How London evolved 82 German urban development measures - - C: Powers to assemble land in French spatial planning Germany, France, and the Netherlands 88 - - US urban renewal areas D: Land assembly test cases 92 - Acquiring land - The Dutch ‘Building Rights’ model EXECUTIVE SUMMARY CAPITAL GAINS: A BETTER LAND ASSEMBLY MODEL FOR LONDON INTRODUCTION METHODOLOGY This report brings together the evidence The research team identified an initial and makes recommendations for changing range of challenges in its submission the way land is assembled in London. It which provided the focus for selecting and responds to the commission from the GLA analysing relevant case studies, including: to address the following basic research questions over a period of four months: • Allocating suitable land for affordable housing; • With reference to international • Achieving quality development; examples, what conditions would best support land assembly for house- • Changing planning practice; building in London? • Mobilising people and funding; • Which specific statutory land assembly • Achieving a cultural step change; and models could enable an increase in and acceleration of the delivery of homes in • Building partnerships that work. London? • How could these specific statutory land assembly models be implemented in To help ensure the results would be robust, London? a Research Advisory Group was set up with the aim of testing our conclusions with a range of other experts from across the The report outlines a range of models, sector, including academics and the RICS. drawing on both international good The team undertook the commission in practice and London’s own past, and four phases: proposes improvements that could be made in the short term, as well as those Agreeing what may need to change requiring changes to statutory framework. An initial meeting considered conditions It is entitled Capital Gains because it deals that might need to change to support an with the particular challenges facing the increase in house-building in London, nation’s capital, and because it is aimed drawing on a review of previous research. at harnessing land values for the city’s Some thirteen barriers were identified that benefit. can arise in assembling land. Fourteen The research team has been led by Dr possible case studies were identified, and Nicholas Falk from URBED, supported by were narrowed down to the places from legal experts at Dentons and surveyors which the most could be learned. at Gerald Eve with particular experience of compulsory purchase, the network of Assembling the evidence metropolitan regions and areas, plus inputs Case studies were prepared of housing from Pete Redman at Housing Futures Ltd. developments in four countries. I • The French case study is ZAC Claude Bernard in a disadvantaged part of North WHY LAND ASSEMBLY MATTERS East Paris plus an example from the fast- FOR HOUSE-BUILDING growing city of Montpellier and Paris Delivery rates for housing have fallen far Rive Gauche, where a railway line has behind demand for decades, with common been built over to create a new district criticisms including restrictive planning policies, limited resources for planning • The German case study is a sustainable larger schemes, a shortage of developers urban extension to the historic university willing to take complex schemes forward, city of Freiburg plus an example of land and an acute shortage of experienced staff pooling in Frankfurt. in the boroughs. For London the assembly • The Dutch case study is a new of land in multiple ownership is now seen settlement on the edge of the mid-sized as one of the main obstacles to doubling town of Amersfoort where land has been house-building rates. pooled plus an example from Amsterdam of creating new housing sites in the Land assembly to deliver housing is River Ij. inherently complex and time consuming as it may involve any or all of: • The North American case study is a regeneration area in a former industrial area in Portland Oregon plus the a. Unifying multiple interests including example of Toronto in Canada. adjoining land, leasehold and other interests affecting the title of the land; • The report also draws on examples of planned intensification from Hong b. Removing ransom strips and other Kong and Denmark where housing and impediments such as rights of way; transport has been combined. c. Obtaining agreements with statutory undertakers, including highways and other agencies; Because the UK has particular cultural and d. Remediating damaged land; legal traditions, the team also drew heavily e. Providing infrastructure to land which on what London could learn from its own otherwise would and could not come past. A literature review has summarised forward; the lessons from periods when London grew fastest as well as good practice from f. Relocating non-compliant uses that recent experience. would conflict with housing; g. Freeing up of underutilised land that Drawing the lessons does not make good use of its location, Dentons drew up a list of eighteen possible for example by taking advantage of measures that could address the various accessibility or amenity, but which may currently be occupied or operational; challenges and that were capable of implementation both in the short and h. Investing in advance of planning longer terms. The measures broke down permission being granted and certainty into four topics: planning for strategic that the development can proceed. housing; acquiring land; incentivising land assembly; and resourcing land assembly. The review of barriers to land assembly The most promising ones were selected identified factors that are inherent in and worked up. the sites, such as contamination and unpredictable costs and values, as well as Testing the recommendations factors associated with ownership, such as Two very different ‘test cases’ have been absentee owners, and over-expectations examined to see how far the possible due to an inflated ‘hope value’. Land measures could achieve the GLA’s aims and is often occupied, which requires what benefits or advantages could secure compensation or relocation. Ownership the support of the different stakeholders. can be fragmented, and land value across the entire site may not split proportionately II into individual plots. Finally, as well as designation of a New Towns and the owners who prefer to ‘hold out’ and London Green Belt enabled damaged land speculate, there is a loss of the skills and to be mobilised in a strategic and planned techniques that used to be available in both way. Comprehensive Development Areas the public and private sectors to assemble enabled sites in different ownerships to land. be rapidly assembled, as did the setting up of the development corporation for the Utilities and transport undertakings can London Docklands. be hard to engage because their priorities are not aligned with the need to deliver Today public-private partnerships are used more homes, making it hard to secure the to achieve something similar. But whereas ‘marriage value’ from