This morning NLA hosted an interesting talk by Dan Doctoroff, CEO and President of Bloomburg and former deputy Mayor of New York. While working for Mayor Bloomburg’s administration Doctoroff oversaw the development and implementation of PlaNYC, which provides an ambitious and comprehensive framework for developing a sustainable (in every sense) future for New York.

His main theme was that friendly competition between London and New York drives innovation in both cities and ought to allow them to maintain their position as great world cities long into the future. Both cities are very similar in terms of size, diversity of their populations and forecasts for economic and population growth. By a long way they lead the world as centres for financial industries, with Doctoroff claiming New York has a slight edge over London (using the number of Bloomburg subscribers as the measure).

Doctoroff sees quality of life as essential to ensuring London and New York’s long term success. It is at the heart of his ‘virtuous cycle for a successful city’ – quality of life attracts people (residents and visitors), which drives the economy, which provides the money to invest in projects to improve quality of life. Those projects must be part of comprehensive strategy for urban transformation. The High Line for example has not only created a fantastic new public space in the centre of the city, but was also the catalyst for wider change in over 40 neighbouring blocks.

Creating a great city for walking is central to the PlaNYC transport strategy and has driven much of the rapid transformation of New York’s public realm over recent years. Improvements that are also helping to create a cycle network that in terms of its eventual coverage and quality of provision is miles ahead of London’s Cycle Super Highways.

The first London Plan, drawn up under Ken Livingstone, was the template for PlanNYC, but New York’s plan is much more ambitious. Doctoroff politely suggested that New York was still learning from London, using the example of the cycle hire scheme (which London can hardly claim to have pioneered), but it is London that must now learn from New York.

The votes are being cast and we’ll soon find out who will be Mayor of London for the next four years. It remains to be seen whether the unprecedented mobilisation of London’s cyclists will help decide the outcome, but judging by the polls it seems unlikely that Ken Livingtsone (the preferred candidate amongst the big two) will emerge victorious.

Regardless of the eventual outcome this election is likely to prove pivotal in deciding the longer term future of cycling in the Capital. London’s cyclists are more politicised than ever thanks to the fantastic efforts of Londoners on Bikes (an organisation that didn’t even exist 6 months ago, that has turned out to be a very smooth and savvy operator); strong campaigning from the London Cycling Campaign under the banner of Love London, Go Dutch; and the excellent Cities fit for Cycling campaign run by The Times. They’re also increasingly vocal and visible – a process that started in 2011 with hundreds taking part in the first Blackfriars flashride and culminated (for now) with 10,000 braving the rain to join LCC’s Big Ride last Saturday.

Judging by his track record and manifesto commitments four more years of Boris Johnson won’t be great for cycling, but it need not be disastrous. Johnson has signed up to both The Times Cycle Safe manifesto and LCC’s Go Dutch principles. That doesn’t mean he’ll necessarily deliver on those commitments, but it does make it easier for the cycling community to hold him to account. In the short term this will hopefully mean that at the very least some of the most dangerous junctions will belatedly be improved and the next generation of cycle ‘super’ highways ought to be an improvement on the last.

But whether it’s Boris or Ken who starts work at City Hall on Monday, the real opportunities are longer term. Creating the conditions for mass cycling to flourish in London will take time, and it will be at least four years before we find out whether London is to become a true cycling city. If it is, then the debate at the next election can’t be about cycle safety. London’s cyclists, building on the momentum gained during this election campaign, will need to be at the vanguard of a mass movement for a more liveable city, with everyday cycling at its heart. As I’ve argued before, we need a transport revolution not a cycling revolution.

Perhaps people are just bored with the subject, but the publication of the final National Planning Policy Framework at the end of March seems to have generated little other than mild relief from supporters and critics alike.  This despite a series of concessions from the draft version that, arguably, go further than the development industry and not as far as the conservation lobby wanted and certainly retain most of the flaws in the draft which I previously highlighted , especially the where-practicals that provide a get-out from anything too awkward.

One inclusion receiving strikingly little comment is the statement that “[t]he policies in paragraphs 18 to 219, taken as a whole, constitute the Government’s view of what sustainable development in England means in practice for the planning system”.  As a way of getting around the criticism that it had not defined what the sustainable development in favour of which it wanted a presumption actually is, this is ingenious: it’s whatever we say.  An adaptation of the Nixon defence, (“when the president does it, it is not illegal”), and the kind of evasion that could easily be the payoff in an episode of Yes, Minister, this amounts to any development allowed under the NPPF being, by definition, sustainable regardless of whether or not it makes any environmental or social sense (any development, of course, always makes economic sense to someone).  The competition is now surely on to see what execrable scheme can stretch the definition farthest, for what pitifully small recompense: whither the next ‘green’ business park with a wind turbine,some shiny PVs and 2,000 parking spaces?

For those of who think sustainable development has a bit more rigour – some of the rigour of, say, a nine-tenths cut in rich-world CO₂ emissions by 2050 to avert catastrophic climate change – the NPPF represents just so much more of planners talking their material considerations while the world gets hotter, more unequal and increasingly prone to affluenza.  One thing that can be said for the NPPF, however, is that it ought to make development that really does seek to address the challenges of sustainable development (qua Brundtland rather than qua Pickles) a little bit easier too.  As we at Beyond Green prepare to submit our planning application at North Sprowston & Old Catton, north of Norwich, for what we believe will be the first authentically sustainable urban extension in the country this summer, we hope to hold ourselves to higher standards than the NPPF does.

We take walking seriously at Beyond Green. For our own development projects and when we’re advising clients, the walkable neighbourhood is the basic building block of sustainable places – ensuring that all residents are in easy walking distance of the shops and services they need day-to-day. We believe that the creation of high quality streets and public spaces that make walking a pleasure and the natural choice for shorter journeys is an absolute must if we’re to break free from the social, economic and environmental costs of car dependency.

If Beyond Green had been around in 1929 we’d probably have joined the Pedestrians Association, which became Living Streets in 2001. Originally founded in response to the seemingly unchecked rise of the motor-car and the spiralling numbers of pedestrians being killed or seriously hurt on Britain’s roads, Living Streets now has local groups up and down the country. With over 1.6 million children involved in their Walk to School campaign each year, and a range of other campaigns and actions aimed at all walks of life, they continue to champion the rights of pedestrians up to the highest levels of government. This month they’re running the Great British Walking Challenge as part of National Walking Month.

Bruce is passionate about sustainable transport issues (he’s our resident transport specialist and founder of Movement for Liveable London) and is looking forward to helping Living Streets make our towns and cities great places to walk.

This piece is written by Jonathan Smales, Executive Chairman of Beyond Green

Last Wednesday I joined Unilever’s Sustainable Living Lab – a novel on-line debate facilitated by GlobeScan. The purpose was to reflect on some key themes in Unilever’s bold and innovative sustainable living strategy, marking the first anniversary of its publication.

The first thing to note, it seems to me, is what a remarkable cultural phenomenon this is in the field of sustainability. When I was MD of Greenpeace UK in the 1980s major corporations were of course inherently the bad guys: evasive, carefree and careless, unapproachable megaliths which had no discourse on environmental issues still less sustainability. Unless and until attacked on a specific campaigning issue they had little or nothing to say about the environment.

Waves of change came and went from Elkington and Hailes’ ‘new consumer’ of the late 1980’s and Schmidheiny and Timberlake’s World Business Council for Sustainable Development at and beyond Rio, to later work on corporate accountability and environmental reporting in the 90’s. This work laid the foundations for what is arguably now a flowering of myriad big business initiatives in sustainability. We’ve gone from the environment being ignored to becoming a reputational threat, to a marketing opportunity, to what is now seen in the best corporations as a great opportunity. If climate change is the greatest market failure the world has seen let’s create new markets. If aid can’t solve poverty let’s start environmentally benign new businesses that employ people and generate revenue. If the old technology threatens life on earth let’s quickly invent and design some new kit.

This is not to waft my inner Dr Pangloss airily over what is an area still fraught with profound contradictions, huge gaps between promise and delivery and, let’s be honest, continued widespread corporate negilgence. But would that we had a government that put sustainable living right at the heart of its programme as has Unilever? Would that we had a national equivalent of M & S’s Plan A. Would that we looked deep into our whole manufacturing process and examined cradle-to-cradle with the rigour of InterfaceFlor.

Beyond Green’s own philosophy is captured in the phrase, ‘How Shall We Live?’ The challenges of the 21^st Century are so urgent and so different that we need remarkable change at remarkable speed. And it is no longer possible, if indeed it ever was, to be serious about sustainability without re-considering how we live well (individually and collectively) and with far greater social justice, but with a carbon and wider environmental footprint one-tenth of that we impose on the world today. We can re-design our cities, de-carbonise our energy grids and reconfigure the world’s agriculture…but there is no technological panacea in sustainability. It is not a design problem per se. We must embrace the challenge – indeed the opportunity – of living differently. And this is why Unilever’s work is a breath – even a blast – of corporate fresh air.

Bruce McVean, Principal Consultant at Beyond Green will be speaking at Newcastle Cycling Campaign’s quarterly meeting on the evening of 12^th June. His presentation will consider whether 2012 will mark a turning point for mass cycling in the UK.

See the Newcastle Cycling Campaign website for details.

The 3-course locally-sourced menu will include celeriac cream soup with squash brochette and truffles, rosti with field mushrooms, smoked peppers & braised baby leeks, panfried seabass with saffron fondant, buttered spinach & dill veloute, and caramelised pears with vanilla bean panna cotta & red wine or poached blueberry syrup. All served with a range of local and organic wines and beers. For more information see http://www.wildernesswood.co.uk/event/candlelit-dinner-trewin-restorick-ceo-global-action-plan and to book places call Wilderness Wood on 01825 830 509.

Background:

-We’re developing an ambitious outreach campaign aimed to reshape the conversation on sustainable development and city planning, both in the UK and abroad.

-This campaign will engage with local and international networks of development practitioners, media, higher education programmes and various other stakeholders.

The role:

Contribute to creating core infrastructure for the campaign, which will include aspects of:

• Website and brand development
• Communication and outreach planning
• Production of an event series

Help research and organize stakeholder database

• Consolidate and categorise existing stakeholders within Beyond Green network
• Investigate and reach out to new contacts for potential project collaboration

We’ll pay £20 per day to cover travel and subsistence.

If you’re interested, please send an email marked ‘internship application’ to Joshua Foss (joshua@beyondgreen.co.uk) explaining why this internship opportunity interests you. Please attach your CV and send it before 9th January. If you have any questions on this position, feel free to write to Joshua.

Very much in a nascent stage, the Challenge has successfully certified 4 buildings at varying scales throughout North America, with many more in occupancy and development stages in various parts of the world.  Several iconic projects are now in the works, including a $60 million 5 story office building in downtown Portland, Oregon. With each project that strives for and obtains certification, a bar is raised that proves our built environment is capable of becoming more. This creates a ripple effect that is felt far and wide, energizing those who are on the front lines of sustainable development.

Beyond Green’s own Joshua Foss is from the US and has been an ambassador for the Challenge the past two years. He has been trained by the Living Building Institute to lead volunteer presentations on their behalf.  These genereally entail an hour long seminar presented for interested groups/organizations/events and are qualified to earn attendees’ 1 LEED continuing education hour.  In addition to presenting on the Living Building Challenge, Foss has also contributed to several projects that have aimed for certification, including a multi-family mixed use development in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Beyond Green certainly understands and is inspired by the Living Building Challenge, but recognises that it is currently not an all-encompassing vision for sustainable development.  Real sustainability must be developed at scale with a focus on quality placemaking without investing too much emphasis on single structures (although the LBC certainly recognises this and looks to be evolving to better incorporate district and neighbourhood scales).  The value the Challenge does however serve is being an icon for sustainability, for raising awareness and excitement within the field, and for acting as an agent to tranform development processes to be more upstream thinking, collaborative, and transparent (all things that we strive to do here at Beyond Green).

If you are interested in learning more about the Living Building Challenge, please contact Joshua.  He is very keen on engaging dialogues here in the UK about the standard and discussing how it fits into the greater sustainable development conversation (he is at the moment the only trained presenter in the country).  Foss can be reached at joshua@beyondgreen.co.uk

This past Friday, Chris Hill, a rural affairs correspondent for the Norwich Evening News, wrote a constructive and balanced article on the growth triangle and its various critics and supporters.  Smales was given a fair portion of the article to defend the idea that greenfield developments should not automatically be written off as destructive.  He went on to say:

“The population of the UK is growing rapidly and we are very sympathetic to the notion that the priority must be to build on brownfield sites. But the idea that a boundary of a town or city should never change is a weird notion.

“We would be fossilising the boundaries of all places if we never had any greenfield development.

“In certain situations where you can mend an urban edge and put systems in place which are intrinsically sustainable, then it is not only defensible, it can be a very good thing.

“I am not for a second decrying the environmental campaigns but neither would I want to be in a camp that says we should never build on greenfield land under any circumstances. You cannot tar every project with the same brush.”

Mr Smales said the development would increase public access to open spaces including Beeston Park and Red Hall Farm, as well as providing more trees and natural habitat within the planned open spaces.

For a link to the article in its entirety, please click HERE.