Wednesday, 2022 February 23 · 12:30
London (GMT +0:00)
Cost: Free
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Technology and big data are already transforming the planning system, giving us new ways to engage with local people, understand day-to-day patterns of place usage and cooperate with neighbouring authorities and infrastructure agencies. The 2020 Planning for the Future White Paper set out intentions to take this further with ‘a radical, digital-first approach to modernise the planning process…moving from a process based on documents to a process driven by data’ (p.21). Similarly, the COVID-19 pandemic has driven many planning organisations to move their activities into virtual spaces, from day-to-day collaboration, to site visits and public consultation. However, other perspectives on digitisation processes warn us to be cautious of their potential to further fragment the system, to be exclusionary and, in extreme circumstances, racially biased.
This session brings together expert speakers addressing the spectrum of digitisation from the potential opportunities to possible side effects and unintended consequences.
In this webinar speakers will consider:
-What role can digitisation play in day-to-day planning activities?
- How can effective use of digital systems promote community engagement?
- How is digitisation impacting on case law?
- What are the possible unintended consequences of digitisation?
Through a combination of expert speakers and discussion, you will learn:
- How digitisation can increase the efficiency of planning activities
- How digitisation can contribute to effective engagement activities
- How digitisation is being cited in emerging case law
- How digitisation can have negative effects, that needs to be considered
About the Speakers
RTPI South East
RTPI Regions
Nicola Waight Hampshire County Council
Nicola is the Team Leader for Transport Planning Services at Hampshire County Council, leading an “in-house” consultancy delivering projects for both Hampshire itself, and external clients, mainly in the public sector.
Her team delivers a range of projects such as transport statements/assessments, strategic TAs, placemaking studies, policy, bid development, scheme support and travel planning. Most recently, they’ve delivered six Local Cycling and Walking Infrastructure Plans, and strategic transport assessments and plans for several clients.
Angela Koch Founder ImaginePlaces
Angela is a Planner and Urban Designer with a notable track record in delivering co-design processes closely aligned with RIBA Plan of Work and driven by a contagious drive for innovation and good place-making. She chairs the St Albans City and District Council’s Design Review Panel and is a vice-chair of the Swale Panel on behalf of Design South East. She also serves on the Greater Cambridge Design Review Panel as Panel Member.
Dr Christopher Maidment University of Reading
Chris is a Lecturer in Planning at the University of Reading. He is a chartered planner and started his career as a planning policy officer in English local government, following a PhD at the University of Sheffield. His research interests focus on issues of professionalism, decision-making and multi-scalar plan-making. He joined Real Estate & Planning in August 2019 as a Lecturer in Planning, with research interests in plan-making and professionalism.
Chris previously worked at Anglia Ruskin University and as a Planning Policy Officer for Bassetlaw District Council. Prior to this, he studied for his PhD at the University of Sheffield. His PhD draws on different ways in which the ‘public interest’ can be understood, and how these variations are present in plan-making. The fieldwork explored case studies of spatial plan-making in Central Lincolnshire and the Peak District National Park, using multiple qualitative methods. At the core of Chris’ research interests is understanding the relationship between normative theories of planning and the practice environment; both how planning theory should shape practice and how practice should influence the development of theory.
Dr Jennifer Manuel
Jen works across the fields of planning and human-computer interaction, exploring how technology could be better used in planning policy processes. Her PhD work explored the role of technology in neighbourhood planning from a citizen-centred perspective, although the findings are broadly applicable to wider policy processes.
Ben Mitchell Hampshire County Council
Ben is an Assistant Transport Planner in the Transport Planning Services team at Hampshire County Council. He has recently completed a Masters in Transportation Planning and Engineering from Southampton University and has substantial transport planning experience relating to travel plans, Local Cycling and Walking Infrastructure Plans (LCWIPs), data analysis and network planning.
