This is the question posed by our managing director Paul Smith in a new report penned for the Adam Smith Institute; Popular Planning: Using fantasy football to reimagine the planning system.
The Adam Smith Institute is one of the world’s leading think tanks, recognised as the best domestic and international economic policy think tank in the UK.
Unlike the Premier League’s Fantasy Football game, which is simple and popular, the plan-making process is complex and ignored by most people. The result is a system that lacks public confidence. The way consultation is handled encourages confrontation and makes it all but impossible for communities to suggest alternatives.
The current system’s various difficulties could be addressed by learning from the popular game, using a variety of solutions, from a simple online interface to identify sites that planning officers consider suitable for development, through to offering trade-offs, putting more decision-making into the hands of local communities and incentivising the process.
Perhaps best of all, the approach could be introduced without legislative change and would improve both public confidence in the planning system and the quality of new development.
Read the report here and find out more about the Adam Smith Institute and the work they do.
