Urban Regeneration - from the NICVA Policy Manifesto
Posted by Feargal O'Kane on Feb 13 2007 under Urban regeneration, Policy Manifesto |
It is commonly accepted that any approach to urban regeneration goes beyond the physical and economic, and is effective in including communities. The voluntary and community sector welcomes the intention to transfer responsibility for urban
regeneration and neighbourhood renewal to local government in Northern Ireland and expects that an effective link will be made between politicians and local communities.
The critical mechanism is the new proposed community planning partnerships in which voluntary and community groups will be willing to play their part to make effective strategies for dynamic change. Most importantly a statutory duty will be placed on key public bodies to participate in the process but social partners will also be engaged drawing them into the community planning and urban regeneration process.
While much has been done in terms of urban regeneration in Northern Ireland, there is still the necessity to hone an effective delivery mechanism capable of delivering the outcome of the strategy in a staged and timely way.
Political parties and the Assembly should:
- Establish baseline information on the current state of urban regeneration in each area.
- Set a vision for urban regeneration, what it is trying to achieve and an effective delivery mechanism with a structured planning process which can deliver a strategy in a timely and effective fashion.
- Establish key indicators to measure success which are based on quality of life and the impact in areas targeted for regeneration.
- Provide and resource the community planning process which links the bottom up planning with strategic development.
- Develop integrated stakeholder neighbourhood plans in local areas which can integrate into a wider community plan.
- Identify the skills and knowledge required by different sets of players involved in neighbourhood renewal and develop the skills and knowledge of key stakeholders, including the voluntary and community sector.
- Ensure that the new local authorities as lead bodies in co-ordinating urban regeneration take cognisance of best practice in other countries to help develop their planning processes.
- Secure the long-term commitment from government departments and other statutory bodies to the regeneration process in each local authority area.
- Move to outcome focused funding where voluntary and community organisations and other bodies are engaged as part of urban regeneration processes.
- Include walkable green space in urban regeneration plans.
Comments
Leave a Reply
