Design matters: major house builders and the design challenge of brownfield development contexts

Abstract

The quality of contemporary residential development, and the associated design challenge for house builders, are important current policy issues in England. Until recently, better‐designed contemporary housing development was more frequently seen on smaller, more constrained urban or brownfield sites and more rarely on greenfield sites. Set against a significant shift in the prevailing planning regime during the 1990s (from greenfield development to an express policy emphasis on brownfield development), this paper attempts to explain this observation. Utilizing the concept of ‘opportunity space’, it develops a model of the role of design and the designer in the development process, which is then used to account for differences in the quality of development on greenfield and brownfield sites. It is suggested that the development of greenfield and brownfield sites displays significant contrasts and that, as a consequence, successful brownfield developers yield opportunity space in their business strategies to designers.

Notes

Steven Tiesdell, c/o European Urban and Regional Research Centre, Department of Land Economy, University of Aberdeen, St Mary's, King's College, Aberdeen AB24 3UF, UK. Email: [email protected]

In the UK it is commonly accepted that brownfield land is either derelict or vacant (Syms, 1994; Urban Task Force, 1999; Alker et al., 2000). In this paper, the term ‘brownfield’ is used as shorthand for the concept of ‘previously developed land’ contained in Planning Policy Guidance Note 3 (DETR, 2000a).

While there are about 18 000 house builders registered with the National House Building Council, speculative house building is dominated by a small number of major companies, each with an annual output of 500 units or more (Adams & Watkins, 2002). In 2000, there were 43 such companies in the UK. Together they accounted for almost 71% of all homes built by the sector (Wellings, 2001).

In the USA, Australia and the rest of Europe, there is a greater degree of separation between land developers and house builders (see Ball et al., 1988; Ball, 2003). In the USA and Australia, the more common practice is for developers to sell serviced plots to house builders. In European countries, such as the Netherlands and Sweden, the state has traditionally played a larger role in land assembly and in providing serviced plots to house builders, often within the constraints of a masterplan specifying additional development and design requirements.

Closing producer–consumer gaps is a necessary but not sufficient condition of ‘good’ design. Despite responding to the needs of occupiers and investors, developers can exclude the needs of the general public and those of the community at large.

In other European countries, where there is a greater separation between developers and builders, the house building industry has been compelled to concentrate on productivity gains and cost savings as the basis for enhanced corporate profitability (Adams & Watkins, 2002; see also Gibb, 1999).

A volume house builder is usually defined as one completing an average of 2000 or more dwellings each year (Adams & Watkins, 2002).

This situation is not always true. Larger greenfield sites are often split between—and developed by—a number of different developers on the ‘ice cream sellers on a beach’ principle (i.e. vendors congregate to maximize their potential market).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Steven Tiesdell

Steven Tiesdell, c/o European Urban and Regional Research Centre, Department of Land Economy, University of Aberdeen, St Mary's, King's College, Aberdeen AB24 3UF, UK. Email: [email protected]