There are over 33,758 brownfield sites across England, covering 27,000 hectares of land? 🌍 This could provide around 5.4 million homes. So why are so many sites still sitting vacant!? These sites face tough constraints—think contamination, infrastructure challenges, and sensitive neighbours. But guess what? All of these issues can be overcome. The real challenge is costs. 💰💰💰 So how do we make brownfield sites viable for development? 🏗️ The answer: Density! By increasing density, we can increase the GDV of these sites until the development can pay for itself. We've done this well before, and we can do it again. Do we prefer to build at much higher densities, or leave these sites vacant? These are the tradeoffs we need to make. #BrownfieldLand #Sustainability #HousingCrisis 

Much of the land classified as buildable, within the City of Bellingham and its Urban Growth Areas (UGAs), is located in extremely challenging areas to build. Some of the land is in critical areas such as the Padden Creek watershed and steep slope areas, and much of it lacks the necessary capital facilities infrastructure, such as sewer and public utilities. Other areas also require expensive off-site road construction that may never be built as prerequisite conditions for any development. We know we need to be building about 825 homes per year to meet the demand but without a sufficient supply of buildable land where will we build? It’s time to reassess Bellingham’s existing UGAs and reconfigure the City’s urban growth boundaries to introduce new surrounding land that is proven to sustain responsible growth. #UrbanGrowthAreas #LandUsePlanning #ComprehensivePlan #GrowthManagementAct #WashingtonState #HousingCrisis #HousingforBellingham

We are in desperate need of housing. What do we do when building new housing will cause death and disability to our construction workers? From Article... “For example, you get a natural disaster that destroys a bunch of buildings, and you’re needing to rebuild but this extreme heat is making it harder to supply new buildings,” he said. “There are these interesting interactions that we think will probably even increase the quantitative importance about this.” #housing #extremeweather #climatechange https://lnkd.in/gw4axb8b

Presumption in favour of sustainable development   The consultation refers to the changes to paragraph 11d) (including footnotes 7, 8 and 9, no less) as “an effective failsafe to support housing supply”…. “and, introducing new safeguards, to make clear that its application cannot justify poor quality development”. The amendments clarify the scope of policies which can be rendered “out-of-date”, which is to be limited to “policies for the supply of land” but consistency with policies in the Framework for the location and design of development, and for securing affordable homes will be afforded greater weight in applying the ‘tilted balance’. The Government has made clear that the changes to the Framework and the new Local Housing Need figures also published today are not seen as opening 'the flood gates'; the consultation makes clear that landowners, promoters and developers should continue to demonstrate the suitability of sites for development and to commit to delivering high quality development. Please get in contact with Stantec's Planning, Design and Technical teams if you want to discuss the implications of the proposed changes for your sites. #NPPF #presumption #healthyplaces #affordablehomes #designquality

After 27 months the team has followed in Elton’s footsteps and said goodbye to a road that became their home. Brick by brick, they achieved a lot 👉 The construction of a 1.4km gravity main was ticked off the to-do list. Storage tanks that hold up to 700,000 litres of wastewater were placed underground, and they built a new wastewater pump station that can handle 💩 flows of up to 225 litres per second. All that infrastructure will prevent overflows into the Tāmaki River and make sure our 💩 network is A-OK when more people and businesses move into the neighbourhood. Yup, we’re all about future proofing. Before they exited stage right, the crew planted 260 native plants and demolished the old pump station so the reserve could be gifted back to the community. The cherry on top was that all this work came in under budget. And, while our crew's "future lies beyond the yellow brick road" we reckon they’ve nailed their exit strategy. If you want more golden nuggets from our Dunkirk Road mahi, hit the link 👉 https://bit.ly/4h4XnZv #WaterIndustry #Water #Wastewater #Teamwork #Team #Auckland #Infrastructure #Project #OnTheTools #Engineering #Construction #Partnership #Environment #Farewell

LAND can identify key development constraints instantaneously, allowing them to be compared to development options. When constraints are considered early, development strategies can be optimised, providing huge savings on both time and money. This example of a large housing development site near Blackburn highlights 3 key constraints: 🗺 Steep Site Topography. 🗺 Watercourse Destination for Surface Water. 🗺 Historic Landfill across the Southern Boundary. The impact of these on the development's layout were: 🧱 Retaining features throughout the site between plots and on-site boundaries. 🧱 Surface water attenuation features were introduced with associated land-take. 🧱 Significant land gas protection measures were put in place for Southern plots. LAND's unique overlay feature allowed for the development options to be uploaded and compared to the impact of these key ground constraints and meant that all the above was understood and planned for from the outset. #LANDapp #EmergingTech #LandDevelopment #DevelopmentConstraints #HousingDevelopment

#DYK: "Daylighting streams" can help reduce flooding in urban areas. Bentley's Tom Walski delves into the pros and cons of this approach to urban water management and community revitalization. #urbanplanning #communityrevitalization #watermanagement

Found an older article directly related to the unusual high-density, multi-residential development that inspired a post a few weeks ago ("Navigating Zoning Land Mines"). https://lnkd.in/eyxWBa4m The article mentions that the community of Marda Loop pushed back with a 1,000-signature petition. Interestingly, I referenced the Marda Loop Area Redevelopment Plan (ARP). Since the development was approved, the ARP maps and wording were modified to show the creep of high-density development into the previously designated "Low Density, Residential" section of the roadway (previously designated east of 19 Street SW). This shows how malleable long-term ARPs are in response to pressure from developers and changing market forces. The article indicates how the DC or Direct Control zoning is a flexible used in land use redesignation.

Frostpunk 2 resources keep the city running. They are produced by buildings. Some resources are consumed by the people. Others are used as construction materials. We can categorize them in three ways. #Frostpunk2 #Frostpunk2guides #Frostpunk2Resources

#NAEPerspective: Currently, much of the Los Angeles River is a concrete channel, but there is growing recognition that the river could be so much more. In a new NAE Perspective, Mitul Luhar details how revitalizing the LA River is a prime example of a large-scale infrastructure project that requires #engineers to work alongside #nature and #society. Read here: https://ow.ly/WHtP50SOjvA