We are preparing a new local development plan for Edinburgh called City Plan 2030.
In line with our Development Plan Scheme, the Proposed City Plan 2030 will be reported to Planning Committee on 29 September for elected members to decide on officer recommendations for the strategy, proposals and polices for future development in the City of Edinburgh Council area.
If approved the Proposed Plan will then go on to its next statutory stage and be published to allow representations to be made. Details of the representation period and the engagement programme for it will be published with the Committee papers in advance of the meeting.
You can find more information on the project, including the ‘Choices for City Plan’ public consultation, at www.edinburgh.gov.uk/cityplan2030.
You can keep up to date with the City Plan project by:
As we enter into a new year with a vaccine gone into distribution, we would like to offer our best wishes to everyone for a better year ahead.
Whilst we look forward with optimism for a glimpse of normality, we would like to highlight the current circumstances of the service amid current lockdown restrictions.
Whilst a spring/summer lockdown of 2020 was challenging, the longer sunny days and warmth made the daily tasks of home working and home schooling seem bearable. Like many of you, we face these same tasks in the winter months, confined to our homes due to a dark, damp and cold climate, the challenges and strains have been intensified.
As a service, whilst continuing to offer the best customer experience that we can, current restrictions requires the continued closure of our offices and maintained remote working. Managers have recognised the extended challenges of this lockdown on all staff within the service from family life, care of vulnerable family and friends, childcare and home-schooling to those living alone, all in need of support. Consequently, the well-being and mental health of our staff within the service will continue to be prioritised. Approximately 40% of our staff have young children and dependants therefore, we expect elements of the service to experience delays as parents fulfil their daily duties however, we continue to do the best we can to minimise the disruption to the service.
Key elements of the service still continue and these include receiving, processing and assessing planning applications; City Plan 2030; planning enforcement; neighbour notifications; Planning helpdesk; DM sub-committee; and, the Local Review Body. Elements of the service that have been suspended include site visits, and site notices will be available online only. A small plea: if you are submitting an application, any contextual information including photos would be very helpful.
As a planning authority, we rely heavily on the input from colleagues within other services, agents/architects, consultants, stakeholders and communities. We recognise these same challenges will be faced by everyone. We offer our sincere understanding and continued willingness to work with you, optimising new forms of communication and alternative working arrangements.
We will continue to deliver the best possible planning service for our city however, given these challenging times and restrictive working environments, we ask for your continued patience and understanding for our staff.
We are preparing a new Local Development Plan for Edinburgh called City Plan 2030. This will set out policies and proposals for development in Edinburgh through to 2030. City Plan 2030 will set out how we develop our city sustainably over the next ten years.
Choices for City Plan
Our main engagement stage ‘Choices for City Plan 2030’ took place between January and April 2020. We received over 1800 responses to the consultation from organisations, community groups and members of the public. The responses to Choices for City Plan 2030 were reported to Planning Committee on 12 August 2020. The full Choices for City Plan consultation responses are available to view on our website.
City Plan 2030
We are now preparing the proposed City Plan 2030. The timetable for preparing the plan and how you can get involved in the next stage of the process is set out in our new Development Plan Scheme.
As set out in the DPS, a proposed plan is now expected to be presented to committee in February/March 2020.
Following publication of the proposed plan, the next stage of the plan preparation process allows for comment on the proposed Plan, this is called the period of representations. Representations can be submitted to the proposed plan, either supporting or seeking change to the policies and proposals set out in the plan.
The impact of the current health emergency on the period of representations to the proposed plan is not known at this stage. It is not known if social distancing and/or lockdown measures will be still in place in 2021 to enable traditional, in person, engagement to go ahead.
However, if possible, some, or all, of the following activities will be used to raise awareness and encourage people to have their say on the proposed plan:
● Launch of proposed plan
● Publicity to raise awareness of proposed plan
● Statutory neighbour notification
● Notification to those groups and individuals on the project mailing list telling them how to comment
● Staffed exhibitions in public places to raise awareness, if possible
● Drop-in sessions to allow opportunity to find out more about consultation proposals, if possible;
● Best practice online/digital engagement (as guided by the Scottish Government’s digital planning programme) which could include virtual exhibitions, a planning engagement hub, webinars and online events, and
An update to the Development Plan Scheme will be provided at the time of publishing the proposed plan with the full details on how you can submit a representation to the proposed plan.
Non-digital engagement – including opportunities to ask informal questions, telephone surgeries, printed newsletters, hard copies of documents, paper letters and engagement via other council services.
In the meantime, you can keep up to date with the City Plan Project by
● subscribing to this blog
● following us on twitter at @planningedin
● joining in the conversation by using the #cityplan2030 hashtag.
This is our latest update to the continuing changes to the planning service as we adapt to the restrictions needed during the COVID -19 outbreak.
Screenshot from our most recent online local review body.
Local review body
We have held our first meetings of the local review body online, held over Skype, to continue our statutory duty to process relevant appeals. Two have been held successfully and we will be continuing this format.
Screenshot from our most recent online development management sub-committee.
Development management sub-committee
Similarly, we have continued holding online meetings of the development management sub-committee and these will continue to be held over the summer.
Screenshot of the virtual planning appeal hearing held recently.
Planning hearing
We have taken part in a virtual planning appeal hearing, run by the Scottish Government’s Planning and Environmental Appeals Division. This was the first in Scotland and ran very smoothly in terms of technology. The webcast of the hearing is now available to view.
Weekly list
We have moved the publishing of the weekly list, showing all applications and decisions made, to an online format due to the restrictions on advertising. In addition to this, we are piloting a new interactive map which shows all applications and decisions in each weeks list.
We have received positive feedback on this new way to view planning applications. We would like to thank those of you who sent us your comments, which will help us evaluate the pilot.
Choices for City Plan
The consultation on our next local development plan, Choices for City Plan, received 1800+ responses. A new Development Plan Scheme setting out the timetable for the preparation of the proposed plan will be presented to committee this summer.
Planning help desk
We are now providing a planning help desk service by email at planning@edinburgh.gov.uk. We think this will be particularly useful to businesses looking for advice on planning as they adapt and emerge from lockdown in line with national changes.
Wellbeing survey
We have also carried out a staff wellbeing survey, completed by most of our colleagues, to help us get an idea of how we will support our staff to continue providing services and completing our projects while working from our homes.
We will be continuing to use this blog to provide updates, so please subscribe to receive further updates.
Presentation on a masterplan for housing at West Craigs at the most recent virtual Development Management Sub-committee
This is our latest update to the continuing changes to the planning service as we adapt to the restrictions needed during the COVID -19 outbreak.
Development Management Sub-Committee
This week saw our first ‘virtual’ meeting of the Development Management Sub-Committee. The meeting was webcast live and went pretty smoothly thanks to a lot of preparation by all concerned.
We’ve learned that it takes a lot more resource than traditional meetings in the City Chambers. Behind-the-screens work included having back-up planners on stand-by in case of IT issues, and partners/children/pets being banished from the house, or at least the wi-fi router.
The meeting allowed several important cases to be discussed by the elected members in the sub-committee. These include some key sites in the current Local Development Plan reaching significant milestones.
Discussion with councillors at the most recent virtual Development Management Sub-committee
We intend to hold virtual sub-committees on a regular basis from here on, which will allow us to make and issue decisions to support economic renewal and a positive future for the city.
Extended duration of Listed Building and Conservation Area Consents
The Coronavirus (Scotland) (No. 2) Bill has passed through the parliament and will soon become an Act. The Bill makes changes to some of the duties of public bodies. These changes will allow essential public services to continue to be delivered and support businesses and individuals in Scotland.
The Act will extend the duration of a listed building consent or a conservation area consent that would otherwise lapse during the emergency period because the works have not begun. The emergency period is the period beginning with the Act coming into force and ending on 6 October 2020.
Consents to which this applies will instead lapse at the end of an extended period which ends on 6 April 2021 unless works have begun before the end of the extended period.
Planning reform
Despite the restrictions around Coronavirus, work is still progressing on the implementation of the work programme for the Planning (Scotland) Act, which seeks to make changes to the Scottish planning system as part of a wider review of the system.
Two new provisions of the Planning (Scotland) Act are now in place. The first introduces a statutory requirement for certain types of development to include accessible toilet facilities which meet specific technical standards. Details of the standards and type of development this applies to can be found here, and this will now apply to these types of developments in Edinburgh as well as across Scotland.
The second introduces a power for planning authorities to designate parts of their council areas as short-term let control areas, as a further means of controlling where short-term lets may be permitted. There will need to further Council-wide discussions before we consider the use of this power. Details can be found here.
Further updates
We will continue to adapt and change our service as necessary to ensure we can continue working for the recovery of the city, such as with our previous updates to our pre-application service, weekly lists and site notices.
Please subscribe to the blog by email to receive further updates as soon as they are posted to stay up-to-date.
Planning Edinburgh 
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