Fix your masterplan in seven steps (without having to start again)
We are living in a period of sustained uncertainty. Macroeconomic events such as austerity, Brexit, Covid-19, the cost of living crisis and climate change have brought profound changes to our towns, cities, high streets, and communities. Masterplans developed just two years ago may already be out of touch with the challenges we face today and the future we expect to see.
Investment into some of these masterplans may seem like a waste of valuable and increasingly scarce resources. However, rather than discarding such work, a strategic review can identify areas for improvement that adapt a seemingly outdated masterplan to suit today’s challenges and future needs. This is particularly pertinent when it comes to pressure on viability.
At PRD, we are collaborating with clients to update masterplans to make them fit for purpose. Our work enables them to support new investment and drives future economic growth, providing a stable foundation for communities to thrive. This approach combines PRD’s specialist socio-economic and development viability expertise to find holistic and deliverable solutions. Based on our recent experience, we have identified seven essential steps to fix a masterplan.
1. Refresh the evidence base
Recent events have shown us that a lot can change in a couple of years. Reviewing the latest social, economic, environmental and market data can illuminate new facts about places and how communities have experienced change. It can also help identify triggers for action as a foundation for the masterplan.
Public sources such as the ONS, NHS, Consumer Data Research Centre, and Urban Big Data Centre regularly release new data and evidence about communities and local economies. Our public sector clients are also increasingly keen and able to access innovative data from private sector providers, such as footfall and spending. For example, for several years we have supported the GLA’s High Streets Data Service, which provides greater insight into how London’s high streets are evolving.
A masterplan can respond effectively to such evidence where there is a strong and well-articulated wider economic growth strategy for a city or region. We question how development delivers against place-specific challenges and opportunities and addresses local needs and political priorities. Put simply, who are these buildings for?
2. Integrate, deliver, and measure social impact
Social impact has a fundamental role in shaping inclusive and successful places. Our view is that when considered early, this can drive both commercial and social success measures. Integrating a social impact strategy and framework into the masterplan from the start—together with existing and incoming communities—sets a solid foundation for building a place that is characterful and attractive to residents, visitors, new businesses, and investment.
As implementation unfolds, continuously monitoring social impact and its outcomes is crucial. It is powerful to articulate the impact of the masterplan to stakeholders externally and is also an internal tool for any adjustments or pivots throughout delivery and beyond. By adopting a flexible, responsive framework, the masterplan can maximise its social and public value impact over time.
3. Review commercial viability
Viability has undoubtedly declined in recent years, and this has affected infrastructure-hungry projects such as strategic masterplans. Whilst construction costs have risen by around 10% annually, revenue growth has slumped, impacting development appraisals nationwide and eroding the commercial viability of many projects. This is further compounded by higher borrowing costs and a weakened investment market.
However, when a long-term scheme is no longer viable in today’s terms this does not mean delivery is impossible. Creativity is required to consider how successive phases may become viable across long-term time horizons with particular focus and effort invested in early phase success. Development must drive long-term value through innovation and placemaking and address infrastructure requirements in close partnership with public sector partners.
Improving viability may mean reconsidering the overall residential and non-residential offer, including housing types and different products and tenures. Our work often drives at balancing the competing priorities around keeping build costs down whilst still aiming to shift the dial where there is a need to ‘market make’ in projects. In recent years, rather than a fixed masterplan, it is often more effective to outline development options through a framework masterplan to allow for greater flexibility through delivery phases.
We know that each successive recent government has supported regeneration by investing in areas that would otherwise be unviable where there is a strong and evidence-backed business case. Our approach to viability considers the changing political and funding landscape of central government as well as the new and emerging opportunities around devolution.
When we consider viability for a masterplan, we also consider its business case through the HMS Treasury Green Book lens. Our experience has supported our clients to unlock more than £130m of government funding over the last three years. Key to driving projects forward is the articulation of the direct and indirect economic value of development to attract multiple sources of funding.
4. Develop a meanwhile and adaptive reuse strategy
The adaptive reuse of buildings and consideration of meanwhile use is fundamental and increasingly valuable to the delivery of any masterplan. A coherent approach to reusing buildings and activating places can reduce estate management costs but more importantly build the pipeline of non-residential uses needed to animate and support value growth in the development over time. Meanwhile space also provides ultimate flexibility to test new approaches and support businesses and communities that otherwise would not be able to access conventional commercial units.
Meanwhile space can often be the cornerstone of creating and growing value. It can bridge important links between the past and future of a place and can help reduce climate impacts by respecting the embodied carbon within our existing buildings.
- Read our thinking on this with our regular collaborators at REDO, which is actively being put into practice by us and others around the country.
5. Invest in the public realm and the spaces between the buildings
Much of the life that characterises an area and determines its vibrancy happens at the ground level, in the places and spaces between buildings. However, masterplans often focus on the use class and value of the buildings, and public realm remains a secondary consideration.
Prioritising investment in the public realm will create attractive places people want to be in or visit. This can support commercial metrics such as protecting value and market absorption as well as help people feel safer and more connected to a wider community. For example, a new public park drives change, including resetting perceptions of a place and catalysing the next stages of development.
6. Prioritise, rationalise, and phase infrastructure
Our work often considers essential infrastructure to enable development and support placemaking objectives. Whilst infrastructure is often perceived as a barrier to the delivery of serviced plots, it can be a huge opportunity transform a place. Infrastructure can take a number of forms, including highways, bridges, walking and cycling infrastructure, public realm creation, and enabling works such as site remediation and demolition.
A focused review of infrastructure is critical to unpacking how a masterplan might be adapted to be made deliverable and viable. Our approach prioritises long-term phasing, and where possible, a diversified approach to funding (whether this is consideration of different governmental department budgets as well as private investment). Ultimately, the task is to ‘break down’ the infrastructure cost burden over time and among funders, alongside a prioritised approach to what is most important in early phases.
By looking at the masterplan through a business case lens, as in step 3, we can leverage the future positive outcomes and benefits that early infrastructure delivery can unlock.
7. Get creative with partnerships
The public sector, despite its ever-diminishing resources, has increasingly been responsible for addressing the challenges facing our communities. However, no organisation can tackle these issues in isolation. Collaboration and partnership working across the public, private and third sectors is now more crucial than ever.
Partnerships can be tailored to deliver a wide range of outcomes, from social impact to meanwhile use to commercial development. They are essential for making progress and should be planned for from the start of a project. Good partnerships take continuous planning and a commitment from each partner to play clear and consistent roles in delivery. Doing this requires honesty about the abilities, limitations, and risk management responsibilities of each party—and developing a partnership structure that makes the most of each partner’s capacity and expertise. While partnerships will mean new ways of working and different roles from the day-to-day, especially for local authority partners, they can be highly effective for masterplan delivery.
- Our best practice for Public Private Partnerships with regular collaborators Newbridge Advisors sets out practical guidance for all stages of partnership working. Read more here.
Written by Martin Woodhouse. Contact Martin for a conversation about the masterplan for your place or community: martin.woodhouse@prdemail.co.uk
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