Fields of planning action: housing, economy and infrastructure

Here three core fields of planning activity are analysed, to excavate the political and ideological forces in play in each case. The fields are housing, commercial development (industry, retail, warehousing) and infrastructure (transport, energy). It is argued that central ideological structuring is important in all three fields, given the power of central government financing and regulation in most areas. There is scope nevertheless for the formation of some variation in local political and ideological landscapes. This may affect for example local policies on housing or on welcoming or otherwise of economic development, or policies on retail investment. However this is generally constrained. In each field case examples are given from English localities, including town centre retail schemes, large warehousing projects, highway schemes and power station developments.