Digital Betterment: Modelling planning viability & developer contributions​

The idea of ‘betterment’ in statutory planning is a well-established but poorly understood principle. The UK Government has published intentions to replace the current complex system of developer contributions. The current approach can comprise both a standard locally fixed ‘Community Infrastructure Levy’ (CIL) and a variable case-by-case negotiated ‘section 106 agreement’ (s106) for affordable housing, plus a mix of direct costs, ‘policy costs’ and in-kind contributions.
Thus, reforms are an attempt to simplify, clarify and give certainty to the level of developer contributions for any significant application and constitute a broader move from a negotiated or discretionary planning system to a defined, coded or ‘Euclid’ system. With a new focus on precision, this change in emphasis potentially facilitates a semi-automated digital calculation process. In response, this paper introduces work on an emerging digital ‘betterment’ model developed through a collaboration between academia and industry that breaks down this complex process into its composite stages, tasks and clarifies the decisions taken and the data / evidence used at each stage of the process, utilising open source, statutory planning, and commercial databases. The workings of the digital model are demonstrated through a comparison between the emerging ‘Infrastructure Levy’ and the blend of s106 and fixed CIL, using costed case studies of typical applications with key cost components broken down into (1) land, (2) construction, (3) betterment, and (4) developer profit. We demonstrate the potential of a reproducible and adaptable digital ‘viability model’ that responds to local demand for developer contributions and plan viability through statutory planning in England.