That makes this a technology landing issue, rather than a technology platform issue.
Sharp says that type of understanding is still a long way off.. How long will it take to modernise planning?.Jack Ricketts says it isn’t currently known how long digitising the planning process will take because of the financial investment required.
However, there are plans for an application to Innovate UK and their Smart Grant funding programme.Of course, digitising the entire planning process is an enormous goal, and for efficiency’s sake, the process will have to begin with a single use case.Ricketts feels the best and most informative starting point is building safety, highlighting MHCLG’s external wall system survey as a good example of data collection and collation..
The MHCLG project asked local authorities to research and report back on the materials present in the external walls of all buildings above 18 metres within a particular borough.Although it sounds like a straightforward task, in reality it presented some unexpectedly complex questions and issues to surmount.
What is a building?
Is it the postal address?These may sound like very different clients with very different problems, but what we have found is that their challenges are very similar: they all need a solution to a problem that is difficult to articulate because a lot of people are involved, with different values and different perspectives..
The solution is beyond the competence of any single individual designer.It requires knowledge and expertise from a wide range of stakeholders.
Important decisions must be based on evidence, and we have to build a shared understanding of the problem and an agreement on the best solution throughout the process.Then at the end of the process, we produce a detailed but understandable account explaining why the proposed solution is the best.
(Editor: New Masks)