BA (Hons) URBAN AND ENVIRONMENTAL PLANNING

This module focusses on the legal, policy and political framework of Development Management, the nature of development and the process the planner manages including pre application, validation, applications, public consultation, decision making, planning obligations, appeals and public enquiries, judicial review and enforcement. It considers the nature of these processes and the role and skills of the planner and the various stakeholders involved them.

A module which examines the challenges faced when trying to make places more sustainable and encourage appropriate forms of future development. A week long residential field study visit, currently to Cornwall, is integral to the module and provides the opportunity to explore sustainability issues with professionals engaged on live projects.

This module is concerned about people, places and the creative aspects of ‘spatial planning’ that underpin the current belief that ‘good planning’ and ‘good design are inseparable’. After a critical historical overview of the forces that shaped the built environment over time, the module will focus on the principles of urban design as a process of place making. Students will be introduced to the assessment of the character and qualities of places and to various ideas on how the experience and understanding of places and their elements can be visually communicated through plans and other media.

The module provides an introduction to the way the planning system and planning practices have evolved in the UK. The module combines an historical approach with a critical consideration of the key attributes of the planning system as it emerged and developed after the Town and Country Planning Act 1947. Alongside this engagement with the development of the statutory planning system is an introductory examination of how the principles guiding planning practices have evolved.

This module introduces students to the structures, networks and relationships that underpin contemporary society, and how these are reflected and mediated geographically. It aims to explore key ideas that help us understand how places are structured and created. It will examine processes of economic, social and cultural change and academic attempts to conceptualize these shifts.

A module which examines a range of ways in which geographical information is produced and communicated, with an emphasis on developing students’ skills.  It includes a focus on Geographical Information Systems (GIS) and how planners and other relevant agencies, stakeholders and interest groups, compile, represent and use geographical data.

This module focusses on environmental issues and examines potential responses aimed at securing more sustainable patterns of development and resource efficiency and adaptation to and mitigation of climate change.

On this module you'll focus on the importance of modes of transport for patterns of land-use and the construction of a sustainable future.   You'll also examine how issues of power and equality underpin mobility: who can move, how and in what ways.

This module explores economic development at a local level in terms of both theory and practice, considering the internal and external factors influencing local economies. Students will consider both research and policy responses to local economic change, particularly with regard to the role of planning in local economic development. The module will explore the complex economic factors shaping local areas and provide students with the tools to interrogate them and form recommendations for how a local authority can intervene.

The module focuses on the role of the planning system in delivering housing. In doing so, the module considers the interrelationships between national, regional and local housing strategies and the delivery and implementation of residential development.

This module focuses on the importance of place and the challenges involved in regenerating urban and (to a lesser extent) rural environments facing issues of decline and restructuring. The role of local scale interventions and strategies through planning and regeneration agencies is a key focus. The module is based around regeneration issues in the UK and a residential field study visit in a European city.

A module that enable students to reflect critically upon a period of work experience so as to enhance their future employability.  In addition to staff advice and contact the student will gain the support of the University’s Employability Service.

This module investigates the role, nature, benefits and disadvantages of evidence-based planning and policy making. It equips students with the ability to choose and employ appropriate planning related research techniques and methodologies and to able to write a research proposal.

The module will develop understandings of real estate knowledge, by focusing on the development process, markets, and valuation. By developing an understanding of methods and applications of development viability appraisals, the module will pay attention to the economics of land and property markets and of the development process.

The module compares and contrasts key challenges facing spatial planners across a range of international settings and the extent to which both the challenges and the policy responses are mobile across international borders. A range of planning cultures and planning practices will be examined in order to facilitate a comparative analysis of diverse approaches to planning in different contexts. The module primarily explores spatial planning at the strategic level. In practice this can refer to planning activities at the regional, national and international levels.

This module explores the ways in which the changing geographies of cities have been conceptualised and represented across a range of written and visual media through history. The implications of such representations for policy and practice, particularly for spatial planning, are a central theme of the module.

This is a double weighted module that runs over two semesters. In it, students will carry out an independent academic research project supported by supervisions and seminars. This is an opportunity for students to develop their own specialist interests and exhibit their individual expertise, knowledge, and research skills. Students will be encouraged to gather and analyse primary data.