There is a recognised need in international and national legislation and policy for more sustainable waste management practices, which will involve more minimisation, re-use, recycling and treatment methods that extract value from wastes, and less disposal of waste to landfill.
The planning system has a role to play in delivering more sustainable waste management by providing the spatial framework through which to identify and plan for the necessary waste management facilities.
As part of the preparation of their Local Development Framework (LDF), the London Borough of Tower Hamlets therefore needs to find and allocate sufficient sites/areas with the Borough to accommodate new waste management facilities required to meet future waste arisings. However, alongside the need to identify land for additional waste facilities in Tower Hamlets, as it lies partly within the ‘Thames Gateway’ it is also required to respond to the national priority for regeneration and growth, thus there are competing interests for available land in the Borough.
LUC was commissioned in late 2008 to provide waste planning advice to Tower Hamlets to inform the development of their waste policies and site allocations for the Local Development Framework.
Local Development Framework documents must be based on sound evidence. Our work provides this important evidence base for waste policies within Tower Hamlets’ LDF. It describes the amount of different waste types and future waste management capacity requirements that Tower Hamlets needs to plan for. It also quantifies how much land would be needed to meet the future waste management capacity requirements apportioned to the Borough in the 2008 London Plan, and describes the site assessment process (incorporating Sustainability Appraisal) used to identify potentially suitable sites for allocation for strategic waste management uses in the Core Strategy.
For more information on the Core Strategy go to: http://www.towerhamlets.gov.uk/lgsl/851-900/856_local_development_framewor/core_strategy.aspx
