Rethinking planning for growth and infrastructure delivery: Pathways for spatial development strategies

This report explores how England’s new spatial development strategies (SDSs) can help deliver national ambitions for housing growth, infrastructure delivery, economic development, and Net Zero. Introduced through recent planning and devolution reforms, SDSs are intended to operate at a larger-than-local scale, coordinating housing, transport, energy, water, digital infrastructure, and environmental priorities across functional economic areas.

The report argues that current planning arrangements are often fragmented, with different sectors operating across mismatched boundaries, timescales, and evidence bases. These issues, combined with skills shortages, limited strategic capacity, and short-term decision-making, can delay investment and constrain growth. SDSs are presented as a means of providing a long-term, place-based framework that aligns growth ambitions with infrastructure capacity and investment decisions.

Based on extensive stakeholder engagement, the report identifies six essential components of effective strategic planning: long-term strategic direction; foresight and resilience planning; robust and shared data; cross-sector and multi-scale alignment; organisational capacity and skills; and delivery, monitoring, and stewardship.

The report concludes that SDSs should be treated as active, evolving frameworks rather than static planning documents. Supported by digital tools, shared data, stronger governance, and ongoing monitoring, they can provide greater certainty for investors, improve coordination across sectors, and help authorities deliver growth and infrastructure more effectively over the long term.

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