The city of York has launched ‘New City Beautiful’- a vision document for York drawn up by a team led by urbanist Professor Alan Simpson.
The vision plans to create a car-free city that will compete with international cities of the world.
The report has now been approved by members of the …

The government’s regional growth fund will fail to support regeneration given the scale of public spending cuts, the chief executive of Centre for Cities has said.
Alexandra Jones, head of policy research group Centre for Cities, said at today’s Public Property Summit in London that the £1.4bn regional growth fund was …

Local authorities need to be realistic about what their region can support if they want to attract retail development, a conference in London has heard.
Speakers in a session on retail at the Public Property Summit, run by PublicPropertyUK.com and Property Week, said that there was a gap between what the …

The London Development Agency is set to cut 216 workers as its 2011-12 budget is set to be reduced by around two-thirds.
The LDA today told workers that the number of staff next year would be reduced from 324 to 108 workers.
It also said its budget would be £56m in 2011-12, …

England’s regional development agencies have lost 424  staff in total since the general election in May, Public Property UK can reveal.
The bodies, which are due to be abolished by April 2012 and employ around 2,500 staff, have recently finished a first wave of voluntary redundancies and are set to cut …

The government is set to spend up to £1.4bn over the next four years on regional development agency projects and the cost of dismantling the regeneration bodies.
The government has today confirmed that it will be forced to keep spending on the doomed regional development agencies until 2015. It will also …

The Lee Valley Regional Park Authority has begun the search for a developer to lead the redevelopment of a 126 acre leisure complex in Edmonton, London.
The body wants a leisure developer to propose an “innovative” masterplan for the  redevelopment of the Lee Valley Leisure Centre site. It is currently the …

The Greater London Assembly has today demanded “urgent clarification” following reports that the London Development Agency was set to lose its £156m non-Olympics budget in the next financial year.
Len Duvall, the chair of the London Assembly’s economic development, culture, sport and tourism committee has written to the mayor’s economic development …

Birmingham City Council is set lose 79 full-time posts as it merges its planning and regeneration departments into a single team.
Its plan will mean cutting the team by one third, and setting up smaller planning and regeneration teams based in different areas across the city. It means all staff in …

John Richards has been appointed as the non-executive chairman of the Torbay Development Agency.
Richards is the former chief executive of Hammerson and is currently president of the British Property Federation.
Richards said: “My roots are here in the West Country, and this is the perfect chance for me to ‘put something …