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As developers contend with affordable housing requirements, biodiversity net gain obligations, and an ever-expanding list of planning conditions, supporting infrastructure is slipping down the list of priorities. In many cases it remains on the drawing board until the later stages of planning, only for significant issues to emerge that delay projects or require costly redesigns.
It is difficult to reconcile delays and inconsistencies in infrastructure support across developments with a national commitment to accelerate housing delivery. Even more so when the delays arise after planning permission has already been granted.
However, this is not because there is no desire to build infrastructure or make good communities and places for people to live. On the contrary, delays are often because of trying to make spaces more inclusive and better to live in, but the planning system compounds challenges such as technical approvals, planning permissions, and even having consistent staffing on projects throughout a process.
It is unfortunate that these delays have become increasingly common, adding substantial cost and uncertainty to projects and by extension, uncertainty to the contractors and subcontractors that rely heavily on keeping to schedule.
Utilities present a similar contradiction. Access to power is taking longer to secure and becoming significantly more expensive, yet the industry is simultaneously being encouraged to adopt electric plant and equipment to reduce emissions on site.
The power bottleneck for new developments also drastically impacts project delivery, causing delays for one third of businesses, increasing costs for 32 per cent and obstructing energy transition plans for a quarter. The ambition to decarbonise construction is the right one, but without investment in the supporting infrastructure, the industry is being asked to meet expectations that are often beyond its control.
None of this is an argument against higher environmental standards or better placemaking. The difficulty is that every additional policy requirement carries financial and programme implications, and those pressures are coming at a time when inflation, taxation, labour shortages and material costs continue to challenge project viability. Schemes that once appeared commercially sound can quickly become complicated. When delays within the planning system and utility provision are added to that equation, it leaves developers with difficult decisions about whether projects can proceed at all.
This uncertainty highlights that greater emphasis must be placed on the systems enabling development to happen: faster technical approvals, better coordination between planning authorities, utility providers and developers, and earlier collaboration across the project team to ensure infrastructure is designed and
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