This paper assesses how far community led rural visions accord with the current thrust of rural planning policy delivery in the UK. Adapting conventional visioning methods, qualitative techniques were used on eight different communities across urban, exurban and rural Wales to elicit views relating to the kind of local countryside(s) that were desired. The results show that the communities' visions reflect an emerging consensus around local countryside priorities: multifunctionality, integration, wider countryside protection, development based on need, and local distinctiveness according with the thrust of current planning policy at national and local levels. However, there is a clear dichotomy between this and the reality of what communities actually experienced in developments affecting their countryside. Here, universal criticism was encountered over the type, pace and scale of development, the lack of rural specificity and the failure to take account of local community needs and priorities. It is hypothesized that tensions between national and local politics and stakeholder power relations are playing a crucial role in distorting the delivery of town and country planning. It is recommended that rural policy delivery must become more ''joined up'' and rural proofed at national and local levels concomitant with a change in the operational culture of agencies at the forefront of rural delivery. Essentially, effective engagement of top down approaches synergising with bottom up community led ideas is long overdue.
In England attention has focussed on the socio-economic status of larger seaside towns, with a Government enquiry into Coastal Towns and associated research 1 , national research on seaside resorts 2 and, in the North West, research underpinning regional tourism and economic policy 3 . However, smaller and non-resort coastal communities have largely been overlooked, so in 2009 the North West Coastal Forum and 4NW commissioned research 4 to address this gap by establishing a baseline picture of the North West region's coastal communities, their socio-economic and environmental value, issues and opportunities. The research was steered by a range of stakeholder organisations. A representative sample of 47 coastal settlements was agreed with population ranging from under 500 to 705,000. 21 datasets were brought together under the themes of 'People', 'Work' and 'Place'. Analysis of the datasets led to a typology for coastal settlements which was tested with local stakeholders at area-based workshops. The four resulting typologies are: Larger Urban Areas; Maritime Towns; Working Towns by the Sea; Settlements of Choice. This typology fits with, but adds greatly to, the national picture emerging from studies of resort towns. It provides a baseline against which to measure progress and evidence-based policy guidance for each type of community identified. This is important as the national policy focus applies to only one of the diverse settlement types on the North West's coast. The results of the research have contributed to policy development at a regional 5 and local level. Similar methodology can usefully be applied to any geographic region.
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