ABSTRACT

Like many towns and cities whose development and growth burgeoned during the twentieth century, London, UK, codified a land use planning policy framework to protect and conserve a parks and green space network with two key objectives: to provide citizens with opportunities for outdoor amenity and recreation; and to protect the heritage of natural and designed landscapes from the impacts of urban sprawl and increasing density of development. This approach has served the city well and has become a core tenet of land-use planning policy. It has been defended by a host of powerful and respected lobbies concerned with the protection of parks and the conservation of nature, and it provides a set of principles which should remain at the heart of city planning in the foreseeable future.