When Jack Ricketts contacted her about his desire to digitise planning, it seemed a perfect opportunity..
Standardise and digitise (as far as possible and/or desirable) the rules under which designs are - by different parties - created, submitted, assessed, consulted on, amended, approved and ultimately built.. Agree the interoperable standard datasets that will enable this, and how to generate and use them.. As already said, the aim of this project is not to create a single solution for this process; we do not believe a single solution is in anyone’s best interests.We are interested in realising the environment within which one or multiple solutions can be developed and operate together.. To date we have focused on scoping each stage of the process and developing a demo version of how a digital planning process would operate.
The demo version is a series of dashboards showing how sets of interoperable data will enable the planning process at its various stages; which elements can be automated and which will require human intervention; and where we can connect with existing solutions.. Standardising and digitising the rules and datasets will enable us to move from demo to reality.. As said earlier, this is not a question of starting from scratch (or reinventing the wheel): the data already generated through the use of BIM and 3D modelling will form the basis of this process.Established formats such as BCF already allow for rich data sharing (although they are not always used to achieve this).The task that lies ahead – and the project that will fundamentally reshape the landscape – is to define shared underlying rules that will allow the existing parts to connect, and facilitate the creation of new applications to plug the gaps and create onward connections.. Impact on key planning roles.
A digitised planning process will not replace humans with computers.Creating standardised data or the means of standardising existing data across the planning process will enable us to automate those elements which are machine-readable (eg to assess whether standard information supplied by the architect/designer is complete and compliant), and then transparent decision-making by planners.
(And by extension – this can encompass building control, health and safety and other types of compliance checking.).
This degree of automation will not remove the requirement for human judgement and discretion in planning decisions.At BMW and Volkswagen a common car chassis is used across all models.
It’s the finer details that change from car to car - the wheels, trim, engine, bodywork… Similarly, Ikea use a limited kit of components to create their various pieces of furniture.It doesn’t matter whether you’re making a bed, wardrobe or bookcase, most of the connecting pieces are the same.
Construction Platforms allow us to apply this same type of thinking to built assets.Yes, those assets require flexibility, but the need for flexibility doesn’t have to be at odds with standardisation.