An AI tool is being developed by councils in Cambridge to help analyse feedback on planning policy.
Greater Cambridge Shared Planning (GCSP), a link-up between South Cambridgeshire district and Cambridge city councils, is pioneering the development of a new tool, in conjunction with the University of Liverpool to process and summarise thousands of comments received on documents such as those submitted on Local Plans.
The project to develop the tool, known as Large Language Model (LLM), has funding from Funded the Government’s PropTech Innovation Fund. As well as expertise from the University of Liverpool, there will be additional input from Anglia Ruskin University and the University of Cambridge, which is funded by the AI@Cam initiative.
Cllr Dr. Tumi Hawkins, lead cabinet member for planning for South Cambridgeshire District Council, said: “With Greater Cambridge Shared Planning being one of the first local authorities in the UK to develop its own bespoke LLM, the aim is to provide more reliable and meaningful insights into what people in the area think about proposed developments and planning policies.”
She added: “In the last two consultations on the emerging Greater Cambridge Local Plan, around 19,000 comments were submitted by residents, community associations, parish councils, developers, and other stakeholders.
“Reviewing such a large number of responses takes a considerable amount of time, especially where responses include technical documents. It also means it takes a long time for people to see how the councils have responded to their comments as the Local Plan progresses through the various plan making stages.”
The AI tool is seen as a faster, more efficient way to summarise comments but GCSP says there will be safeguards to prevent misrepresentations and incorrect information.
Cllr Katie Thornburrow, executive councillor for planning, building control and infrastructure at Cambridge City Council, said: “Ultimately, the new tool will help us make more informed and more efficient decisions, whilst ensuring that the views of local communities continue to play a key role in helping to shape the new Local Plan and other planning documents.
“This initiative is a step forward in using modern technology to create a more inclusive planning system that listens to and serves the needs of the community.”
Professor Alexander Lord, lever chair at the University of Liverpool, said: “Few aspects of public policy arouse such strong feelings in local communities as planning and so it will be very important for us to develop technologies that we can all be confident represent citizens’ views accurately.
“Our goal with this project is to create a tool that allows the planning service to lead the way in harnessing AI to enhance the public’s engagement with the planning system.”
Image: Jernej Furman from Slovenia, CC BY 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons.
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