A new report suggests post-pandemic working habits mean the built environment sector should prepare for 40% homeworking. Greg Mitchell, executive planning director at Summix, explores the future of work
It has been 70 years since the first residents settled in to the Monkswood and Broom Barns Estates in Stevenage in the early 1950s. They were pioneers in the UK’s New Town movement – an ambitious post-war social engineering project which would go on to change the lives of thousands of people.
Arguably, it delivered the biggest shake-up to our interaction with the built environment for generations – that is, perhaps, until Covid came along.
It has been three years since the first lockdown in the UK. Although the virus is mostly behind us, I believe the long-term effects of post-pandemic working habits will have a similarly momentous impact on where and when we work, and how we interact with the built environment.
The pandemic encouraged a move to remote, home, and flexible work
The pandemic ushered in an immediate move to remote, home and flexible work. People quickly came to appreciate the benefits and resisted the environmental, quality of life and cost-of-living challenges associated with heading back into the office.
The Future of Work report commissioned by Summix set out to explore these changing habits in relation to homeworking pre- and post-Covid, and how planners, developers and the wider built environment industry should respond.
If the industry is to keep abreast of post-pandemic working habits, the private and public sectors will need to take an evidence-based approach to inform and shape the design of future development.
Britain’s “hidden” business parks
Our report findings show almost one-third of all UK workers now work mostly from home – and calls for the sector to prepare for levels of 40% homeworking in the long term. It also identified an increase in “tribrid” working, where professionals will divide their time across the home, the office and flexible working locations, which has effectively created “hidden” business parks in many residential areas across the country.
While certain areas – such as office space – have suffered negative impacts from these changes, there is a huge opportunity for those planning for new settlements or urban regeneration. The built environment sector is well-placed to unlock these benefits from the changes in working patterns through adopting a more thoughtful approach to placemaking for communities.
Answering how, where and when we work and live is fundamental to making sure we can plan for new development in the most effective way possible. Building the right homes in the right places is critical, but it should also provide the necessary connectivity and amenities to meet people’s needs while improving sustainability. That could come in the form of redeveloping redundant office space to create co-working, housing and amenities. It could also be achieved through a human-centric approach to designing new homes and developments, creating dedicated home offices and co-working facilities to better accommodate the future of work.
Making sure we protect the environment, have decent public transport links and provide sufficient education and health facilities are just a few of the considerations factored into this equation.
How development can respond to shifting post-pandemic work patterns
We hope businesses, policymakers, the development industry and the wider public find the report findings useful in rethinking how we shape and design new development – making sure we can realise the huge environmental, social and economic opportunities on offer from the changes in working patterns we have witnessed over the past few years.
This will improve our ability to respond to people’s needs but, crucially, it will also maximise the potential of the built environment. Adopting this approach to planning and development (at scale) has the potential to be a catalyst for the UK economy, while at the same time leading to greater levels of sustainability.
As with the New Towns reacting to the destruction of the Second World War, all of this begs the question: does the UK need a similarly ambitious vision for placemaking in response to the continuing post-pandemic housing crisis?
For more information on Summix’s Future of Work report, please click here.
Greg Mitchell
Executive planning director
Summix
Tel: +44 (0)20 7647 6220
info@summix.com
