It’s Planning Time!

It’s Planning Time! printed invitations at Neighbourhood Supper Club, April 2026

After 6 years of dreaming, designing, rehearsing, and building together with you all, the first planning application for the Neighbourhood Public Square site (2026/01280/PA) went live on 21st April 2026. This application was for the change of use, enabling works to repair and reinforce the existing buildings, and retrospective planning for temporary structures to learn, prototype, and co-build together on site.

This defining step marked a shift that the past decade of our collective organising has been in service of, and the next decade will be committed to, following the purchase of the freehold for the site at the end of 2024 and building upon research, practice and rooted organising together as Impact Hub Birmingham and CIVIC SQUARE since 2015.

This planning permission would kickstart the beginning of a phased retrofit of the existing buildings of this former waste transfer station to demonstrate regenerative civic infrastructure at the heart of Ladywood, Birmingham, co-building and democratising access to the spaces, tools and resources for a bold, imaginative, distributed transition, held in common with the neighbourhood.

Design & Access Statement on public display at The Floating Front Room, May 2026

When the application opened for public comment, we only had 21 days to direct people to Birmingham City Council’s Planning Online portal to formally submit their messages of support from near and far, their ideas about what the Neighbourhood Public Square site could enable, or any concerns or questions they had for us to be able to address or adapt to.

The Neighbourhood Public Square: Explore The Planning Application page we created was supported by an open campaign online, printed invitations through doors, a public exhibition, and dedicated neighbourhood events to discuss and find out more about the application together in a relaxed setting, including Neighbourhood Supper Club and a (gloriously sunny) weekend at The Floating Front Room.

So many of you came down to share your views, stories about the site, ask questions and find out more; from those who have followed along and travelled alongside us for years, to those who learnt about the vision for this special site for the first time via the planning process.

The Floating Front Room: It’s Planning TIme! May 2026

The incredible young people in our Design & Construction Club put up their own reimagined planning notices as posters on site, side by side with the official planning notice, following explorations about the role of planning and how young people can shape these processes more directly in their own neighbourhoods with the brilliant MATT+FIONA, which you can see a little further down this page.

A huge thanks to all who shared their thoughts, feedback, ideas, dreams, questions and challenges in a range of ways, with the invitation to continue to do so as we build together over the long term.

**Whilst comments on the planning application are now closed, we are still awaiting the decision from Birmingham City Council.

Please cross your fingers for us!**

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It’s Planning Time Invitation

This printed invitation invited local residents, those attending Neighbourhood Public Club and The Floating Front Room to comment directly on the planning application, using the materials in Neighbourhood Public Square: Explore The Planning Application to illuminate planning and act as a how to guide, alongside clear times and places to chat about it in person too, over a cuppa, a meal, to bring questions, curiosity and creativity to this collective process together.

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View the It’s Planning Time! print invitation in full:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1UCWfc7JtUca2y543iZg79MzxT41F3uly/view

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Online Campaign

We playfully utilised the visual language of a formal planning notice to open up the news of the planning application going live as soon as possible. For us this application was far from just an administrative step, but an exciting, alive, gratitude-filled milestone moment in our long term organising, side by side with the countless peers and movements working joyfully, creatively, collectively with determination, grit, and endless resourcefulness to equip their places for the possibilities and challenges ahead in so many different ways, against the odds, over the long term, up and down the UK, including securing land into the hands of the people who live there.

As we prepared to begin a new chapter of organising, learning, graft, craft, safety, care, deep reimagination and endless possibility together ahead, making the preparations to begin construction of Neighbourhood Public Square, we both practically and imaginatively amplified the planning application, but also invited you to explore how we got here together, as one part of a connection story for so many places, as outlined further in The Land Story So Far.

One thing has remained constant across this journey, now spanning 15 years; there has never been any us without you.

It continues to be a privilege to steward this work alongside so many of you organising across the neighbourhood, our city, and around the world. Huge thanks and solidarity with all who continue to bring their energy, wisdom and collective power together towards more just and regenerative futures; from local resistance and grit, to global reimagination and re-entanglement.

Here’s to deepening relation, ambition, rigour and solidarity for the worlds known to be possible, together throughout 2026 and beyond. As this year stretches before us, the work ahead asks us to keep turning toward each other — to build, retrofit, adapt, and take courageous steps together. In deep, collective gratitude and solidarity, let us be the folks to do so together; to create something new in this moment.

Neighbourhood Public Square: Explore The Planning Application

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