The Friday Five 28.01.22
It’s the Friday Five - five of the best town planning jobs on Planner Jobs this week, along with a selection of ‘fun facts’ associated with each location. This week, we’ve gone all musical…
1. PLANNER (POLICY), LONDON BOROUGH OF LAMBETH
Location: Lambeth, central/south London
The job: “This is an exciting opportunity to join Lambeth’s policy and place-shaping team and support the council’s ambitious planning service as it embraces the digital agenda and responds to national changes to the planning system.
“Lambeth is a vibrant inner London borough that attracts significant investment and offers a wide range of challenges and opportunities. The successful candidate will report to the principal planner (information and research) and be a key part of the council’s planning policy team. Their work will encompass monitoring of planning data and development trends alongside opportunities to gain experience across a wide range of policy work, such as providing policy advice on planning applications, assisting in the development and review of development plan policy and guidance, and assisting in responding to consultations on national legislation and policy and regional policy and guidance.”
Fun fact: There’s no shortage of mentions of Brixton (home of Lambeth Town Hall) in popular music – from The Clash’s The Guns of Brixton to Taylor Swift’s "nights out in Brixton" in London Boy.
Perhaps the most memorable, and real, however, is the reference to a particular street in the south London district. Eddy Grant’s Electric Avenue, which hit number 2 in the UK and US charts in 1983, refers to the first market street to be lit by electricity. In the early 1980s, however, it was synonymous with the racial tensions and urban energy that was characteristic of many inner cities.
Grant’s song was specifically a response to the notorious Brixton riots of April 1981. These emerged out of aggressive policing against the large African-Caribbean community in an area scarred by racism, unemployment, poor housing, lack of amenities and high crime rates. This in turn gave rise to the famous Scarman Report, which warned that “urgent action” was needed to reverse these trends and which led to a new code of conduct for police.
Electric Avenue, though upbeat and catchy, doesn’t shy away from these realities and talks openly about violence and poverty in Brixton. It was Grant’s biggest international hit, though he continues to perform, innovate and run a successful recording studio.
2. SENIOR PLANNING ENFORCEMENT OFFICER, FOREST OF DEAN DISTRICT COUNCIL
Location: Coleford, Gloucestershire
The job: “We are looking to recruit a senior planning enforcement officer to provide technical expertise, planning advice and direction to internal and external customers when solving problems or managing risks.
“In this role you will apply a high level of expert knowledge within a technical area of expertise and manage sensitive, open ended and complex case or project based work. You will also be required to deal with enquiries and complaints relating to all forms of development and breaches of planning control and give advice to members of the public and others, including, those responsible for a breach, and try to find ways to resolve the breach.”
Fun fact: Musician and actor Olly Alexander, of Years & Years and It’s a Sin fame, grew up in Coleford, Gloucestershire, where his mother co-founded the annual Coleford Music Festival. Past performers at the festival have included The Four Tops, Enter Shikari and, of course, Olly Alexander.
Born in 1990, Alexander’s acting career got under way with the 2008 film Summerhill about the radical boarding school. He quickly blossomed and by 2013 was appearing in Skins and playing Peter Pan in the West End alongside Judi Dench.
In 2021 he played the lead role in the critically-acclaimed Russell T Davies AIDS drama It’s a Sin, which led many to call for Alexander to be given a BAFTA.
He first came to serious prominence, however, as lead singer of the band Years & Years. Formed in 2010, the band had a number 1 single (King) in 2015; their debut album Communion reached number 1 in the same year. A gay songwriter, Alexander – unusually – defies the established convention of pretending that love songs are about women when they are not and openly writes love songs about men.
3. SENIOR COMPLIANCE OFFICER, ELMBRIDGE BOROUGH COUNCIL
Location: Esher, Surrey
The job: ”As a senior compliance officer, you will help us investigate and resolve alleged breaches of planning control. Sometimes these could be quite complex cases which will draw on your experience and knowledge of planning legislation and dealing with sensitive and difficult situations.
You will also:
- work well as part of team but also on your own,
- support your team with their workload and priorities,
- have experience carrying out investigations and gathering evidence,
- and have a good eye for detail.
“As you would expect, excellent communication skills are important, as well as the ability to remain calm with customers who may be angry or upset. Your ability to ability to understand and clearly explain complex rules will be important.”
Fun fact: The smart and extremely affluent Surrey commuter town of Esher doesn’t get many mentions in music. Why would it? It’s quiet, private and unremarkable. Unless you’re Marc Bolan, of course.
Bizarrely, Bolan references the town in King of the Mountain Cometh, the B-side of Hot Love, Marc Bolan and T-Rex’s first number 1 single, released in 1971. The song is equally bizarre, a strange and fantastic story of - well, read the lyric
The Wild-Witch Wizard of Esher
Was a changeling son from Mars
He learned his song from the Cosmic Throngs
And played them on a Fender guitar, oh yeah.
Born in 1947 in East London, though raised mostly in the Putney/Wimbledon area, Bolan recorded ‘psychedelic folk’ in the 1960s before becoming a pioneer of the glam rock movement in the early 1970s. Indeed, it’s often said that it was Bolan’s performance of Hot Love on Top of the Pops in 1971 that launched glam rock.
For three or four years, he was a megastar. But personal problems, a poor decision to live as a tax exile and the advent of new forms of music led to a decline in his profile. It was in the midst of a comeback in 1977 that he died while a passenger in a Mini driven by his girlfriend that veered off the road in Barnes, south west London, and hit a tree.
So, why Esher? Well, Bolan was close friends with Beatle George Harrison who lived in the town. Would it be far-fetched to suggest that the "Wild Witch Wizard of Esher" who played a Fender guitar was Harrison himself and King of the Mountain Cometh was a song about the erstwhile Beatle?
4. SENIOR DEVELOPMENT MANAGEMENT PLANNER (MAJOR APPLICATIONS), CHICHESTER DISTRICT COUNCIL
Location: Chichester, West Sussex
The job: “You will deal effectively and efficiently with a caseload of significant and complex planning applications, associated pre-application enquiries and appeals, demonstrating a high regard for performance while securing high quality design. You’ll be part of a team providing an efficient and helpful service to all customers in all aspects of planning and to provide support and mentoring to other members of the team.
“Key duties and accountabilities will include providing advice to applicants, developers and agents on development proposals; formulating recommendations on the various categories of application for consideration by the development manager or planning committee; preparing the Council’s response to appeals; and assisting the planning policy team with formulating the local plan policies.”
Fun fact: Chichester Psalms is an extended choral composition written by composer Leonard Bernstein for the 1965 Southern Cathedrals Festival held at Chichester Cathedral in 1965. The piece, considered complex and difficult to perform, sets six Biblical psalms to music in their original Hebrew. It’s considered one of the most overtly Jewish of Bernstein’s works.
Bernstein selected the psalms to focus on an overarching message of ‘the brotherhood of man’ and the piece is generally considered to be optimistic and at times serene. Despite its difficulty, it’s still performed occasionally as an anthem in choral Evensong.
Bernstein, of course, is more popularly known for a far more commercial, but no less radical, work – West Side Story, which is effectively a jazz opera. But he was nothing if not versatile: his work roamed over symphonic and orchestral music, ballet, film and theatre music, choral works, opera, chamber music and works for the piano. He was also the first American composer to gain true international repute and is credited with the revival of the works of Gustav Mahler.
His works have won Emmys, Tonys and Grammys by the bucketload. But he was also a civil rights campaigner, protesting against the Vietnam War and nuclear weapons, and he raised money for HIV/AIDS research. One of his final musical acts was to conduct a performance of Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 in Berlin to celebrate the fall of the Berlin Wall. The concert was televised live, worldwide, on Christmas Day 1989. Bernstein died the following year, aged 72.
5. DEPUTY TEAM LEADER – PLANNING APPLICATIONS, ASHFORD BOROUGH COUNCIL
Location: Ashford, Kent
The job: “As one of two deputy team leaders in development management you would be responsible for managing junior staff as well as your own case-load. You would gain experience of a wide range of different application types and sizes and be expected to present at planning committee, to deal with appeals and to advise on all planning issues.
“We are the largest authority in the ‘Garden of England’. It’s a beautiful place to live and work and we are the focus of significant investment and examples of new development include a designer outlet expansion, a development of c. 5,750 homes, a new Junction on the M20, a winery and a new commercial quarter. There are also plans for film/TV studios in the town.”
Fun fact: Ashford in Kent and exotic landscapes: what could they possibly have in common?
Artist Roger Dean, of course – born in Ashford and most famous for his album covers for the 1970s prog rock bands Yes and Asia. These are known for their dream-like, otherworldly scenes, often featuring stone arches, floating islands and strange organic habitats. Since the 1960s, Dean’s works have sold more than 150 million copies worldwide.
Born in 1944, Dean was actually destined to be an architectural and furniture designer but was, in effect, waylaid by commercial work for musicians after a college interior design project for the Ronnie Scott’s jazz club led to an album cover commission for the rock band Gun.
From here he started designing for the aforementioned Marc Bolan and in 1971 was hired to produce the cover art for rock band Yes’s fourth album, Fragile (pictured), beginning a 50-year association with the band.
His fame spread; his fantasy landscapes adorned posters on bedroom walls all over the world; he designed the logo for Virgin Records, worked with other bands, branched into stage design, architecture and video game design. His radical home designs have included affordable futuristic homes that can be mass-produced in factories and customised to the user's tastes.
Dean continues to work, has a permanent gallery in East Sussex and his paintings have even featured on a collection of stamps in the Isle of Man. In 2021 he produced the cover art for Yes’s 22nd studio album The Quest.
Image credits | Shutterstock (x4); Roger Dean-MALPWARR
