There is magic in the invention of new towns. Who wouldn’t want to plan out their ideal urban community, like Sim City and its many video game imitators, or Babar the elephant building Celesteville with its palace of work, palace of pleasure, perfect jobs for each citizen and a lake for swimming and sailing? Our king had great fun devising his Poundbury model town. The lucky members of the government’s new towns taskforce have been dreaming up a modern generation of new civic places, and are due to unveil their plans in July.

They work in the shadow of the great 1946 New Towns Act, and plans drawn up under a similar committee, chaired by Lord Reith, which led to the building of Stevenage, Harlow, Crawley, Corby and others. In the next waves came the ambitious city of Milton Keynes, Peterborough and others.

The new committee has been travelling the country, looking at the successes and errors of the past. It looks, too, at lessons to be learned from the great failure of the last Labour government, which pledged to create 10 eco towns. Only one very small development came to fruition in North West Bicester and “disappointing” was the verdict. Built on an isolated greenfield site, with no shops or buses, contrary to what was promised in its desirable original masterplan, residents are totally reliant on cars.

This time, from talking to those close to the action, I sense real urgency, not just a nice-to-have addition to Labour’s housing plans, but flagships of growth and regeneration in a nation stymied by a lack of homes. Michael Lyons, ex-chair of the BBC........

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