Jonathan Brookes

I am a strategic planning and place professional with over 25 years’ experience spanning landscape architecture, urban design and spatial planning across the public and private sectors.

I am particularly interested in how places work as a whole – the relationships between buildings, landscape, movement, infrastructure, communities and the wider economic and environmental context.  I enjoy joining the dots, understanding complex interdependencies and bringing different disciplines, organisations and ambitions together to deliver great places.

Within the Strategic Sites Team at the Greater Cambridge Shared Planning Service, I provide leadership, critical review and strategic direction across major growth and regeneration programmes, including North East Cambridge, Cambridge East and the Cambridge Biomedical Campus.  My work spans strategic spatial planning, masterplanning, development frameworks and planning policy.  I particularly enjoy shaping visions for what places could become and translating them into coherent, deliverable places.

A key part of my role is providing strategic steer, constructive challenge and practical problem-solving.  I believe collaboration is fundamental to achieving great outcomes, and work across organisational and professional boundaries to bring together perspectives, identify connections and anticipate, manage and mitigate risks as proposals evolve.  I particularly enjoy the space between strategy and delivery, where good judgement and an understanding of the bigger picture can make a real difference.

My approach is rooted in a strong belief in the public purpose of planning: creating places that work well for the people who live, work and spend time in them.  Successful placemaking means more than designing individual buildings - it means creating connected, walkable neighbourhoods, high-quality public spaces and sustainable places that respond to their context and stand the test of time.  I have played a lead role in negotiations on many of the growth sites around Cambridge and as a result have worked on a wide range of projects including the award-winning Abode and Aura developments at Great Kneighton, Knights Park at Eddington, the Cambridge Biomedical Campus and the regeneration of the CB1 at Cambridge Station.  My current focus on Strategic Sites centres around North East Cambridge, Cambridge East and the University led sites at Eddington and Cambridge West. 

My background combines a degree in Landscape Design and Planning, a Diploma in Landscape Architecture and a Master’s in Urban Design.  I am a Chartered Town Planner (MRTPI), an Academician of The Academy of Urbanism and a Recognised Practitioner in Urban Design.  In 2018, I received the Alan Cherry Placemaking: Outstanding Contribution Public Sector Award.

Areas of expertise: Strategic masterplanning | Growth and regeneration | Spatial planning | Urban design | Placemaking | Planning policy | Development frameworks and design codes | Landscape and public realm | Stakeholder engagement | Cross-disciplinary coordination | Strategic problem-solving | Sustainable development and place leadership.