ASSOCIATE Professor HANNAH HICKMAN
Co-Investigator and Planning Authorities Co-Lead
Hannah Hickman is Associate Professor of Planning Practice at the University of the West of England. Hannah joined academia from practice in 2017 after a career involving senior leadership roles in both the public and private sectors as a professional town planner.
Hannah is passionate about the value of research in achieving change in policy and practice and was selected as The Planner’s “Women of Influence 2022: Academia”. She is chartered member of the Royal Town Planning Institute, Chair of the University of Cape Town RTPI Partnership Board, Vice-Chair of the University of Newcastle RTPI Partnership Board, and a UK representative on the Association of European Schools of Planning.
Her research interests include: strategic spatial planning; planning for housing; nationally significant infrastructure planning; and, professional practice, ethics and motivation.
Her most recent research projects have included: the role of local planning authorities in delivering brownfield land (for the Planning Advisory Service); improving post-planning processes to deliver better places (for the West of England Combined Authority and winner of the 2021 RTPI Sir Peter Hall Award for Research Excellence); and project-hindsight: post-decision implementation (for the National Infrastructure Planning Association and winner of the 2024 RTPI Sir Peter Hall Award for Research Excellence).
Particularly relevant to URBAN RETROFIT, is previous work she carried out for PUCA (Plan Urbanisme Construction Architecture, part of the French Ministry of Planning) on the challenges of urban densification.