The Trust and major issues affecting the City - TrustNews September 08
Without a publicity officer there is a risk that our activities may not be adequately reported. We therefore thought it might be useful to summarise the Trust's major concerns and what we are doing about them.
Pressure for growth
This is our most worrying concern. Ever since the publication of PPG3, (the government's planning guidelines that fundamentally changed planning policies towards greatly increased densities within urban areas in order to spare the countryside), the Trust has been concerned to mitigate the effects of this on the character of the City. We published a detailed paper on how the new policies should be applied in places like Winchester, which so impressed the Director of the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (CABE) that he forwarded it to Mr Prescott (no response). The paper did have some influence locally, however, in promoting the need for neighbourhood studies and design guidelines, because we emphasised that the government had placed as much importance on good design as on increased density. We made a particular point of the need for dedicated policies to conserve the character and setting of the City as an entity of national importance (rather than just an urban element of the district).
Strategic Planning
The government's plans have subsequently added additional pressure for growth in the suburbs and in the countryside. The Trust made extensive representations on those aspects of the South East Regional Plan (SERP) that affected Winchester, stressing the Plan's description of Winchester as "a tremendous and irreplaceable asset", which it then seemed to ignore. More recently we responded to the City Council's questionnaire on the emerging Local Development Framework (LDF), which is the document required of them, setting out the long term future of the whole district (within the much larger south east region). We were shocked by even greater pressures for growth, with the evident preference shown in the draft for building satellite developments around the outside of the City in response to the government's latest requirement that Winchester be designated as a location for additional growth, it being a 'sustainable centre', which is to say an urban area with a ready-made infrastructure (over-stretched as it may already be).
Conceptual Framework
As with the SERP, the line we are taking on the LDF is that Winchester has to be seen as something very special — the "tremendous and irreplaceable asset" — and that if it is to grow (we would all prefer not, but this is a government matter, beyond our influence), then it should not be done in unrelated, poorly planned, developer-led increments, on haphazardly chosen pieces of land (in the manner of Barton Farm). Rather, any growth should follow an in-depth and expert study of the whole City and its setting that explores every possibility, and puts forward well-considered outline proposals, of which we and future generations might all be proud — a 'conceptual framework', to put it in planning terms. It is our contention that this should be done before any further decisions are taken, that the explorations should include the sites already reserved for possible developments at Barton Farm, Pitt Manor and Worthy Road, and that the selection of the expert consultants should be a matter of the greatest care, taken with the advice of experts.
Design in general
Running through all this we have ever-present concerns about the quality of the design of new developments. Apart from monitoring, and where necessary commenting, on every planning application, we both ask for, and are asked to receive presentations from applicants for new developments and, where possible, we like to see schemes at the sketch design stage when there is more chance of influencing the design. Few of these show any real quality and we are concerned that the planning department is not adequately resourced to cope with design issues, preoccupied as they must be with meeting government targets for all manner of things, from sheer speed to the provision of affordable housing, that have nothing to do with design. In lieu of a design section within the planning department (which we are told cannot be afforded), we are urging the Council to consider engaging an eminent, visiting design consultant to raise the profile and understanding of the crucial importance of design, and to advise on all design matters, including the selection of expert consultants.