Barton Farm - Update - TrustNews Mar 13
Some of you may have seen Cala’s exhibition in the Guildhall last month, following which the Chronicle reported that the main concern of visitors was the diversion of Andover Road through the new housing estate. This has also been our major concern so far and, at our last meeting with Cala and their architect, we asked how and why the diversion had become part of their scheme. The answer is that the architect proposed this as a solution to the City's brief, which, amongst other things, required the estate to be integrated with Winchester and the shopping centre to be vibrant and successful. By taking all the traffic through the shopping area the architect argued that it will attract many more shoppers, and that the diversion will also ensure that Barton Farm will seem much more a part of the City because its existence will be well known, and because of the removal of the road barrier between the new estate and the existing development to the west. The idea had not originally appealed to Cala but, they said, the architect had convinced them. So we challenged them to try to convince us, and this they have agreed to do at our next meeting with them early in March. Our objections are that it seems absurd to divert traffic through a residential area, that the shopping centre will be unpleasantly traffic dominated, and that the supposed barrier of the present road, once moved, will then become a barrier within the estate.>
This issue tends to dominate all discussion about Barton Farm and, because it is a fixed element of the outline planning approval, we are told that no change is possible unless both Cala and the City Council agree to it. To complicate matters, we understand that the Andover Road closure is part of the last phase of the development in 15 years time and we don’t yet understand how it will be handled.
Artist impression of development-Cala Homes
So we must not forget that in the meantime it is equally important to work with Cala and the City to ensure that the Design Codes produce the best possible outcome for the many elements of the development that have not yet been decided. These include vitally important things such as the arrangement of the secondary roads and the housing densities around the site, sustainability measures and the provision for renewable energy, and the actual design of the buildings and the landscape. Not least are the arrangements for walking, cycling, driving and parking, not only within the site, which are Cala’s responsibility, but to and from the site, which is the responsibility of the County highway engineers using money paid to them by Cala.
What is a design code? Very briefly summarised it is instructions written by the master planner for how the development is to be designed (using words and graphic illustration in the form of both rules and advice), so that the architect (whether of the whole development or of a part) knows the parameters within which there is scope to design the project in detail. Design codes for all aspects of Barton Farm have to be approved by the City Council before a detailed planning application can be made.