Troy Planning + Design with Navigus Planning prepared Infrastructure Delivery Plans to inform the preparation of the North and Mid Essex Local Plans which consist of the Local Plans for Braintree District Council, Chelmsford City Council, Colchester Borough Council and Tendring District Council.
The Councils are preparing a combined strategic Part 1 Local Plan 2017-2033 with Braintree, Colchester and Tendring Councils and Essex County Council. A key part of this Spatial Strategy is the delivery of 3 cross-boundary New Garden Communities. The authorities are preparing Part 2 Local Plans which will address the development strategy for the rest of the areas outside the planned New Garden Communities including Colchester town, Braintree and Clacton-on-Sea, the villages and rural areas.
The New Garden Communities could deliver up to 40,000 homes over 30 years with development and design founded on Garden Community Principles:
Source: North Essex Garden Communities Peer Review (Lord Bob Kerslake) January 2017
A Garden City is a holistically planned new settlement which enhances the natural environment and offers high-quality affordable housing and locally accessible work in beautiful, healthy and sociable communities. The Garden City principles are an indivisible and interlocking framework for their delivery, and include:
- Land value capture for the benefit of the community.
- Strong vision, leadership and community engagement.
- Community ownership of land and long-term stewardship of assets.
- Mixed-tenure homes and housing types that are genuinely affordable.
- A wide range of local jobs in the Garden City within easy commuting distance of homes.
- Beautifully and imaginatively designed homes with gardens, combining the best of town and country to create healthy communities, and including opportunities to grow food.
- Development that enhances the natural environment, providing a comprehensive green infrastructure network and net biodiversity gains, and that uses zero-carbon and energy-positive technology to ensure climate resilience.
- Strong cultural, recreational and shopping facilities in walkable, vibrant, sociable neighbourhoods.
- Integrated and accessible transport systems, with walking, cycling and public transport designed to be the most attractive forms of local transport.
Source: https://www.tcpa.org.uk/garden-city-principles
Central to the IDP work are the following Questions which the study set out to answer:
- What infrastructure is required and how it will be provided (e.g. co-location, etc).
- Who is to provide the infrastructure.
- How will the infrastructure would be funded.
- When the infrastructure could be provided.
A key part of preparing the Infrastructure Delivery Plan was to categorise infrastructure by priority in terms of what forms of infrastructure must be delivered early on to enable the Spatial Strategy and which infrastructure, whilst important, is unlikely to prevent development in the short – medium term. The IDP categorised infrastructure into the following priorities:
- critical: to the delivery of the emerging Local Plan (i.e. must happen to enable growth);
- essential and necessary to mitigate the impacts arising from development;
- policy high priority as it is required to support wider strategic or site-specific objectives which are set out in planning policy or are subject to a statutory duty but would not necessarily prevent development from occurring; and
- important for infrastructure that is unlikely to prevent development in the short to medium term but is vital as a part of effective place-making.
We engaged in a number of workshops and discussions with land owners, site promoters, service providers and agencies from an early stage of the programme to help inform the preparation of the IDP. Coordination and alignment of investment and delivery will be critical to the success of the Spatial Strategy across North and Mid Essex over the Local Plan period and beyond.
Location and Years
Essex, 2016-2017
Clients
Braintree District Council, Chelmsford City Council, Colchester Borough Council and Tendring District Council
