Design Review in 2012
In early December Places Matter! announced 17 new Design Review Panel members. Places Matter! has offered Design Review in the North West since 2007. In that time the programme has given advice on over 230 schemes, ranging from masterplans, to schools, public spaces, housing, commercial and mixed-use. Design Review also offers a service looking at strategic documents such as Supplementary Planning Documents or Core Strategies and deploys members of the panel to offer training on a variety of related topics and provide independent design input on briefs, competitions, and consultations.
Places Matter Design Review in action
Design Review is a respected method of improving the quality of new development by offering constructive, impartial and expert advice. Design Review panel meetings allow local authorities, clients, developers and design teams to present their schemes at the pre-planning stage to a panel of experts from the built environment sector and benefit from the discussion and constructive advice of the panel. Places Matter! Design Review is affiliated with National Design Review run by Design Council Cabe and is part of a national network of design review panels, providing local planning authorities with access to independent practical design advice.
For the 17 panel appointments Places Matter! received over 180 applications from a range of practitioners. For Places Matter!, design is not solely about the architecture, it is also about the client, the planners, the landscape and the neighbouring environment. This against a backdrop where many of the public agencies that supported good design are gone or severely diminished, where local authority planning teams are endeavoring to stretch resources across boundaries as never before and where private sector colleagues are under pressure to minimise fees and maximise returns. Places Matter! would always argue that Design Review should never be seen as an alternative to a well-resourced, experienced and motivated Local Planning Team. It is easy to spot towns and cities with in-house design expertise. They're the good ones, the ones where you'd like to live and work, who are doing interesting projects and don't appear to be sliding backwards. The competitors are no longer north and south or on opposite sides of the Pennines but further afield in developing markets.
The Draft National Planning Policy Framework that came out earlier in the year made a clear commitment to Design Review. Section 120 stated that: "Local planning authorities should have local design review arrangements in place to provide assessment and support to ensure high standards of design."
Places Matter! understands that the consultation response has resulted in revisions that indicate even greater support to design quality. We will watch and wait with interest.
To date North West Design Review has operated free-of-charge to the user with the support of the North West Development Agency and latterly Design Council Cabe. With the conclusion of the development agency, Places Matter! is no longer in a position to offer the service without a charge. In line with the majority of other Design Reviews around the country Places Matter! will be introducing charging from January 2012. Each scheme seen at Design Review involves pre and post work, site visit, venue costs, preparing briefing papers for the panel, panel costs on the day and the subsequent written report. With project costs usually a minimum of 100 times or more than the charge for Design Review it can be money well spent if utilised at an early enough stage for the panel comments to make a constructive contribution. Places Matter! is offering the Design Review service at a subsidised rate for 2012, details are available at:
Annie Atkins, programme director, Places Matter!
