Turley Associates appoints new head of urban design

The Manchester-based planning and urban design consultancy said Matt Quayle has been promoted and will take up the post from 1 June 2011.

Quayle joined Turley Associates in February 2007 and leads a team of 25 urban designers and masterplanners across ten offices and is responsible for business development, forward planning and design direction for the urban design team's projects which include residential, mixed-use, town centre and regeneration initiatives throughout the four principalities.

Quayle is replacing Michael Lowndes as head of urban design as Lowndes is also being promoted into a new role based in London with a slightly wider remit. Turley told Place that further details of Lowndes' new role will be made public soon.

Quayle said: "Urban design and masterplanning continues to play an increasingly important role in delivering high quality and sustainable development in a landscape of challenging market conditions and evolving planning policy. Integrating urban design and planning can facilitate development opportunities and add significant value to projects through the creation of a genuine sense of place along with the key attributes of sustainability. I look forward to developing this role further."

Quayle was appointed an independent advisor to CABE in 2003, 2005 and again in 2009. He was also appointed as a CABE-accredited building for life assessor in 2007 and won awards from the Civic Trust, Building for Life, the Royal Town Planning Institute and the former office of the Deputy Prime Minister.

Quayle has led design teams in a range of design and masterplanning competitions including the masterplan and design code for the £150m redevelopment of the former Terry's Chocolate Factory in York to create a high quality and sustainable new mixed use city district.