Developing a Plan for Alnwick

Report of Partner Event

Saturday 26th March 2011

St James Centre Pottergate

Argyle Planning consultancy ltd

Developing a Plan for Alnwick –

Report of Partner Event 26th March 2011

St James Church Centre, Pottergate

Introduction

The purpose of the workshop was to explore the idea of preparing a plan for Alnwick – what would be involved and what issues needed to be resolved. 22 people representing the Town Council, Community Development Trust and a range of other groups were present - see Appendix 1 for full list.

Aspirations for Alnwick

The first task for the group was to work in pairs to identify their 3 aspirations for Alnwick and report back. The outcomes were as follows:

General

  • A town in which there is ‘life’ and pride
  • A town that is more sustainable and self sufficient
  • A critical population mass that will support new business coming to the town
  • A town where we build on the potential of our unique image

Retail and town centre

  • A town where all retail units are occupied and there is a balanced retail offer
  • Secure new development in the heart of the town centre similar to the Sanderson Arcade in Morpeth
  • Market Place to become ‘the Covent Garden of the North’
  • A town centre that is open on Sunday
  • A town where local food is supported and promoted to reduce food miles and keep money in local community
  • Create a family evening culture and ambience in the town centre

Business

  • A town that continues to provide services and facilities that attract locals, tourists and businesses
  • Create a business group – ‘Development Alnwick’ to search out timely investment
  • Increased range and quantity of employment opportunities
  • A town where the local economy is managed to tackle economic disadvantage

Housing

  • An adequate supply of housing
  • Ensure a balanced housing market with opportunities for affordable housing, small households, those downsizing and for families.
  • Ensure all existing homes are to a decent standard including warmth and energy efficiency

Education

  • Develop a new community high school
  • Improve access to higher and lifelong education provision to build skills locally

Transport

  • A town that is less car dependent with reduced demand for car use and improved supply of alternatives
  • Improved access to services and facilities

Emerging out of the exercise the top wishes were:

  • Securing a new high school
  • Retaining young people in a town where there is a range of jobs and housing opportunities – a more self sufficient town
  • A lively town with an improved retail and leisure ’ambience’
  • A town that attracts more people and firms to establish here.

The context for an Alnwick Plan

The session on the context for a neighbourhood plan set out the background in terms of the localism bill now before parliament and the opportunities this presented for neighbourhood planning. The main issue for the Alnwick Plan was the fact that the ideas for neighbourhood plans are still emerging and will not be ‘locked down’ until legislation is enacted and regulations produced. There was a strong feeling that in the circumstances Alnwick should progress with a more informal masterplan approach but monitor the progress in neighbourhood plans and convert to the formal statutory process as soon as the procedure had been finally agreed.

Working within the County’s Strategic Planning Framework for Alnwick

The background strategic planning framework that the Alnwick Plan would have to work within was explained in the form of the Alnwick Local Development Framework Core Strategy in particular and the progress with the emerging Northumberland LDF Core Strategy and related documents.

A Future Vision for Alnwick – An onlookers’ view of a town with big opportunities

Mark Massey of Ian Darby Partners Architects gave an upbeat view of the opportunities that Alnwick has and encouraged the group to take the initiative and move forward to realise a sustainable future for the town.

Identifying the Burning Issues for Alnwick

The main group of partners was divided into 3 smaller groups to examine the main issues facing Alnwick in each of 3 topic areas – Environment and Transport; Living and Working; and Community, Leisure, Culture. The outcomes from each group were as follows:

Environment and Transport –

The group considered the plan would need to both improve and protect the environment.

The environment was more than just the landscape in which Alnwick sat there were other environmental constraint issues to consider:

-protecting biodiversity

-avoiding flooding

-improving cleanliness

-reducing greenhouse gas emissions

-protecting and enhancing our built environment

-encouraging low carbon energy /renewables

-promoting sustainable new building and retrofitting sustainability into our existing buildings

In terms of transport Alnwick suffered from a degree of ‘isolation’ and was vulnerable to the effects of high transport costs. The issues arising in discussion were:

-reducing the need to commute and travel for services – the town as more self sufficient

-increasing the opportunities for alternative methods of transport

-building Alnwick together with Alnmouth as a rail / transport hub

-increasing opportunities for cycle routes to benefit tourist visitors and locals

-reducing vehicle / pedestrian conflict in the town centre and increase pedestrian priority

-develop park and ride opportunities linking to Alnmouth Station

Living and Working in Alnwick –

People of Alnwick, as in many places, want good jobs, good housing, good schools, good transport and a quality of life. To retain young people we need jobs, training, affordable housing, provision for affordable business units.

In terms of economy -

-Need for economic strategy that delivers diversity of jobs/employment at all levels and transport to jobs

-Strength required from Chamber of Trade

-Build on the uniqueness of local food / produce leading to manufacturing and retail job opportunities

-Build on Alnwick as a possible centre for green industries

-Build on Alnwick as a centre for heritage conservation industries

-Need to create a vibrant town centre – finding uses for unoccupied shops eg ‘pop-up shops’ and extending activity of market place.

-Need to have a retail vision – a choice and diversity of interesting shops

-Find ways to extend tourist season

In terms of living –

-Need to maintain diversity of service provision

-Housing development needs to be the right product in right place

-Need to recognise the reality of an ageing population and provide for retirement living whilst providing opportunities for young persons’ housing

-Ensuring we provide sustainable buildings that are going to be affordable to ‘run’ in the future not just affordable to purchase.

-Need for increased publicly accessible, quality open spaces around the town.

-Find new ways of supporting local voluntary and charity groups possibly through a community trust fund.

Community , Leisure, Culture -

Group felt there were great assets in the town – Playhouse, Bailiffgate Museum, Willowburn Sports Centre, Sporting teams, Good schools, Alnwick Infirmary, Northumberland Hall, Castle and Garden, a strong historic identity, music, food, and beer festivals.

The issues emerging were :

-Need to expand town population both to retain existing level of services and provide others

-In a situation of under-funding and tightening financial circumstances – need for better coordination of community services and facilities to work together.

-Creation of new high school was a significant and pressing issue

-Need to make better use of facilities we have – e.g. Northumberland Hall could be a key to town centre revival project

-Limited open space and outdoor sport provision compounded situation of limited provision for youth generally

-Access to and absence of links between facilities made situation of limited opportunities worse.

-Retail businesses were struggling to improve and expand in the face of high rents

-Need to make more of our history in our future.

Broad Scenarios

Thinking about the issues that had been identified by all 3 groups, the context for the plan, the constraints facing Alnwick and the opportunities that had been highlighted, the groups were asked to think about a broad scenario for the future of the town –

The agreed elements of a broad scenario for the town were:

  • Sustainable level of growth – growth in balance with service provision and employment provision. There was agreement over the need for modest expansion.
  • The provision of a new education campus and in particular a new high school was paramount. Discussions had been held in the groups about the wisdom of focussing this on the southern edge of the town but, whilst people felt ideally it should be more central, the opportunities that were available were too restricted. The site on the southern edge in any event was better for access from outside Alnwick vis a vis access to the A1 and allowed the opportunity to maximise dual use of sports pitches.
  • There was agreement that some expansion on the fringes of the town would be necessary as there were limited opportunities other than the school sites for in-town development. However the groups wanted to retain a compact urban form to Alnwick to maximise sustainable transport. The town must not be allowed to sprawl outwards.
  • Groups felt that if the school sites were developed this should be done in a way that retained some of the sites as green space/corridors to allow attractive car free links between parts of the town.
  • There was a need to plan and provide for a wide employment base possibly with some further employment expansion east of the A1. Equally however it was important to improve on existing industrial estates.
  • There was general agreement around the need for increased pedestrian priority in the town centre – improved cycle and pedestrian links – better transport linkage generally in the town.
  • There was discussion about investing further in improving the Alnwick south A1 junction and around improved access to the west and south side of the town but no real stomach for major new road schemes which in any event were unlikely to be affordable.

Summing Up and Next Steps

In summing up there was a discussion about how best to proceed. \the partners were in agreement generally on the following points:

  • A plan for Alnwick should be prepared – it would focus on Alnwick town but would consider the wider role of Alnwick. In particular it should involve Denwick Parish Council closely in the process in view of the south eastern boundaries of the town being within Denwick Parish.
  • Although Alnwick Town Council would be the ‘qualifying body’ to prepare the plan, in practice the Community Partnership was best placed to reflect the wider partnership involved.
  • The group felt strongly that we should crack on with the early stages of the plan and integrate it with the full neighbourhood plans procedure as that became clearer after the Localism Bill was enacted.
  • The plan should be aspirational but rooted in realism.
  • The plan was a big opportunity now and we should not lose it by dragging our feet’.
  • We should develop and progress the plan in a way that was inclusive, allowing other groups to join the Community Partnership if they were interested in working on the plan.

In terms of the next steps it was agreed that this report would be circulated to all participants of the Partner Event including those unable to attend and taken to the next Community Partnership group with a view to the partnership agreeing the setting up of a plan steering group probably comprising the Town Council, Community Development Trust and up to about 6 key partners to drive the process.

Early and wide consultation that the plan was underway was important and the new steering group would need to look at ways of spreading the word, making clear the opportunities for those with an interest to get involved.

The Steering Group for the project would then have to go on and scope the plan, liaise with the Local Planning Authority and commence work on identifying issues and options.

PDB Argyle Planning April 2011

Appendix 1

Participants in Partner Event

Organisation / Name
Alnwick Town Council / Sue Allcroft
Eileen Blakey
Gordon Castle
Bill Grisdale
Martin Harrington
Ken Moore
Alan Symmonds
Ritchie Waddell
Geoff Watson
Bill Batey
Alnwick Community Development Trust / Carys Thomas
Northumberland Estates / Colin Barnes
Northumberland County Council - Highways / Margaret Robinson
Northumberland County Council - Planning / Charlotte Colver
Alnwick Friends of the Earth / David Farrar
Rachael Roberts
Transition Alnwick / Paul Mills
Denwick Parish Council / John Taylor
Aln Valley Railway Society / Tom Spence
Lionheart Radio / James Boyd
Alnwick Markets Forum / Philip Angier
Ian Darby Partners / Mark Massey