Question 21. How should the Local Plan protect our heritage and ensure new development is well-designed?

All new Buildings and renovations should meet British Standard 8300 All new build homes should be to Wheelchair homes stadard

De gustibus non est disputandum

By meeting government design guidance (expected shortly) and adhering to NPPF advice on heritage assets.

Protecting local character has been a consistently popular theme in our Neighbourhood plan consultations. Heritage assets (listed buildings and conservation areas) play a major part in building the character of our Parish. New development should use local consultation to make sure that they are protected and that any development enhances them. Local communities know best what is important to them.

Incorporating the same architectural designs as the historical part of the city centre so it blends. Whilst putting tags on historical landmarks to protect them

New development should respect historic buildings, conservation areas and the character and size of existing communities. It should not be out of keeping and should not overwhelm existing communities.

No specific comments. Existing arrangements appear to work satisfactorily.

Designated heritage assets should be addressed in accordance with NPPF and local policy and where appropriate, major developments should be required to implement agreed design codes for development to ensure the built and natural environment that is being created is of the highest quality.

By having “conservation areas” actually conserve. Our local conservation area seems to be a total joke. By preventing (too late now) horrors like the piazzification of the area around the train station - what a nightmare. By tearing down the hideous developments all along the railway line from near Cambridge toward London. What an embarrassment. By having National planning guidelines support what local communities need and want instead of what money-grubbing greedy developers want. It has all gone so horribly wrong.

Pigeon consider that, as a principle, and in order to address criterion d) in para 20 of the NPPF, the Plan evidence base should identify heritage areas and assets clearly and use their presence and values as part of the basis for site selection for development allocations. By focusing new development away from acknowledged heritage assets the best of our existing environment can be protected. Pigeon’s site at St Neots Road, Hardwick is located away from any existing heritage assets and its development would therefore avoid impact on any existing heritage assets. It is also able to ensure the achievement of high-quality design.

CAMBRIDGE is a special place, what may be ok elsewhere is no necessarily good enough for Cambridge. We should aspire to higher quality designs and, in particular, materials. This should not just apply to our conservation areas but the whole city and it’s surroundings. In conservation areas we need to be ensure that new developments genuinely respond to the existing styles and that a successful contrast when approved is really that.

We should reduce parking availability for private vehicles. These are horrible warts when trying to view and enjoy our historic environment and they contribute to pollution damage to stone and wear on historic roads.

Chapter 16 of the NPPF provides guidance on preserving and enhancing heritage assets. As noted in Figure 17 of the Issues & Options consultation document the Greater Cambridge area has a significant number of Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas. The adopted Cambridge Local Plan 2018 and the adopted South Cambridgeshire Local Plan 2018 contain detailed policies that seek to protect heritage assets. There are adopted appraisals for most of the Conservation Areas in Greater Cambridge and additional heritage supplementary guidance. Therefore, heritage assets are already well protected. It is requested that the emerging GCLP includes similar policies to protected heritage assets that are consistent with national guidance.

We should look further afield to Europe for some inspiration on housebuilding and the built environment. We should break from traditional houses and methods that we are currently using and make a radical change.

With strong policies that restrict developments to those with zero carbon impact, and that favour local travel, social inclusion and that look beautiful

In my opinion, the new housing developments north and south of Cambridge look very bleak, like giant boxes scattered across a featureless terrain. Can't planners and architects do more to make new communities look welcoming and livable?

Our heritage should be protected by preventing large developments going ahead near small existing settlements, conservation areas and historic assets, where the new is out of keeping with, and will overwhelm, the old.

The very qualities of life and environment that have made Cambridge unique don't scale. That same human scale that makes Cambridge a success i vulnerable. Ever increasing growth makes the city a victim of its own success. The city centre should be pedestrianized. HGVs and large buses banned. The maintenance of buildings should be upgraded, There is room for more greenery and improved footpaths. The river Cam is slowly dying and concerns have been raised about the impact of over-abstraction on the River Cam, still large deverlopments keep getting approvals.

The most destructive force with regard to our heritage has been highways design to enable private car use. This has festooned our streets with ugly signage, barriers, road markings and other street clutter. Highways proposals should be subject to a beauty and sustainability test. Contain and screen the large commercial waste bins that blight our public spaces. Have a design quality panel who swear an oath to weed out proposals of the abysmal quality of ‘The Marque’ on the corner of Cherry Hinton Road/Hills Road.

Just forget new development. We haven't got water for it. DO NOT ASSUME GROWTH! This is not a valid consultation in you assume infinite growth on a finite planet!

Respect Cambridge's heritage by observing the skyline and stop allowing developments that are higher than our existing buildings. And that doesn't mean using the Marque as a benchmark! Respect neighbouring buildings and local community homes. Limit the height of buildings now.

I think designs need to be made that are not just looking to provide the cheapest option in terms of building materials. The designs need to ensure that they will provide the best possible outcome for the area that they are placed in so that they blend well with the existing buildings in the area and are made of high quality materials and will be attractive homes and offices for years to come.

Based on our experience with the developments in the Southern Fringe, the Trumpington Residents’ Association stresses the importance of Design Codes and a strong investment by the Councils in the planning and development process. There is a need for the Councils to give more attention to monitoring the quality of new buildings and responding to poor quality. In the case of new developments (including recently completed areas), it is important to maintain their design ethos by restricting changes to individual properties, including alteration of approved car parking space standards, through continued implementation of planning controls, action against HMOs, etc. Protection is not just an issue for the City centre, but also other 'historic' areas such as our local Conservation Areas. Also, it is essential to protect the vision of the Cambridge Green Belt, by maintaining the compact city, by refusing further development at the transitions from countryside into the city such as on Hauxton Road.

• For villages, the first level of protection must be through the preparation of Village Design guides and Neighbourhood Plans, which must be given full weight as SPDs (supplementary planning documents). • As well as greater protection for Conservation Areas and Listed Buildings, support needs to be given to local communities to identify Buildings of Local Interest, non-designated heritage assets, and other buildings, streets, views, and green spaces that provide character. If the necessary detail cannot, or has not been fully covered in any VDG or NP, then a separate document might usefully be prepared that can also be given full SPD status.

We should stick to current village and town development frameworks, and utilise village SPDs and design codes to ensure the character of the locality is preserved.

Savills (UK) Ltd are instructed by St John’s College, Cambridge to make the necessary submissions to the Council’s consultation “The First Conversation” as part of the Issues and Options consultation process for a new Greater Cambridge Local Plan. The College is a significant landowner in and around Cambridge and accordingly needs to make the necessary representations to the Councils in respect of its assets and on other relevant planning policy issues that will arise in the context of any new development plan for the two administrative areas of South Cambridgeshire and Cambridge City. The new Local Plan should encourage the development of integrated masterplans that provide long term strategic development and balance the need to protect heritage assets versus the need to grow. Such plans can also identify opportunities to reduce the environmental impact even within a growth setting. The Local Plan could consider how to provide for formal adoption of masterplans, including College masterplans, as part of the planning process to support this approach.

Our heritage should be protected by preventing large developments going ahead near small existing settlements, conservation areas and historic assets, where the new is out of keeping with, and will overwhelm, the old.

Clarity on how this works with the net zero targets - esp for the historic buildings and what trade offs will be made

I love the mixed architecture of Cambridge. More interesting than Bath. Our "heritage" will soon be underwater though. That is the main consideration. In that context, nothing else matters.

Local Plan heritage policies should be consistent with government policy in the NPPF, in particular including: o a focus on conservation, not protection o assessment of heritage significance should be proportionate to the assets’ importance and no more than is sufficient to understand the potential impact of the proposal on their significance (NPPF paragraph 189). o Where a development proposal will lead to less than substantial harm to the significance of a designated heritage asset, this harm should be weighed against the public benefits of the proposal including, where appropriate, securing its optimum viable use (NPPF paragraph 196). Policies should seek to achieve the proportionality and balance sought through government policy. We remain concerned that the City Council’s Historic Core Appraisal was not based on a robust appraisal methodology, and that ‘Positive Buildings’ were identified on a subjective basis.