Urban Design London (UDL) is launching a new scheme to provide expert design and planning advice to London authorities through an informal type of Design Review called London Design Surgeries.

Esther Kurland Director of UDL says; ”We are offering access to technical expertise and experience that local authorities might not have in house and can not easily get in other ways at the moment.  The idea is to support local officers as they assess, negotiate and decide on schemes, but we do not dictate or direct.  We have an excellent panel of experts available to help authorities achieve the best possible schemes for their area. This is a pretty unique a model.  It is relatively cheap and efficient, it is friendly and unintimidating and it pools expertise to offer great quality advice to a large number of authorities.

“Unlike more traditional models of Design Review, there is no formal written outcome and it is up to the officers present to decide how to use the advice given.  Surgeries let local authority officers learn, gain confidence and hone their design appraisal skills. Trial Surgeries have proved useful not only in supporting negotiations on pre- planning application development proposals, but with public realm schemes, where Transport for London (TfL) is taking a lead by using them to consider the design validity of street improvement projects.”

 Design Surgeries use leading design ‘surgeons’ who are experts in their field.  A refreshed surgeons panel is being procured at the moment, but surgeons at trial sessions included;

Fred Manson whose planning experience includes the Tate Modern  and GLA Headquarters;

Neil Deely Architect responsible for the design of Adamstown District Centre, Winner of the 2008 RTPI Sustainable Communities Award.

Bill Mount, lead officer at Kensington and Chelsea responsible for Kensington High Street and Exhibition Road schemes.

The Surgeries are a joint project with Design for London, HCA London, TfL and the North London Strategic Alliance.  Around 10 trial sessions have been run to date.    Partners involved with the surgeries include:

• Sunand Prasad – Past RIBA President and member of the Mayors’ Design Advisory Panel
• Mark Brearley – Head of Design for London
• Nina Webster – Coordinating the use of surgeries to support improvements to main roads in Transport for London.
• Julian Hart – Head of Design and Standards at HCA London
• David Rowe – Head of Borough Projects and Programmes Transport for London

Waltham Forest, Barnet and Enfield are amongst the London boroughs that have been involved in the trial of this new programme.

Design Surgeries complement other support, review and decision making processes, for example on going project help offered by Design for London. They are generally best suited to small schemes that are not supported in other ways. They take places twice a month. Each session focuses on either streets/public realm or mixed use/town centre or housing schemes. Each project reviewed in a session is given 1-2 hours depending on the complexity of the scheme.

Surgeries are free for boroughs who are members of UDL (27 out of London’s 33 authorities at present). They are not normally available for others.

For more information call +44 (0) 207 593 8379 or visit http://www.urbandesignlondon.com

Urban Design London (UDL) provides unique, independent insight through training and professional advice to built environment practitioners working in urban design, housing, streets and green space development. UDL runs high quality Continuing Professional Development training courses suitable for all levels of experience within the profession. It also runs networking events that provide an opportunity to get the inside track on policy and to meet with influential policy leaders and colleagues from other areas of urban design. It is one of the few training organizations to run site visits.

Media enquiries:                

Caroline Corfield-Rose cc@totalmarketingnetwork.com

Tel 07979 706 553  Or Denise Pritchard dp@totalmarketingnetwork.com

Tel 07802 582 842

Report by Zsuzsa Szeles, UDL Intern

 First of all, many thanks for everyone who came for our Tricky Issues session on the 1^st of July and particular thanks to speakers who gave us an extremely interesting insight into different projects and issues.

The main focus of the session was on achieving high quality design of mixed tenure and high density housing developments to enhance safety and access for all.

The session started with a presentation by Julia Robinson from HCA who highlighted some of the key issues which were identified through a quality assessment of 42 residential schemes conducted between 2008-2009. Various aspects, such as habitability, connectivity, unit size, security and quality of external spaces were looked at to assess standards of developments. The presentation provided a number of best practice examples and explained what should be avoided in terms of external and internal design.

This was followed by a series of presentations given by Gary Tidmarsh from Lewitt Bernstein;  Steve Proctor – Proctore & Matthews; Alan Camp & Nikki Cutler- Alan Camp Architects, Chris Rainsford- Calford Seaden Architects and Dominic Papa from S333 Architecture & Urbanism. They focused on different aspects of designing shared facilities such as communal spaces, refuse and car parking areas as well as attractive and well designed entrances.

The presentations generated a very stimulating discussion session and questions about different design approaches and challenges that arose during the design process. Please place your cursor over the image to receive more information.

 If you would like to tell others of your approaches to designing shared facilities, issues and challenges   please add through discussion forum on the link below.

 1. Julia Robertson, – HCA- Audit of Communal Facilities

 

2. Gary Tidmarsh – Lewitt Bernstein – The Bolanachi Building

 

 3. Steve Proctor – Proctor & Matthews -The Grove, Wembley  

4. Alan Camp & Nikki Cutler- Alan Camp Architects- Falcon Works, Southwark

Notes

Today’s Tricky Issues session attracted a range of people from TfL and a number of London Boroughs to talk about various paving materials and construction techniques from traffic and design perspective.

As the presentations stressed, landscape re-modelling and public realm improvements require a new approach to design process and more thoughts from professionals with more initial planning.  This includes a list of design objectives and a number of other considerations which need to be taken into account such as

Durability: Will the product stand up over time?

Functionality: Are the materials are well suited for the purpose? Do the materials serve multiple functions?  

Appeal & Aesthetics: Do they enhance nearby elements?

Accessibility: Do they help orientate the user, mark transitions and boundaries and facilitate wheelchair or other mobility assisting devices?

Health & Safety: Do they consider slips and accidents? Are they the right finish for the use and place?

Manual handling and labour: time and cost implications

It was useful to get some insight into different surface and paving products as well as various paving patterns that are widely used in traffic and public realm schemes explaining their benefits as well as shortcomings in different setting.

Following this, the presentation moved onto the use of street furniture such as bollards, seating and lighting, some of them which have been developed in order to provide high security and counter-terrorist solutions. As we know, architects and planners are now being required to take into consideration counter-terrorism (CT) measures when designing public access and public spaces. This aim is set out by RIBA’s recent publication ‘Guidance for Designing for Counter-Terrorism’ (April, 2010) which intends to improve the way architects and designers think about security from the outset.

As Mark explained, the overall aim here is to seamlessly integrate such measures into the streetscape without compromising the aesthetics, characteristics and accessibility of the spaces. These are designed to provide affective hostile vehicle mitigation measures to reduce risk and increase the safety and security of spaces.

 The session ended with a general discussion about the implication of various design decisions in terms of cost, time and labour and how this could affect project delivery in a wider scale.

 

Presenter: Scott Lester, Transport for London

Scott currently works in the Better Routes and Places Directorate as a Borough Programme Manager and has worked for TfL since its beginning in 2000. He is a Chartered Civil Engineer and previous projects he has assisted with delivery include Woolwich Town Centre and the Oxford Circus Diagonal Crossing. Scott’s current projects are the programme management of the Olympic Walking and Cycle Routes in across East and South East London.

Case Study: Woolwich Town Centre

The work was carried out by Transport for London and Greenwich Council. The objective of the project was to reduce segregation and congestion and generally improve the public realm and the streetscape.

 Summary:

Woolwich declined as a town in the late 20th century, starting with the closure of the Siemens factory in 1968 and continuing as the Royal Arsenal scaled back operations and finally closed in 1994. Without major local employers, the local economy was affected and the demographics of Woolwich changed. In the town centre, department and chain stores closed and the sprawl of the town centre shrank. The focus of shopping activity was limited mostly to Powis Street and the area around the market. By the early 1990s, the town centre had the typical appearance of a town in decline—discount retailers and charity shops using the empty stores. The local Council used several properties as offices. The last cinema, the Coronet, closed and in general Woolwich seemed to have lost its previous vigor.

Following a bid in 2005 for the regeneration of the area, Phase 1 works commenced in December 2007. A number of issues were identified, including poor level of permeability, visibility and security as well as problems with crime and existing CCTV cameras as they appeared to have poor area coverage due to a number of trees around the site.

The first Phase of the scheme included the creation of a new crossing for cyclists and pedestrians in Plumstead Road, pavements were generally widened, unnecessary street furniture’s were removed and trees were planted to improve the streetscape.

The next stage of the project, commenced in June 2009 proposed further public realm improvements and a new, tree-lined boulevard to give a more ‘open’  and  ‘green feel’ of the area.

In addition, as Scott explained, there was a lot of emphasis on de-cluttering and removing poorly designed and unnecessary street furniture’s, guard rails and bollards in order to open up and ensure pedestrian access and linkages are sufficient.

Earlier this year, the town centre project was awarded for its contribution to the community at the London Civil Engineering Awards, organized by the Institution of Civil Engineers.

Smarter Street Design – Tim Long

The public realm is frequently characterised by clutter. Roads and streets are often dominated by ‘street furniture’ components which include anything from bins, benches, bollards, railings, lighting, signposts and cycle stands. Some of these items are introduced on grounds of ‘pedestrian improvements’, yet they stagger pedestrian crossings and impede pedestrian movement while allowing a free run for the car. Therefore,   all these need careful attention. Since the promotion of walking, cycling and place making are high on the agenda, it is recognised that changing designers and local authorities approach to street design is vital to create attractive streets while giving high priority to the needs of pedestrians, cyclists and users of public transport. 

Tim Long gave us a presentation on a more sophisticated, smarter design approach with a particular focus on the use of innovative, multi-purpose street furniture elements to avoid clutter and make streets and public spaces more attractive environment.

As Tim explained, by implementing multi-purpose street furniture, a number of objectives can be achieved:

-Reducing visual and physical clutter in public spaces

-Less cleaning, management and maintenance

-Appreciate architectural quality

-Simplify street design

The first objective is particularly relevant in today’s security conscious urban environments, specifically where the use various design elements (bollards, planters and other form of barriers) intend to reduce vulnerability and increase security.

The presentation included a number of case studies where improvements have taken place  and provided great examples  of different type of street furniture such as ‘bin & bench’,(a multi-functional bench that can be also used as a bin) which was implemented in Covent Garden’s Great Queen Street.

Other solutions included anti-terrorism benches and bollards whereby the counter-terrorism function is hidden for the users. These furniture elements are impact tested to stop vehicles to carry out attacks.

The session generated a number of interesting questions and discussion points towards the end in terms of comfort, cost effectiveness, practicality, use of material and people’s experience using these new features.

This discussion was followed by looking at a range of surface materials and their correct applications as well as suitability in different urban environment. As Mark, an expert on landscape & surface materials described, there are a number of considerations which need to be taken into account when choosing surface materials for paving or road surfaces. These include for instance resistance, durability, weather condition of the country and finishing of materials. Handling should also be considered, as this have a time and cost implication on public realm and urban design projects.

 

Edmund Bird- Heritage and Its Role within TfL

Transport can impact on the historic environment in a number of ways, some negative but some positive. For instance, a new road may risk damaging archaeology or affect the setting of a listed building and historical character of the area. On the other hand, a sensitively designed public space free on unnecessary street clutter such as signs, guardrails and road markings can be a positive benefit to the historic area.

The focus of Edmund Bird’s presentation was on the relationship between heritage and new transport proposals of different scales from public realm improvements to major infrastructural proposal in historical settings. Looking at a wide array of case studies and examples, the presentation provided an excellent insight into sensitive issues, design considerations and possible conflicts when dealing with public transport improvements in historic environments.

A brief discussion included topics on restoration processes, historic bollards as well as other considerations such as trees and landscape protection.  

 

Nick Blades- Legible London

Speaker:

Nick Blades is a programme Manager at Transport for London within the Strategy and Business Development Directorate. He is currently working on the Legible London Programme but at TfL has previously worked on a range of transport and urban realm projects including London Bridge Interchange, Greenwich Waterfront Transit , A406 Bonds Green Safety and Environmental Enhancements, A13 Renwick Road Junction Improvement. Previously, he has worked as a transport planner for a range of public sector organisations and private sector consultants. 

Despite improvements in the last few years, there are a number of challenges facing London and its transport system. Public transport is crowded and roads are congested. In order to reduce overcrowding and maintain the efficiency of the transport system, further investment in transport infrastructure are planned, along with the Major’s objective to improve cycling and walking in London and provide a safe and efficient pedestrian network in the city.  However, as Nick explained, there are a number of barriers to walking in the city due to lack of information, poor integration and infrastructure, people’s poor awareness about distance and lack of research in relation to pedestrian movements and how they can be improved.

In order to develop an integrated and effective pedestrian network, TfL is piloting ‘Legible London’ to tackle these issues and help both residents and visitors walk their destination quickly and easily.

As the presentation highlighted, the system aims to integrate, feed and co-ordinate a range of information, including street signs and printed maps to help people find their way. Most importantly, it seeks to be part of the wider transport network by providing consistent end to end journey information via a range of media, TfL modes and in different places.

Discussion towards the end of the session provided an opportunity to find out more about future delivery and system development, partnership working and cost implications of the scheme.

 

Lennox Davidson- Oxford Circus Diagonal Crossing 

Nick’s presentation was followed by an extremely interesting overview about Oxford Circus’s Diagonal Crossing by Lennox Davidson from Transport for London. Claimed to be the largest of its type in Europe, the crossing has been inspired by one in the Sibuya district of Tokyo in Japan to cut congestion and overcrowding of London’s busiest retail street and devote more space to pedestrian movement.

In order to allow getting people to cross with ease, all its barriers and street clutter were removed and remodelled and footways were widened to give pedestrians the freedom to move around quickly both straight and diagonally.

As Lennox stressed, it was important to attain a deep understanding of the problems of Oxford Circus and conduct a series of analysis and predictions in relation to pedestrian movement, impact on buses and journey time for such high profile transport planning and urban design intervention.

Six months on, the project is already considered to be highly successful and has brought a number benefits, for instance:

• Improved public realm
• Reduced pedestrian congestion
• Walk time has been reduced
• However, there is a need to do more surveys on bus journeys and traffic.

After the seminar, a  number of questions were raised, which generated a stimulating discussion on Accident rates since the completion of the project and the impact of removing guard rails around the site, which, as Lennox explained had no efficient function and were considered to be as part of an old design. However, terrorism and ‘design out of terrorism’ appeared to be a concern during the design process and a number of meetings had to take place with Anti-terrorism design officers to find some solutions for their concerns.

Presenter:  Jamie Dean, Design for London   

Jamie is a senior member of the Mayor of London’s Design for London team. He is responsible for developing policy, design and delivery strategies and pushing forward a number of master planning, public space and transport infrastructure projects in key areas of change across London. A key responsibility is the coordination of a broad partnership of government and local agencies alongside a range of designers to develop the East London Grid (ELGG) and the London Thames Gateway Parklands Programmes. These initiatives promote a green infrastructure approach to shaping and supporting London’s eastern expansion and tackling climate change. An award winning programme the ELGG is now being extended across the Greater London Area, with Jamie taking the lead.     

Parks and green open spaces are both a highly valued and highly used feature of the built environment. Three out of four people visit a public green space at least once a month- more than a quarter do so at least three times a week. It also has a vital role to play in combating climate change and tackling flooding, supporting biodiversity and maximise sustainability.    

Although the concept has been around for a while, the last few years have seen a growing appreciation of the value of green infrastructure and the need to protect and increase it. This aspiration is deeply imbedded in the London Plan’s urban greening policies as well as other outputs such as ‘World Class Places: The government’s strategy for improving quality of life’,(2009) and ‘ The City of London Climate Change Adaptation Strategy (2010).     

Today’s seminar on Green Grids generated a huge interest, and over 40 UDL members attended to both, the morning and afternoon session.  The first presentation, which provided an overview about Green Grids and explained the idea behind the East London Green Grid, was presented by Jamie Dean, Design for London, whom has been intensely involved in developing policies and strategies for the East London Green Grid Framework.    

As Jamie explained, the East London Green Grid is considered to be “the next generation of parks” that seeks to provide as series of access and links to open space. The key drivers behind the green grid idea is manifold; climate change targets, including London’s growth as well as huge housing targets in combination with green belts and other policy initiatives requires the need for a more co-ordinated approach. For instance in East London, South Essex and North Kent a collaborative approach to existing and potential green space has been developed by partnerships of local authorities and others, embracing the concept of Green Grid. The precise approach however varies from place to place, but in each case Green Grid emphasises the importance of physically linking together parcels of green space such as parks, marshlands, cemeteries, and nature conservation areas.   

In East London, there are 6 areas and within these, over 300 green infrastructure projects that are being prepared for delivery by public agencies or as an integral part of developments. Partners have defined a first phase of over 100 projects to push forward over the next 3-5 years. These projects will establish a green infrastructure network for East London anchored in the London Thames Gateway and a series of strategic walks. For further information, an interactive map and details of Phase 1 projects please visit the Design for London website (www.designforlondon.gov.uk).    

The seminar was followed by a group discussion which addressed a number of questions in terms of challenges to deliver the projects, what are the local priorities of different boroughs and how Green Grids (GG) helps to deliver them.   

Case Study : Lea River Park development   

Summary: The Lea River Park is an exciting new project in East London, part of the regeneration in the Lower Lea Valley managed by London Thames Gateway Development Corporation. It will form the Southern end of a green corridor of open space, extending from the River Thames in the South along the path of the River Lea to Hertfordshire in the north. Six park areas will be linked by the Fatwalk- six kilometers of parkland with footpath and cycle ways, new bridges and towpath.      

The Fatwalk was submitted for planning permission in April, 2010 and  changes to Three Mills Green are currently being designed.