Design process
The closure of the hospital led to the district council’s planners preparing a development brief for the site. The challenge to traditional highway and urban design was delivered through a collaboration between district council as planning authority, the county as highway authority and the developer. The latter describes proudly how they ‘drove a coach and horses through the highway regulations’. Like others before and since, they found ways of interpreting the regulations in a way that has enabled the creation of a place that is very different from an orthodox suburban layout.
Tetlow King were appointed as masterplanners and took the development brief and turned it into a workable layout.
The masterplanners were determined to avoid the familiar suburban model of houses separated from the road by their driveways. Their solution for much of Charlton Down was to bring the houses up to the pavement, to create a continuous building line along the back of the pavement by building walls between the houses, and to punctuate the walls with solid timber gates (which hide the hard-standing and garage behind). To deliver its desired appearance this arrangement depended on residents taking the trouble to open their gate and park within the curtilage of their property.
The way the highway engineering has been subordinated to the design of the townscape is a significant achievement. The layout of buildings and roads is designed to calm the traffic naturally, by such means as changes in highway width and frequent junctions.
Alongside the configuration of the new build element in this scheme, Section 106 (planning gain) funding was used to conserve the best of the hospital buildings for residential, community and leisure use. This has helped with delivering a limited range of uses within the scheme, has helped retain important local landmarks and has encouraged local community development. In particular the village hall in the old hospital ballroom and the shop give some sense of place to the area in the centre of the development.
