EAST Hampshire District Council's community forum for Alton and the surrounding villages attracted a full house on Tuesday for a presentation by the Alton Town Partnership (ATP) on the Alton Town Design Statement. Delivered by Mike Heelis, leader of the design statement working group, the aim of the presentation was to provide evidence of the progress and intent of the group in support of a funding application to EHDC for the statement. As community engagement was key to the success of the project, it had been agreed to use the forum as an opportunity to conduct a public consultation in support of the statement. In explaining the history behind the decision to produce a statement, Mr Heelis told the meeting that while a lot of villages had design statements, towns the size of Alton had not. Used to capture the character and setting of a town or village, to record what is special about that place, what the community wants to preserve and enhance and how it would like to shape and influence any future development, a design statement is seen as a useful tool that, once adopted as "supplementary planning guidance", can provide a degree of influence in local planning decisions. According to Mr Heelis, the creation of the Alton 2020 Town Plan had revealed a community-wide recognition that Alton must not stand still. However, this acceptance was accompanied by a desire for decisions regarding the town's development to be controlled, sensitive to its character and reflective of the needs and wishes of the townsfolk. "Altonians want more control and influence over decisions which will affect their lives and the lives of the town's future generations," he said. As such, the statement will: • Describe the character of different areas within the boundaries of Alton and Holybourne, and identify the nature of development most suited to each, reflecting the residential and commercial needs of the town and the aspirations of people living and working within its boundaries • Provide for defined residential, retail, commercial, industrial and leisure areas within the boundaries of Alton and Holybourne, detailed design guidance to landowners, developers and architects before they prepare proposals • Provide design guidance for accessibility to the town now and in the future • Reduce unsympathetic development by providing planning authorities with established guidelines when seeking improvements in planning application • Provide a framework justifying rejection of applications that fail to meet community requirements and aspirations. According to Mr Heelis, what was needed now from the people of Alton was engagement. "We need you to tell us what you think is special about Alton. We need your views and opinions." He also stressed the need for more volunteers to help with the project. The process of creating the town design statement began earlier this year, using the Alton 2020 plan as the basis for the work. A public questionnaire, carried out during the Civil War weekend in April, provided some important feedback to help volunteers develop individual sections of the statement. And while it is down to the working group to determine the content and produce review drafts, the workload is already proving onerous. So much so that, according to Mr Heelis, it has been decided to to employ the services of a part-time project manager at a cost of £6,600. Other costs involved with the project include a further £8,000 for printing 500 finished documents and £500 for other costs, resulting in a bottom line of more than £15,000. That, said Mr Heelis, was not accounting for almost £3,000 of volunteer time, costed at £5 an hour. The group was applying for a £2,000 grant from EHDC towards the cost of the project - a request unanimously agreed by the community forum. Following the presentation, members of the public gave their views on four areas of the consultation process, including setting, conservation areas, accessibility and the built environment. Key points to come out of the consultation were the need to protect Alton's skyline, whether conservation areas mean enough to the planners, and the need to integrate cycle and footpath networks. There was a suggestion also that, in order to reach a good cross-section of the community, future consultation exercises should be carried out at somewhere like Sainsbury's. In thanking Mike Heelis and the ATP for the presentation, forum chairman David O'Donnell (Holybourne) stressed that the key to the success of the design statement was "public engagement" and he urged members of the public to "do their bit" by supporting the project.
