Places

Science Park extension with up to 3000 new homes set within acres of leafy greenery.

We prepared detailed landscape, visual and green belt impact assessments, as well as providing a full suite of ecological surveys and reporting. Our teams collaborated to provide a Green Infrastructure pattern book which will underpin this major urban extension with up to 1,200 new affordable homes plus associated infrastructure.

“South Oxford Science Village will deliver all of the advantages of living in an active, dynamic development on the edge of the city, surrounded by the beauty of the countryside. It is a modern development where people can live, work and enjoy themselves together”.

An exciting redevelopment of a 19.5ha ex-military site located within the City of Bath World Heritage Site.

Our heritage team played a pivotal role, supporting Curo Homes with the redevelopment of the former Foxhill MOD base on the south side of the historic City of Bath. The scheme includes 700 new dwellings, a new primary school, as well as retail and employment uses and ‘The Hub’, a £10million state-of-the-art community building.

A new Green Infrastructure led settlement, sports village and Enterprise Zone.

Our masterplanning team prepared a comprehensive development scheme underpinned by robust Green Infrastructure principles. The client – Buckinghamshire Advantage wanted to ensure the project delivered a strong legacy in the form of homes but also jobs and sports/recreational provision.

The outcome was a new live-work settlement site with 100,000 square metres of commercial space, 1,100 new homes and a grid of combined blue-green infrastructure accounting for approximately 58% of the site.

A sympathetic response to a sensitive site

We designed a scheme of up to 250 new homes in a location of high environmental sensitivity close to Tewkesbury town. The Mythe is an elevated bluff between the rivers Avon and Severn, north of the town. Our heritage and landscape teams first evaluated the town’s historic growth pattern to demonstrate that its form had been determined by the flood plains of the two rivers which had created a pattern of development and green-space that the development would continue.

Connecting Garreg Lwyd and Knighton.

Commissioned by Western Power Distribution, the grid connection for the Carreg Llwyd windfarm is one of our largest and most challenging projects to date. The project sought consent to install a 23km grid connection between the consented Garreg Lwyd Hill windfarm, and the existing electricity distribution network at Knighton substation, Powys, mid-Wales comprising overhead and subterranean cables and pylons situated in a remote landscape that transitioned from semi-urban to upland agricultural land.

EDP’s work ensured that significant environmental effects were avoided or minimised and ensured that our client was able to successfully meet its obligations as a responsible statutory undertaker.

Powering the South East.

Working with Regeneco, EDP worked as part of an experienced team to submit the planning application for this landmark renewable energy project near Eastbourne. At a time when wind farms were still relatively alien in this part of the world, not least due to the extensive areas of national designation, EDP worked with the LPA to develop a scheme which minimised impacts on important views from the newly designated South Downs National Park and the dramatically different Pevensey Levels, whilst responding to the need to respect personal residential visual amenity. The project was ultimately consented at appeal, and has been operational for a number of years, providing some considerable visual interest from the South Downs scarp.

It also looks pretty cool close up…

Cardiff’s Garden City for the 21st Century.

We’ve been involved in delivering this vibrant new quarter for Cardiff from the very outset – for well over a decade in fact. The site is complex – entering two major river watersheds, including sensitive areas and significant tracts of woodland, recognised civil war battlefields, St Fagan’s (home of the Museum of Wales) and numerous wildlife sites and protected species interests. Our initial work demonstrated the potential of the land as a high-quality urban extension option – a vision that eventually caught the interest of City Councillors and led to a draft allocation for the site.

With a key voice on the project in respect of landscape matters, trees, heritage and ecology we went on to help secure outline planning consent for over 7,000 new homes and a robust framework of Green Infrastructure and active travel links, and have since assisted lead developer, Redrow Homes, to deliver a number of the early phases.

Making the most of Sunny Dorset.

Drafted in at the appeal stage, EDP provided landscape expert witness services for this large-scale solar development near Gillingham. Located in an historic Deer Park, the site faced significant heritage and landscape issues, and the approach to the drafting and presentation of evidence required close working relationships to be built with fellow professionals, our excellent client and eminent Counsel.

This site is just one of the considerable number of energy projects EDP are now involved in across the UK.

Improving views from the South Downs National Park.

Our team provided the masterplanning, archaeology and landscape services for the creation of this low density environmentally-led housing scheme. The site lies in close proximity to the South Downs National Park and the Pevensey Levels and the proposal was designed to improve the visual relationship between the existing urban area and distance views from the National Park. It therefore included a substantial landscape framework with woodland and ecological areas, generous areas of new tree planting, new community allotments and sports pitches.

Making Change in Stourbridge.

For more than 15 years EDP has worked as part of an extensive project team, including the Revelan Group, Dudley MBC and English Heritage on this ambitious redevelopment project.

The site comprises the derelict remains of a formerly extensive 18th and 19th century ironworking complex straddling the meandering course of the River Stour and sitting close to the Stourbridge Branch Canal.

Having quickly secured approval for mixed residential development at the Stourbridge Rolling Mills, attention rapidly turned to the jewel in the crown of the site, the Grade II* listed Rastrick and Foster’s ‘New Foundry’. Planning permission and listed building consent, for the listed building’s restoration and conversion to the ‘Lion Medical Centre’, was secured in 2010.

Connecting SW Scotland.

EDP were selected from the Scottish Power Energy Networks Environmental Framework in 2013 to provide consultancy inputs to support the preparation of the Section 37 grid connection application for the Loch Urr wind farm. This 150MW development in south-west Scotland required a 25km grid connection to connect to a proposed ancillary substation.

We worked on the project for over 2 years, during which time we undertook many hours of ecology, landscape and heritage surveys, and produced both a Routeing Consultation Document and Scoping Report in line with SPEN’s defined project phases.

Following the change in Government Policy in 2015, the wind farm was shelved, as was the need for the grid connection.

Ripley Gateway.

A model for modern sustainable growth.

EDP is providing a fully multi-disciplinary team to deliver at Hendy Quarry a vision to combine progressive thinking on placemaking and sustainability in a scheme that will set new standards in Wales.

Working with our client Pobl Homes and Tarmac, the scheme will look to deliver a high quality, self-sustaining new neighbourhood that actively contributes to the wider community. HQ will be a resilient and fully connected place for 21st century living and working, which puts decarbonisation, health and wellbeing at its heart.

Setting a new benchmark for sustainable urban design in Wales, it will have a mobility strategy centred on Active Travel and provide a transport hub which can reduce traffic on the road network. This will be a game changer for placemaking in Wales.

Place Shaping: EDP win tender to provide Placemaking Adviser role to Swansea City Council.

New Shoots in Taunton: Growing a New Garden Neighbourhood.

EDP is currently working on an exciting new masterplan forming a new low carbon garden neighbourhood community in Taunton for our clients Redrow Homes and Persimmon Homes.

EDP are passionate about placemaking giving a distinct identity to our design work, so it is rooted in a thorough understanding of place and history.

This new garden neighbourhood responds to this historic field pattern, overlaying with historic records to re-discover and re-interpret new character areas defined by the context. Working with the natural drainage and hydrology with mitigating phosphates on site in an expansive wetland habitat, this development has the opportunity to create a strong overriding character and series of landscape character themes permeating and connecting throughout the site.

The Battle of Backwell: appeal allowed and outline planning permission granted.

EDP led the design team for Persimmon Homes Severn Valley providing Masterplanning design and heritage inputs for an outline application for 125 homes in Backwell, which is a village in the North Somerset countryside, south of Bristol.

EDP also provided expert design witness at the planning inquiry. This was 4th time lucky for this site and the appeal was allowed. There were three previous secretary of state refusals battling local green space and a neighbourhood plan.

The sensitivities of the site called for a responsive solution to its unique character, while working closely with the wider design team and providing comprehensive information for the inquiry delivered through a Design Compliance document.

A vibrant community at Edlogan Wharf, Sebastopol, South Wales.

EDP have been working with Taylor Wimpey South Wales for a number of years in helping deliver a new community at Edlogan Wharf.

Located in the beautiful green valley of the Afon Llwyd, Edlogan Wharf is a community masterplanned for 1,200 homes enjoying countryside living whilst also being close to local amenities and urban centres such as Cwmbran and Newport. There are extensive cycling and walking routes which line the 16-mile traffic free zone by the Monmouthshire and Brecon Canal that bisects the development.

Our Masterplanning team have created Development Briefs to set the placemaking standards, as well as completing a number of Reserved Matter Planning Applications over this attractive and challenging site.

A World-Class Theme Park designed to embrace the Thames Estuary Landscape and create a destination like no other in the UK.

The London Resort aimed to deliver beyond the boundaries of the ‘entertainment zone’. EDP’s landscape strategy was designed to create safe public access to the existing marsh and riverside habitats, as well as a nature-led approach to the resort landscape. Natural processes were designed to clean up industrial legacy on this brownfield site with green and blue infrastructure at the heart of the design.

In this case, nature played the biggest role in the extraordinary tale. Despite the brownfield contamination, our survey and assessment work identified such a rich diversity of habitats and species on site that Natural England designated much of the area an SSSI.

The project is now looking for a new home.

A Strategic Rail-Freight Interchange – moving freight from road to rail.

Hinckley National Rail Freight Interchange is strategically located at one of the few locations in the country where a railport could be built adjacent to a motorway junction. The project is ambitious in scale to make the most of this advantage and deliver on national objectives to move freight to rail.

EDP have advised throughout the project with robust assessment and thorough consultation proposing an open space and planting strategy that complements the wooded context of the site.

Sharpness Eco-Town – bringing nature into the heart of design decision making.

Sharpness Eco-Town is proposed in a historic location at one of the most inland ports in Britain. The landscape and ecology of this estuarine location are the key drivers of the eco-town vision which aims to expand and enhance the connectivity between habitats and create a community that is connected to nature at all levels.

EDP’s Landscape Vision formed the starting point for the masterplan and our Green Infrastructure Strategy is creating the framework for the design development, ensuring nature and enhanced ecosystem services are at the heart of the place making approach.

Trumpington Meadows – leading the way for Biodiversity.

EDP was delighted to help Grosvenor, the master developer of this award-winning development, demonstrate their biodiversity credentials. Many years ahead of legislation requiring a 10% net gain, the scheme delivered a 46% biodiversity improvement with the riverside country park and nature reserve creating new habitats from a former agricultural site.

North Uttlesford – heritage at the heart of the community.

EDP’s work on the heritage and historic landscape of this site, has been instrumental in driving the design of this garden village.

An historic deer park pale forms a natural habitat ring linking a series of village developments while the archaeological interest is celebrated in the creation of a heritage park.

Active trails are central to the landscape and placemaking strategy, with art, play and well-being routes in and around the development.