NEWS AYLESBURY SOCIETY

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ARUP master plan for Aylesbury unveiled

Although not generally announced, the much awaited ARUP plan for Aylesbury town centre commissioned by Aylesbury Vale Advantage can be found in PDF form on the AVA website. www.aylesburyvaleadvantage.co.uk/index.cfm/ava/Projects.Vision
The draft Aylesbury Town Centre Master Plan is a series of documents being produced by a panel of representatives from Aylesbury Vale District Council, Buckinghamshire County Council, Aylesbury Town Council, The South East of England Development Agency and The Homes and Communities Agency. Other key stakeholders include Warner Estates, owners of  Hale Leys shopping mall, and Brookfield Developments, who own The Friars Square shopping mall. AVA commissioned the consultancy firm ARUP to produce the draft Master Plan which forms the first stage of a process; culminating in the final Master Plan in early 2010.
During the autumn and winter of 2009 AVA will hold a series of internal and external workshops with key stakeholders to explore opinions on the draft Master Plan before releasing the final master plan in early 2010. It is hoped that the Aylesbury Society will be consulted at an early stage. We had Richard Harrington speak to us last March but since then we have heard nothing
The final Master Plan will include a suite of documents: Vision, Transport Study, Town Centre Cultural Strategy and Public Realm Strategy. These documents are not a blueprint for development but rather a set of guiding principles to create a high quality town centre environment to attract and support further inward investment into Aylesbury and Aylesbury Vale over the next 12 years.
An earlier AVA impression on how the area around the new theatre could develop.
Looking at the suggestions made in the ARUP plan and it appears that a number of development sites have been identified which include listed buildings and the conservation areas. The largest site proposed would see all the County Offices being redeveloped including the listed 23a Walton Street (now the Greek Taverna) and the old Police stations & HQ. Also suggested are the shops on the corner of Buckingham Street and Kingsbury and the north side of Buckingham Street which would include the listed buildings 61-67 and the listed Methodist Church. Naturally the Society is concerned about these proposals and will comment in due course.
Civic Trust closes after 50 years

The Civic Trust representing more than 700 civic societies across much of England has closed due to lack of funding.

The Civic Trust was the voice for local groups such as the Aylesbury Society, who are dedicated to improving their civic and architectural spaces.

The trust, which ran awards and Heritage Open Days, said it has been hit particularly hard by "the squeeze on local authority spending in the current climate". Philip Kolvin said on behalf of the Civic Trust: "I still passionately believe in the civic movement, but it now needs grassroot members of vision and energy to start afresh with a new organisation, working within its means and building gradually from the bottom”

One of the most important elements of the trust's work was its awards scheme.
The Civic Trust Awards were established in 1959 and were "one of the oldest built-environment award schemes in Europe". The awards went to "outstanding projects in architecture, planning, environmental design, landscape, public art and urban design". Awards went to more than 5,500 buildings, including cafes, churches, houses and hospitals.

In the meantime Heritage Open Days will be organised by English Heritage and the Society will continue its membership with the Association of North Thames Amenity Societies and
will get more involved with the Civic Trust South East which remains unaffected by the administration if the Civic Trust in England.

ASDA could force closure of local shops

The Society has objected to the proposed redevelopment of land at the NHS Trust Stoke Mandeville Hospital Mandeville Road site to provide a Class A1 food store of 3530 square metres gross internal floor space for ASDA. The plans include including associated car parking, service yard, landscaping and alterations to existing access.

Our main objections are on transport and impact on local retailers.

Objections we have made include:

• the appearance of the standard ASDA store conflicts with the adjoining areas
• the store could cause the closure of nearby smaller convenience stores including two Co-operatives. One is also a post office. Closure of these stores could have a knock on effect of adjacent shops and takeaways in nearby centres.
• The location of the store on the edge of Aylesbury is such that only a small proportion of shoppers could walk to the site. In contrast some of the smaller shops put at risk are well located within the residential areas and are convenient for pedestrians and cyclists.
• The sale of comparison goods such as clothes and electrical goods should be specifically excluded. The Society believes that PPS6 & PPS4 has been inappropriately applied in the application, as the purpose of those documents appears  to prevent out-of-centre shops selling non-core goods.

Aylesbury Society Response to Core Strategies.

The Society has submitted a response to the Core Strategy of the Local Development Framework recently published by Aylesbury Vale District Council.   Whilst the document itself is written in fairly clear language the format of the document and, most particularly, that of the standard response forms taxed even those members of the committee that have some experience of these matters.

The main comments/objectives, with the exception of minor comments are:-

• The lack of road links, particularly between the A413 (Wendover Road) and the A418 (Thame Road).   This will lead to overloading of Station Road, Stoke Mandeville and the Walton Triangle.   This will be made worse by the majority of the additional housing being to the east of Aylesbury whilst the majority of additional employment outside of the town itself will be to the west at Haddenham, Long Crendon etc.
• The proposed Broughton Crossing housing area is too small and isolated to be self sustaining.
• No account appears to have been taken of the relationship between employment and housing.
• The proposed enlargement of the town centre to include the new courts at Walton and Aylesbury College is excessive.   There is also a failure to distinguish between the Old Town, the actual/realistic centre and edge-of-centre such as Cambridge Close.   The proposed strategy denotes the Old Town as an area of change!   The inclusion of Cambridge Close/The Junction etc.,  would permit these ‘tin sheds’ to sell anything and compete with the actual town centre.
• There is a lack of comprehensive and coherent transport strategy which is a major omission given that it is predicted that by 2026 off-peak traffic congestion in Aylesbury will be worse than present peak-hour congestion.
• The indicative alignment of new road links suggests that these will pass through the new housing areas repeating the problems which arise now in Bedgrove.

There are other strategies which refer to the wider Aylesbury Vale area which are outside our remit and have not been commented upon.

Keith Robinson