News on Watford

On Thursday 3rd March the Watford Urban Room was the setting for a lively discussion about how we can ensure quality housing in Watford Town Centre. We were joined by development experts Neil Murphy (Director, TOWN), Roland Karthaus (Director, Matter Architecture and National High Streets Task Force expert) and Cany Ash (Partner, Ash Sakula Architects) to explore questions about density, height and car parking. You can see their presentations here.

Roland Karthaus showed us how Waltham Forest Council is integrating new housing development behind Walthamstow High St with commercial uses, connecting it with public spaces and helping to reactivate the High St. He said: “the richness of a place is a combination of its history, the people and the activities that happen in the public space.”

Neil Murphy is working with Milton Keynes Council to redevelop Wolverton town centre, with a mixture of residential and commercial uses, including affordable and social rented housing. In their public consultation, people were encouraged to experiment with building forms using wooden blocks. They quickly discovered that including loads of parking meant increasing height, and this was out of character with the surrounding conservation area.

Cany Ash showed a video of Ash Sakula’s award-winning development in the Malings, Newcastle. The development was limited to four and six storeys, thereby eliminating lift, concierge and associated management costs, and included lots of balconies, roof terraces and communal space, creating a real sense of community.

There was broad agreement on a number of issues:

The relationship of homes to the street and surrounding environment is really important. This gets lost as buildings get higher, particularly if there is lots of parking. In Watford, we want to connect the Town Centre to Cassiobury Park and the Colne River.

Retail units at ground floor level may take a while to let, but it’s usually worth the wait: in the Malings development they now have a very successful bakery and ice cream shop.

Better quality development can be achieved by bringing more certainty into the planning system, through clear design guidelines.

New housing development should consider the overall vision of Watford Town Centre: if we want to retain and enhance the character of the town, developers will need to be more creative about the form of new housing and how it relates to the public realm.

We need to make sure that housing is affordable for local residents: there is often a perceived trade-off between quality and affordability.

Is there an opportunity for shared energy systems in new housing developments in the Town Centre?

Are there opportunities for creativity and innovation in the use of more sustainable materials and non-traditional methods of construction?

Download the Presentations here