South Nazeing: How community engagement in planning supported a positive outcome
At South Nazeing, community engagement in planning played an important part in securing a positive outcome for a proposed 104-home development. Through public consultation, technical collaboration and ongoing discussions with local stakeholders, Arrow helped guide a complex planning application towards a unanimous committee resolution to grant planning permission.
Collaboration is vital to creating the best places. At South Nazeing, community engagement throughout the planning process was central to achieving a positive outcome for a proposed residential development. Following extensive work with officers, councillors and the local community, Members of Epping Forest District Council’s Planning Committee resolved to grant planning permission for 104 new homes in Nazeing.
The positive outcome followed a complex planning process in which ongoing engagement, technical collaboration and an understanding of local concerns all played an important part.
Creating places together
An allocation in the local plan only establishes the principle of development. It does not create a place and frequently does not equate to acceptance from the local community. Leading a multi-disciplinary team, Arrow guided our clients through the process from the local plan stage to a unanimously supported resolution to grant planning permission at planning committee.
The site in question was in multiple ownerships and the Council required the production of a Concept Framework Plan (CFP) to ensure a holistic approach to development. The CFP was intended to ensure that the development would deliver a high-quality, well-designed environment that integrates appropriately with its surroundings, while addressing the key planning and site-specific issues identified within the allocation.
The preparation of the CFP involved a comprehensive process of consultation and stakeholder engagement, including:
- Design workshops with the Local Planning Authority;
- Public consultation with the local community and key stakeholders; and
- Independent design advice and feedback from the Essex Quality Review Panel (QRP).
For the CFP to progress, it also needed to be formally endorsed by the Council’s Cabinet. Following completion of the various stages of engagement and consultation, the CFP was endorsed by Cabinet and became a material consideration in the determination of the planning application.
The challenges
- Achieving a high-quality, well-designed residential development while meeting planning policy requirements
High-quality design isn’t something that can be easily measured. It requires professional judgement, assessed from a range of perspectives, while also meeting all relevant planning policy requirements.
As part of the CFP process, we engaged with the QRP, bringing together professionals across landscape architecture, urban design, sustainability, transport and heritage. We also took part in multiple workshops and meetings with the Local Planning Authority’s design and technical officers, ensuring a high design standard that addressed relevant planning policies.
Through this process, the proposed number of dwellings was reduced to meet the County Council’s parking standards, a decision that took several rounds of discussion across different professional perspectives.
None of this was straightforward. With no fixed process to follow, it took careful project management to keep the proposal on track, incorporate everything raised through consultation and develop an illustrative masterplan that demonstrated high-quality design. - Addressing existing local issues and getting support through stakeholder engagement
Engaging with local members and the community was especially important here, since the CFP needed Cabinet endorsement and the application itself would go to Planning Committee.
Our public engagement helped us understand the area, identify existing concerns, and explore what the development could realistically offer. The CFP was endorsed by Cabinet, but the first Planning Committee meeting didn’t result in approval. The application was deferred for further consideration of existing highways and flooding issues in the area. Following discussion during the committee meeting, we gained a clearer picture of what mattered most to residents: traffic speeds on roads near the site and localised off-site flooding.
Development simply can’t resolve all the existing issues a local area has been experiencing for a long time, but local concerns are important and every effort should be made to deliver improvements where practicable and viable.
Continued engagement with local representatives, Council officers and technical specialists helped us better understand the concerns raised and work through the outstanding issues. This collaborative approach played an important part in progressing the application towards the unanimous committee resolution to grant planning permission.
Sustainable development: Lessons from community engagement
There are key takeaways from this project that we believe are fundamental to delivering successful and sustainable development. These principles remain important regardless of how the planning system evolves.
- Working with the Local Planning Authority
Effective collaboration with the Local Planning Authority is fundamental to progressing a complex development proposal. Throughout this project, we took part in multiple design workshops and meetings with different Council officers to develop and refine the illustrative masterplan and layout together.
This ongoing dialogue allowed us to understand the Council’s expectations, identify issues at an early stage and adjust the proposals as the project progressed. - Working with local communities and stakeholders
As outlined above, engaging with local members, parish councillors and the wider community shaped the illustrative masterplan and helped identify the concerns that were subsequently addressed before the Planning Committee resolved to grant planning permission. Resolving those concerns meant continuing to engage even after submission, bringing together local members, the Case Officer, drainage and flooding officers, and Highway Authority representatives to work through the outstanding issues together.
The lesson here is that engagement doesn’t stop once an application is submitted. Concerns raised by members and the community need to be properly understood and addressed throughout, not just at the outset. - Understanding existing local issues and responsibilities
Local communities often face long-standing issues such as traffic, access to GPs and dentists, school capacity and flooding. New development is expected to mitigate the impacts it creates, but planning applications can also become a focus for wider frustrations about problems that pre-date the development and can’t reasonably be resolved by it alone, as was the case here with highway speeds and flooding.
Through discussions with the Council’s technical officers, councillors and the wider project team, we worked to understand which issues the development could reasonably address and which required a different route to resolution.
Having these discussions helped keep the focus on the right issues, rather than letting every existing problem become attached to the new scheme.
Successful and sustainable development needs collaboration and open discussions to identify what falls within the remit of a development to address. Working with the Local Planning Authority, local communities, elected members and technical stakeholders from an early stage helps identify issues, manage expectations and create better outcomes for the development and the existing community alike.
The value of sustained community engagement in planning
For developers and landowners, South Nazeing demonstrates the value of building meaningful community engagement into a planning strategy from the outset and maintaining that dialogue as projects progress.
If you’re bringing forward a development and would like to discuss how early planning advice and community engagement could support your project, get in touch with our team.
