Response to July 2024 revision scheme for The Beehive site
Beehive Centre, Railpen redevelopment
This is a summary of the information given to the public during the public consultation for the revised proposals for the Beehive Centre. We hope it is an accurate interpretation. The revised scheme is due to be submitted in August when much more detail will be available.
We can see that a lot of work has been done on the scheme and overall it is improved from the exceptionally poor start seen in the original scheme submitted in August last year. However, the scheme remains an over development of the Beehive site. The scale of the buildings is still overwhelming and in stark contrast to the low rise, domestic scale of buildings that immediately surround the site.
From an immediate neighbours’ perspective the proposals are still too high and too bulky. From a city-wide impact perspective, the height of most buildings, we are told, will be below the skyline from most recognised city viewpoints named in Policy 60, but the mass of the amalgamated buildings will still be very visible. It should be remembered as well that the Beehive development will be seen, together with the Grafton Centre development (similar in style), in some views. This will create a very large area of bulky, flat roofed development in direct contrast to historic assets and the attractive and varied roofscapes of the historic core.
Taking information from the consultation exhibition boards (the board number is referenced in our summary) and webinar which was attended by 60 members of the public.
Relationship with surrounding communities
As far as the surrounding communities are concerned, some have benefitted and some have come off badly.
Railpen has decreased the height of some of the buildings as can be seen on consultation board 12 in the consultation website .
Using the revised block numbers, blocks 2, 4, 5, 6 and 9, have been lowered by one laboratory storeys, whereas block 10 has been raised by two lesser height storeys. During the webinar the architect said that the estimated reduction in floorspace is 10%. Note there is no information on flues from the lab buildings (blocks 2, 3, 5 and 6) which will rise probably 25% above the heights given.
York Street, Sleaford Street and St Matthews Gardens
The blocks adjacent to York Street (Rope Walk), Sleaford Street and St. Matthews Gardens have been stepped back allowing a better relationship to those communities.
York Street (boards 8 and 11) properties benefit as Block 7 and 8 have been moved further back from the boundary to allow further tree planting to supplement the existing on the southern boundary. Also the upper floors have been stepped back easing the overlooking, but judging from the cross section the scale of block 7 remains somewhat overwhelming.
The view from the Sleaford Street (Geldart pub) is certainly better, but views from upper rear windows of York Street properties, although improved, might remain intrusive. Fenestration design will be vital to design out as much overlooking as possible.
The relationship between block 8 and the adjacent block of St. Matthews Gardens is certainly not improved and perhaps slightly worse. Comparing to two views from St. Matthews Gardens on board 8 there is less sky shown in the revised version surely meaning there is more building shown.
Silverwood Close
Silverwood Close (boards 9 and 10) - The relationship between block 1 and Silverwood Close is improved as the building has been moved back slightly and also the upper floors are stepped back. It is better but not as acceptable as the view at the moment.
The relationship between block 10 (multi storey car park on upper levels) and Silverwood Close is considerable worse because of the sheer sided elevation of block 10 as well as the building use. The cross section on board 10 showing the revised building and the nearest houses demonstrates this. The architect stated that much of the impact of the building use as a multi storey car park can be designed out. There is a certain amount of scepticism about that. Do not take comfort from the vegetated elevation suggestion as this approach to disguising a building is difficult to establish and maintain.
Relationship to the wider area
Board 12 shows the revised view from Coldham’s Common (green belt) – although the view illustrates the drop in height, the development as a whole remains overpowering in contrast to the domestic scale of building in the foreground particularly as the buildings still merge into one large mass of varying flat roof heights and flues.
Details on building heights
The graphics on board 12 shows a comparison between the original scheme and the revised. The number of storeys (larger white numbers) and the heights in metres in the white tags. It is best not to take much notice of the number of storeys. Laboratory storeys are higher than residential storeys because of all the mechanical engineering that needs to be incorporated into the ceilings. Lab storey heights average between 4.5 and 5.5m, whereas residential storey heights are usually 3m high.
For a nearby comparison, the seven residential storey blocks to the east of the railway in the Timberworks development are 21m high. So you would need to add another 5 residential storeys to Timberworks to be the same height as block 5. (Block 5 is opposite to Hampton Gardens, Cromwell Road, east of the railway).
There has been a lessening of building numbers – 10 as opposed to 12 previously. This because of some building mergers, e.g. the two long buildings backing onto Rope Walk have been merged into two buildings immediately to the north of them.
In terms of the bulk of each building, there has been some pulling and pushing of building floorplates resulting in some building being slightly larger to try and maintain some of the floor space lost to height reduction so there is no improvement in the bulk of the buildings. From a distance the buildings will still merge with one another to create one enormous blocky mass with a varied flat roof line.
This will be evident in the revised Townscape and Visual Impact Assessment to be included in the revised submission in August. It will contain a complete set of revised verified views.
Block 1 = 15.9m at its highest point
Block 2 = 25.4m at its highest point
Block 3 = 20.7m at its highest point
Block 4 = 30.1m at its highest point
Block 5 = 35.7m at its highest point
Block 6 = 31.0mm at its highest point
Block 7 = 28.7m at its highest point
Block 8 = 28.7mm at its highest point
Block 9 = 32.9mm at its highest point
Block 10 = 25.1m at its highest point
Design changes generally
There are additional shops, cafes and restaurants and the landscape design is improved giving a better, consolidated approach and they’ve done the wise thing and omitted the wetland. There is some scepticism about whether café and restaurants will be that successful – they will only serve the local community and workers as the site is not on a main thoroughfare. The food offer will need to be exceptional for people to go out of their way to visit the site regularly.
Cycling
The cycle through route is improved by being changed to a direct, segregated cycle/pedestrian route through the centre of the site. However the width decreases from 4m to 3m for most of the length which we believe is too narrow and confined to be safe.
The road alignment has been revised slightly to allow a larger green space to the east of the Silverwood Close wall. However this does not allow block 10 to be any further away from the nearest houses.
Public Transport Improvements board 15
The downloadable board is an over view of the boards at the consultation event. We will have to wait for the revised submission to learn more. But on the one downloadable board, paragraph 4 says that Railpen’s transport consultants have analysed what is required to get workers and the public out of their cars and onto public transport, walking and cycling and “guide a multi-million-pound package of measures to improve local public transport”. It then goes into more details about the measures to improve buses which do sound very good. But it does not say if Railpen are funding the whole package.
Sustainable development (board 16)
Saying all the right things in terms of constructing sustainable buildings and are committed to BREEAM ‘outstanding’. Interestingly in the webinar when questioned about water consumption the team said that they are committing to maximum BREEAM credits for water consumption (max. 5 credits plus one for exemplar performance) – low flow appliances and rain and grey water recycling. In terms of planning permission, the planning agent said that demonstrating to the local authority that the buildings would comply with the max 5+1 credits is usually enough to gain permission (presumably despite an Environment Agency objection).
Dealing with the Urban Heat Island Effect (board 17)
There is a commitment to delivering 2.6 hectares of new open space and landscape. We do not know how much of that is soft (green) landscape which is the important element when trying to combat UHIE. They are committed to undertaking a voluntary Urban Green Factor assessment which evaluates the quality and quantity of green space provided. UGF does not assess radiated heat from building elevations which will need to be covered by building materials and colours. UGF assessment will be interesting.
Provision of jobs (board 18)
This is important as it will be a major factor in a planning decision based on the ‘planning balance’, i.e. taken in the round, do the benefits of the proposals outweigh the disbenefits? Proposals would “create 5,000 new jobs with 2,130 entry level to mid-level jobs that will require no specialist qualification and would require on the job training”.
However, bear in mind this is a speculative development and as Railpen are the developer of the scheme and not the laboratory operator, there may be changes to these figures at the end of the day.
Construction phase (board 19)
Commitment to minimising impact on local communities and maintaining good lines of communication.
Design Code
During the exhibition there was much about the Design Code. If a planning application is Outline, as this one is, it only deals with bare essentials of the proposals, i.e. access, building heights and dimensions, etc. The detail is then agreed, or not, at the next stage of planning - Reserved Matters.
A Design Code is often required at Outline stage to tie the design down in more detail. It will include such elements as maximum and minimum of building heights and envelopes, amount of soft and hard landscape, design of the accesses, location of a cycle route, etc. Within the Code there will be mandatory elements and discretionary elements – the mandatory must be delivered by the developer. The discretionary is just that – down to the developer to deliver or not.
Note that the Design Code will not include all the ‘lovely to have extras’ Railpen is including in their proposals such as all the travel improvements. Those may, or may not, be included at a later date, or they may be in a different form.
A Design Code is not only a useful tool to tie some detail down, but useful in some cases when a developer who obtained the Outline permission is not the same developer taking the scheme forward to reserved matters application, i.e. the original developer may sell the site on. We believe it is unlikely that this will be the case with regard to the Beehive.
What next?
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