Dear John,
To keep you informed as to what was said at my meeting with representatives of Sheffield City Council's "Urban Design and Conservation Team" at the library earlier today, I summarise the main points that were discussed below.
(Note that I am copying this to Andrew Slaney of SCC so he can come back to us if I have remembered anything incorrectly or wants to add anything. I am also thinking of putting the final version and perhaps other correspondence on conservation.ecclesfieldgroups.com. Note also that I was delayed and arrived after Roger Tordoff and Peter Barker had left, so they might have other things to add).
However the points I know about are...
1. Ecclesfield Village Plan could usefully supply comments about the conservation area. This could most easily be done by emailing a Microsoft Word file to Andrew Slaney at the Cc address above, say the day after our meeting on 18th June. Alternatively, we could have an extension to enable us to put a letter in the post.
2. The council were only able to send out questionnaires to those in the conservation area - some 200 letters. In addition to an official response from Ecclesfield Village Plan, it would therefore also be useful if plan members, or indeed any other people living near the conservation area filled in the printed or on-line forms and submitted them. People are however asked to include their address, so that the Council know which replies come from inside and which from outside the conservation area.
3. Useful areas to comment on
include...
a. Since the existing conservation area
was defined in 1977, any changes or other reasons for increasing or
decreasing its size.
b. Anything missed out of the list of
features which we think it is important to conserve. This could
include land marks, walls, trees, open land, or even views, as well as
buildings.
c. Anything which may be mentioned in the
appraisal or management proposals, but which we think is especially
important.
4. Things the conservation area team could do
for us...
a. Influence planning applications in the
designated area, both in the negative sense of preventing inappropriate
developments, and sometimes in a positive sense by acting as professional
advisers.
b. Encourage (but not usually mandate) service
providers such as BT to treat the designated area with
respect.
c. Influence the style and provision of street
furniture such as street lighting.
d. Influence the
standard of road maintenance, E.g. by specifying the surfacing materials to be
used (but it might take 5 years for this to filter
though).
e. The council recognise that planning notices
posted around the village can get obliterated and not seen, and are happy to
co-operate directly with groups of people interested in particular conservation
areas. They would therefore be happy to supply copies of planning applications
to a body interested in the Ecclesfield Conservation Area. An appropriate way of
initiating this, would be by giving the Council an email address for the body
concerned. [My note: If Roger wants to use it, the
address is already set up, can be diverted to (one only) private email address,
and in addition, can be viewed by anybody with password authority to edit the
website]
5. Things the conservation team can't
do...
a. Influence the cleaning, tidying, and maintenance
of the area. (E.g. they might be able to influence the design of litter bins,
but not ensure that they are emptied etc.).
b. Anything
about the state of Ecclesfield shopping centre. It is not in the conservation
area and does not appear to contain anything which would justify extending the
area to include it.
6. The council cannot recommend, (or disallow) particular suppliers or contractors. However, it was thought that this could be a useful service and there was no barrier to the conservation group doing something like it if they wished. Some planning applications (online since October 2006) do mention the materials to be used, and even particular quarries for obtaining suitable stone. Such information might therefore form a starting point for a list, which householders could use to make it easier to choose suppliers whose work would hopefully match or at least be of the same standard as that of the rest of the conservation area.
If anybody has any comments on anything in the above, or can suggest something to include a draft letter, then please reply to this email .
You can find a link to the council's Appraisal, Management Proposals and Questionnaire on... conservation.ecclesfieldgroups.com.
Jim
PS: I know that several people have had difficulty getting on to this or other sites, and therefore would be grateful if anybody hitting problems would give me a ring.
James A. Percival