Building Briefs – March 17th

Glasgow City Council has approved the next stage of a strategy that aims to make best use of the 90 lanes in the city centre.

A city centre lanes strategy has been drafted - in consultation with stakeholders including the council, businesses, community groups, charities, waste contractors, landowners, artists and artisans - to consider how best to regenerate the lanes network.

The draft strategy examined the uses - historic and current - of each lane, taking into account their individual characteristics and considering the impact of planning policies on the network.

The experience of cities from around the world who have developed similar lane strategies, such as Montreal, San Francisco, Seattle and Melbourne, was also taken into account when preparing Glasgow’s draft city centre lane strategy.

The strategy also contains a range of potential actions that will be scrutinised through the public consultation, such as events and pop-up activities; integration with the new public realm to be delivered through the ‘Avenues’ programme in the city centre; the management of future development aided by planning policy and design guidance to ensure the optimal regeneration of lanes where possible; and initiatives on waste and recycling; public health and community safety; and parking and surfacing.

The draft strategy will now go out for public consultation.

Leuchars housing plan

An extensive new housing development is in the pipeline for Leuchars.

A notice has been lodged with Fife Council by JLW Foster & Co stating an intention to apply for planning permission for the project.

It maps out a site for construction adjacent to Main Street, stretching from the former railway to Leuchars Castle.

Community council members in Leuchars and Balmullo have been notified and a public exhibition of the plans is to be held.

The planning application gives no indication of house numbers but states the residential development would include access, parking, landscaping and open space.

Consultation starts on Fife supplementary planning documents

Fife Council is inviting comment on documents with a view to adopting them as Supplementary Guidance to the Local Development Plan (LDP), FifePlan.

The consultation on four supplementary guidance planning policy documents begins today for 7 weeks, running 17 March - 5 May 2017.

The supplementary guidance expands on existing policies and provides the necessary detail for specific policy development areas. It is designed to help applicants make successful planning applications and for residents to understand the various issues that the council will consider in assessing planning applications.

These guidance documents provide further detail to the policies that are already included in FIFEplan, the Local Development Plan, which have been considered though the FIFEplan Examination.

The four supplementary guidance documents are:

The consultation is online and the documents can be viewed, and comments left on-line at www.fifedirect.org.uk/fifeplan.

Back to school for BRE

The BRE Innovation Park in Ravenscraig played host to a contingent of senior school pupils from Chapelhall Primary School recently.

During their visit, the 22 youngsters were treated to an insightful talk on recycling from Dr David Kelly, group director BRE Innovation Parks Network, before embarking on a tour of the park, and then taking part in a quiz based on the information they had received during the earlier presentation.

Dr Kelly said: “We were delighted to welcome the children from Chapelhall Primary to our Innovation Park. As well as raising their awareness of the importance of recycling, we were able to highlight how, by making very small changes, they can have a huge impact on the future wellbeing of the environment.”

The visit rounded off with the youngsters creating drawings around the theme of recycling, and winners Kimberley Lumley, Emily Burke, and Kieran Gallagher were presented with their prizes by Dr Kelly before heading back to school.

Schools interested in visiting BRE Innovation Park should contact Jackie Reilly on 01698 262193 or email Jacqueline.reilly@bre.co.uk.