The City of Brighton and Hove is facing intense pressure to accommodate housing growth. Located between a national park and the sea, options to expand geographically are limited. The solution is to increase residential densities, but does the council do this without compromising the city’s unique quality and qualities and those of its many distinctive neighbourhoods?
Our third annual City Charrette took place in October 2018 and focussed on developing high density prototypes for five sites across the city, including the urban fringe. We brought together local designers, planning professionals and students from Brighton University to work in groups to develop prototype designs, test them and present them to the wider group. Each of the five groups was led by a member of our expert panel.
The objective was to distil guiding principles for each site and so each team considered practical issues such as proposed routes, connections, building functions, structural forms and public spaces.
After a productive day with over 100 people taking part, including an evening stakeholder event involving community groups and other local people we consolidated the information into a report to help inform future design guidance.