Forum topic: Regenerating Palmers Green town centre

Just a minor point, the email address for Peter George repeats the ".gov.uk" so it wont work.

I have once again registered the faiure of Enfield to use their shopfront design guide to enforce their later rules on shop front solid security shutters. The current guidance is as follows:

DMD 40
Ground Floor Frontages
Development involving the creation of new, or alterations to existing ground floor frontages outside of designated industrial areas will only be permitted if all of the following criteria are met:
a. The frontage maintains visual interest within the street;
b. The frontages respect the rhythm, style and proportions of the building/group of buildings of which they form a part, avoiding damage to existing pilasters, capitals and other significant features, and where possible reinstating lost features important to the character of the street or building;
c. No more than 10% of the glazed area is obscured at any time, and a window display is included and maintained at all times to the reasonable satisfaction of the Council. Window displays should be lit at night using dedicated energy efficient fittings;
d. Any security shutters proposed are internally mounted, located behind the fascia and visually permeable; and
e. The street number is displayed within the frontage.
DMD 41
Advertisements
1. Advertisements must be of an appropriate size and type in relation to the premises and to the street scene.
2. Fascia boards must be of a height and depth consistent with the traditional proportions of the building.
3. Proposals for internally illuminated signs, box fascias or projecting box signs are unlikely to be acceptable in conservation areas and will normally be refused elsewhere unless the proposal is slim; recessed into the fascia area; contained between flanking pilasters; or where the proposed advertisement type is a feature of the building upon which it is proposed. Internal illumination of the entire sign will rarely be acceptable. Externally illuminated fascias and bracketed sign boards may offer an acceptable alternative.
4. Within the Area of Special Advert Control and within conservation areas, the size, siting and illumination of new advertisements must protect the special characteristics and overall visual amenity of the relevant designation. Adverts should not become visually dominant, nor result in unnecessary advertisement clutter and must be directly related to activities of the site on which they are displayed.

I thought this reply from Peter George was worth posting.

Thank you for your e-mail regarding the quality of the shop frontages in Palmers Green. Supporting and enhancing all our town centres is high on our agenda. The quality of shop frontages which you describe is indeed a challenge that all of the town centres in the borough face and have in common.

As you rightly say, we do have shopfront design guidance, which is on our website. We can and do still reference it, albeit it no longer currently has Supplementary Planning Document status. Going forward over the medium term, we envisage developing a suite of design guidance. We will revisit shopfront design guidance and its status as you have suggested, as part of this programme. More immediately, where breaches of planning control have occurred we will continue to look at enforcement action where appropriate.

In terms of reversing the current situation, we did (with the support of local group Palmers Green Reimagined) approach the Heritage Lottery Fund Townscape Heritage Initiative last year, to explore funding for a shop front grant scheme. Unfortunately such a scheme in the Palmers Green area did not fit with their funding criteria.


I don't know who the PG Reimagined group is by the way.