Indicative sketch for consultation, Dorset St / St. Mary’s Place estate renewal. Image: Scott Tallon Walker / Levitt Bernstein Architects

Renewing and redeveloping older complexes in the city is a key area of the Council’s work on housing. This week we are giving an overview of the work on estate renewal projects managed by City Architects. This work programme covers projects that are intended to be delivered by the Council directly and also includes work to redevelop other brownfield non-housing sites for new homes.

Projects of this nature involve considerable research and planning at the early stages across many connected issues in order to consider the options for delivering homes in a cost-efficient and environmentally sustainable way. This work starts with a feasibility study, which sets out options for development and a proposed strategy for how each site should be designed. City Architects generally carry out this work directly, with some external consultant teams being engaged. The work for 2020 builds on a major city-wide review of the condition of housing sites previously completed by our in-house team.

Once a scheme is approved to proceed, the next step is to assign a design team. The project will either be developed by an in-house team, by a consultant design team, or assigned to the system build programme for design & build delivery. COVID 19 has impacted our project programmes, and the resultant delays have varied depending on the project stage i.e. feasibility, design, planning or construction stages. Project programmes on-site have suffered directly due to COVID 19 related shutdowns, and again due to the imposition of revised working procedures to comply with safe working requirements and protective distancing.

The following lists the estate renewal projects by name and location, size, and design team.