Memorandum by Norwich City Council, Liveable
City Project, Norwich Heritage Economic & Regeneration Trust
(HIS 21)
INTRODUCTION
The evidence set out below will address the
6 headings identified by the "call for evidence" but
will additionally submit that:
— Buildings must be viewed in context
and not as isolated and separate entities. Consequently, the term
"historic urban landscape" would be more appropriate
for the purposes of the Inquiry than "historic buildings"
and that
— Heritage urban spaces are key to
the character of English cities. Once the medium for social and
economic exchange and the stage for civic and cultural pageant,
they are now degraded and alien places, devoid of quality and
meaning.
This Inquiry should therefore additionally concern
itself with the form, use and management of historic urban spaces
and the overall role that they can and should play with the buildings
that sit within them in facilitating economic regeneration, social
inclusion, cultural renaissance and sustainable development.
THE CONTRIBUTION
OF HISTORIC
BUILDINGS TO
URBAN REGENERATION
"Norwich has led the way in promoting
regeneration through conservation" ODPM Report to the
Urban Summit on the Partners in Urban Renaissance initiative 2002
1. Norwich has one of the richest urban
heritage assets in the UK and, overall, its heritage resources
represent a collection of international stature. The City Council
has always taken a "stewardly" view of heritage, reaching
well back into the City's history when, for instance, it acquired
a medieval friary complex from the King at the Reformation and
converted it for public use—including the country's first
municipal library. This complex remains a public asset today and
is the only intact surviving medieval friary complex in the UK.
Over the last half century, the Council, with
its partners, has been innovative in using heritage conservation
as a regenerative tool. In the 1950s it developed a national landmark
scheme with the Civic Trust—the Magdalen St Project—to
enhance one of its historic secondary shopping streets. In the
1960s it was one of the first local authorities in the UK to respond
to national legislation on conservation by establishing a wide
coverage of conservation areas and following this up with a series
of proactive enhancement plans. In the 1970s it was the winner
of the European Architectural Heritage Year award for its innovative
work in the regeneration of the historic "Over the Water"
area and in the same decade it established what became a national
model for building preservation trusts (the Norwich Preservation
Trust) as well as another trust to manage its collection of redundant
medieval churches—the largest collection in Europe north
of the Alps. In the late 1970s it initiated a productive relationship
with English Heritage which has endured for over 25 years and
resulted in a series of area based heritage regeneration initiatives
through Town Schemes, Conservation Area Partnership Schemes (CAPS)
and now Heritage Economic Regeneration Schemes (HERS) to deliver
not only physical improvements to the heritage resource but additionally
the introduction of substantial "Living Over the Shop"
(LOTS) schemes and economic and social regeneration to depressed
parts of the City. These area based schemes have attempted to
address a range of problems beyond rather narrow historic building
issues and the current HERS initiative—the Northern Gates
scheme—is looking at issues associated with heritage generation
as diverse as social inclusion, transport problems and air quality
and the reintroduction of small enterprises.
2. As well as these "main line"
heritage initiatives, Norwich has innovated in a wide range of
other heritage management initiatives. Each has formed a building
block in broader regeneration schemes but each has been individually
significant in adding a further dimension to the regeneration
package. These have included:
— The introduction of an historic colour
strategy for heritage buildings in collaboration with a Dutch
paint manufacturer.
— Innovative work on the recording,
interpretation (including web based media) and restoration of
its 13th century City Walls.
— Collaboration as vice chair in the
trans national North Sea Viking Legacy Project which has developed
joint approaches with European partners to interpret the City's
Anglo Scandinavian heritage.
— A successful partnership initiative
with the Heritage Lottery Fund to develop a £11 million scheme
to re interpret and improve access to the Norman Castle—"the
most ambitious secular building of its period in Europe".
— The introduction of a pilot Urban
Archaeological Database in association with English Heritage supported
by an historic buildings database (Orion).
3. Additionally, Norwich has innovated in
the area of natural heritage management by developing the first
"Green Plan" in the UK in the 1980s and following this
up with the establishment of natural area management trusts and
national award winning schemes over the succeeding quarter of
a century. The most recent achievements in natural area conservation
have included the development of a four acre park in the heart
of the City, on the roof of a major shopping development and the
regeneration of its 1930s historic parks with the assistance of
an HLF grant. The City also collaborated in the trans national
Water City International Project between 1998 and 2001 to regenerate
its river heritage and is now a key partner in Water City II.
4. In the spirit of this legacy of heritage
innovation, the City Council is in the process of establishing
the Norwich Heritage Economic & Regeneration Trust (HEART)—a
private charitable company which will produce an over arching
heritage strategy and action plan for the City and regenerate
a large portfolio of heritage buildings (170 assets) but also
uniquely act as adviser in the regeneration of the historic public
domain spaces in the centre. The Trust has already attracted support
from a very wide range of national, regional and local organisations
including the Civic Trust, English Heritage, ODPM, GOEAST and
EEDA as well as financial support from major national financial
institutions and development companies.
THE ROLE
AND EFFECTIVENESS
OF THE
PUBLIC AGENCIES
RESPONSIBLE FOR
THE BUILT
AND HISTORIC
ENVIRONMENT IN
ENCOURAGING URBAN
REGENERATION
5. To a degree, the problem lies within
the question. While an "historic environment" role is
regarded as something distinct from urban regeneration there will
continue to be a "siloed" approach to both issues rather
than an integrated one.
6. At a local level there is often a plethora
of organisations dealing with building preservation issues on
a very narrow basis. There is rarely any overview about the strategic
vision for the work of such bodies beyond the immediate physical
restoration of the building. Even within local authorities, where
potential exists for integration, the "Conservation"
function is isolated, architecturally and building based, more
often than not allied to development control and viewed as a reactive
process designed to stop the worst excesses of developers. It
is rarely viewed as a proactive process, able to develop a vision,
plan change and lead the regeneration process.
7. Beyond the local level, heritage agencies
have made commendable efforts recently to embrace regeneration.
English Heritage's HERS initiative certainly makes the right noises
but there is a real danger of tokenism if such initiatives provide
just another route for "doing up old buildings" rather
than achieving integrated heritage regeneration leading to wider
urban regeneration. On the same basis, if heritage funding bodies
like the HLF see the issues relating to historic building preservation
rather than integrated and wider regeneration then the results
will be piecemeal and unsustainable.
8. In respect of addressing both local and
national issues, Norwich has sought a "new way". Its
Heritage Economic and Regeneration Trust aims to provide a heritage
vision, co-ordinated planning, integrated action to achieve sustainable
regeneration, joined up resourcing and a single approach to promotion
and education. As such it aspires to producing a single product
which heritage and regeneration agencies can "buy in"
to enabling them to see how their funding and support can make
a difference to regeneration overall rather than to the improvement
of isolated heritage assets. Based on an output and outcome orientated
business plan, the Trust will be able to demonstrate concrete
economic, social and cultural benefits from its work to heritage
buildings and spaces
WHETHER THOSE
ORGANISATIONS CARRYING
OUT REGENERATION
GIVE SUFFICIENT
REGARD TO
HISTORIC BUILDINGS
9. Similar issues apply here as above and
the point is developed further in relation to Government Departments,
below. Essentially, there is a prevailing view that, as the question
itself suggests, "historic buildings" are essentially
that and not much to do with urban regeneration. Few regeneration
agencies have grasped the regenerative benefits of the historic
environment as a whole and virtually none (with a few commendable
exceptions) have understood the potential of heritage public space
regeneration as a vehicle for wider regenerative benefits.
10. Until an overarching resourcing response
exists from regeneration agencies to the joined up heritage and
public space initiatives being developed in Norwich it will be
difficult, but not impossible, to demonstrate that heritage is
a genuine economic driver since efforts will inevitably be directed
to securing the funding cocktail rather than delivering the product.
WHETHER THE
PLANNING SYSTEM
AND THE
LISTING OF
HISTORIC BUILDINGS
AID OR
HINDER URBAN
REGENERATION
11. The simple answer is that they can do
both. Often the reactive approach to development and listed building
control, through a combination of protectionist local authority
officers/Members and preservation minded historic building inspectors
can stifle change and innovation. In contrast a visionary authority,
with a proactive approach to change delivered through a strategic
regeneration agenda in collaboration with positively engaged English
Heritage officers can achieve significant regeneration benefits.
12. In Norwich, a strategic approach to
the regeneration of the historic King St Area has transformed
a derelict wasteland suffering major traffic problems and social/crime
difficulties into a regenerated community with more homes, SMEs,
community facilities and cultural activity. The integrated paving
of the historic street and the restoration of its historic buildings
for new uses, through a funding cocktail involving English Heritage,
SRB, Council Capital Programme, Highway Capital Programme and
Lottery sources provided an injection of confidence which has
resulted in private developer investment exceeding £200 million.
13. The essential point is that the system
is capable of helping or hindering regeneration—how it is
applied is the key. More significantly, improvements that can
make it a "force for good" need to be nurtured and brought
forward. Chief among these would be a recognition in Government
that joined up heritage can deliver regeneration supported by
a much more integrated and streamlined approach to funding. While
the Norwich example was innovative and successful, it required
tremendous efforts of persuasion to bring players on board and
a huge effort in co-ordination to stitch together funding from
a myriad of agencies.
WHETHER ALL
GOVERNMENT DEPARTMENTS
TAKE ADEQUATE
ACCOUNT OF
THE HISTORIC
ENVIRONMENT
14. Despite the introduction of conservation
areas almost 40 years ago, Government Departments, and to a great
degree, local authorities and other agencies still view the "historic
environment" as historic buildings. When towns were founded,
activity ebbed and flowed between buildings and spaces with few
rigid distinctions. The market places, squares, open spaces and
winding streets performed as the medium for economic and social
exchange and the stage for civic and cultural pageant—public
space was the city's "front room", the urban glue that
held the functions together.
15. A hundred years of subjugation to vehicles
and highway engineering manuals have left these spaces full of
fast moving or parked traffic, a jostling cacophony of bus shelters,
utility installations, light and sign columns and the ubiquitous
"sheep pen", scarred with tarmac, pockmarked with street
repairs, slashed with yellow lines and traversed with cycle lane
markings. They are now alien places, devoid of meaning, inhospitable
and threatening to their users. The City's "front room"
has become the City's backyard or in some cases, it's outside
toilet. If we treated our historic buildings in the same way that
we have physically and functionally abused England's great historic
streets and spaces we would be in serious trouble with English
Heritage and with the courts.
16. Equally, a "buildings based"
approach to the historic environment has often resulted in "old
buildings" being restored in isolation from their contexts
and often from just a fabric, as opposed to a functional, perspective.
This process has often marginalised what conservation should be
about. "Conservation" is regarded, particularly by the
development sector, as something dominated by academically based
historic building architects protecting the physical fabric of
buildings, often to the detriment of the needs of modern uses
and sometimes obsessively concerned with preserving Byzantine
details of questionable relevance to the building, its future
use or society in general. This is old fashioned preservation
for preservation's sake. What conservation should be is the use
of historic assets in their context to drive economic, social
and cultural regeneration. The essential quality of historic towns,
townscapes and buildings is that they have continually adapted
to society's needs while retaining their character. It is the
role of governmental agencies through conservation to facilitate
and enable this process and not to impede or halt it.
17. The problem is threefold—resourcing,
integration and recognition. Many cities and towns have created
improved domains in a few streets but it's not cheap to do it
well and resources have often prevented progress beyond just the
core streets. Equally, few towns, if any, have recognised the
need to look at the spatial domain with its related buildings
as an integrated whole which is why progress has been patchy.
Perhaps most significantly though, the regeneration of the public
domain is seen as "just cosmetic" when really what it
should be about is using physical regeneration to promote new
activity in public space (cafes, markets, performances, festivals
events and functional regeneration of the buildings around). Thus
it can be a vehicle for overall economic regeneration, social
reintegration by reconnecting excluded communities and cultural
renaissance by reasserting local distinctiveness. Public space
regeneration makes economic, social, cultural and environmental
sense—it's not an urban cosmetic.
18. Norwich has been innovative in addressing
this long standing void. It currently leads "the Liveable
City", the largest collaboration project in the EU Interreg
North Sea Region. The mission of this project is to view historic
urban space as the glue that binds cities together and to plan,
regenerate, mange and maintain historic public space as an engine
to drive urban regeneration. Uniquely, the project partners are
working trans nationally to distil best practice from the UK,
Denmark, Norway, Germany and Belgium to achieve a truly unified
perspective on the heritage public domain and urban regeneration.
19. Similarly, the English Historic Towns
Forum has recently produced good practice guidance (Focus on the
Public Realm), distilled from its wide membership, recommending
how local authorities should tackle public domain regeneration
in an integrated way and how the Government can assist by designating
pilot areas to test new approaches. However, for such an approach
to be truly effective nationally, it is necessary for Government
agencies to recognise that the historic environment is not just
buildings but rather historic urban townscapes and that resourcing
must reflect this position.
WHETHER FISCAL
AND LEGISLATIVE
CHANGES SHOULD
BE MADE
20. Some of these points have been touched
on earlier but in summary changes should include:
— The encouragement of local authorities
and local heritage agencies such as the Norwich Heritage Economic
and Regeneration Trust to develop integrated heritage business
plans or management plans for both buildings and spaces. The incentive
to do this could be an integrated funding response from Government
and allied agencies geared to, say the first five years of the
plan and contingent upon pre agreed outputs. This would avoid
both the current scattergun approach and the waste of effort expended
in multiple fund bidding—if the response is "that's
what HERS does", it doesn't. HERS is a tiny drop in the ocean,
unco-ordinated with other potential funding streams either nationally
or regionally and still, despite good intentions, seen as being
"about old buildings" in many quarters. What is needed
is serious, joined up funding—if we genuinely believe that
heritage can be a key economic driver we should resource it appropriately.
— Stemming from the second point, the
Government needs to recognise the role of heritage public space
and its regeneration as an economic engine. Currently there is
no recognition of this from funding agencies and no funding available
to tackle the issue. Legislatively, while the law punishes those
who damage or destroy old buildings it does nothing to protect
or enhance heritage space in fact it condones its desecration.
There is no onus on local authorities to constrain the worst excesses
of highway engineers let alone any requirement to actually enhance
space and the laissez faire approach to utility operators undermines
any positive actions that might be taken. Legislation therefore
needs to afford a protective value to public space (like listed
buildings), put an onus on local authorities and other agencies
to enhance it, actively discourage bad highway engineering rather
than relying on excellent but advisory guidance and encourage
enhancement with serious funding
— It is widely recognised that local
authority conservation functions are under resourced and often
ill equipped to promote heritage regeneration while attempting
to manage the daily case load. Equally, many local authorities
carry a heavy burden in terms of heritage building ownership,
which they struggle to manage even incrementally, and heritage
space stewardship, which they generally fail to deliver. The promotion
by Government of, and financial support for, an approach such
as the Norwich Trust, as a best practice model, could provide
a radically new and effective way to achieve co-ordinated heritage
led regeneration.
— In terms of bringing historic resources
back into use, the Government should abolish VAT on historic building
works as an incentive and introduce punitive taxation for owners
who keep historic buildings vacant for excessive periods.
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