Streetscape design manual

Streets and spaces are the public face of the borough with the potential to positively or negatively affect perceptions of Southwark. They are also where many of our vibrant social and cultural activities occur. As such they are as important as the buildings and landmarks they provide the settings for.

The streetscape design manual aims to raise the quality and consistency of the design of streets and spaces in Southwark and widen the purposes they serve by:

• Introducing a more standardised approach to their design and appearance
• Improving consistency and coordination of the planning and execution of works
• Considering all uses and users of streets and spaces in the design process, not focussing on vehicle movement alone

The manual will be the key reference document for all public realm works in the borough, so that you know what we are doing to consistently improve and maintain standards throughout our borough's streets and public spaces, and so you can be sure what adoptable standards we will require from new public spaces and streets maintained at public expense.

What are the documents we are consulting on?

The streetscape design manual will be split into two parts:

• Part 1 (General Information) will provide over-view information for all users, be they residents, businesses or professional designers on our new design requirements and quality system. It establishes the framework that we will use to develop detailed technical design requirements in the second part of the manual (below). Part 1 will be formally adopted by the council's cabinet.
• Part 2 (Technical Information) will set out our individual technical design and construction requirements on different issues (for instance, the types of paving materials that can be used, the location of street furniture or the spacing of street trees) and detailed procedures for design review and approval. We will revise and add to these standards over time as we grow and evolve our design system.

We want to know your views on the documents in part 1. These are:

• The 'summary guide'. This establishes the strategic design objectives and policies that we propose. It also explains the overall structure of the manual and the new processes we are proposing to put in place to raise the quality of works to our streets and spaces.

• The 'regulating plan': This breaks the borough into a series of 'specification areas' based on broad character. We propose that the requirements for the design and appearance for each of these will be set through the detailed content in the second part of the manual. This will vary somewhat for each area, reflecting changes in character and use.

You can also view background documents including Appendix A and the introductory guide for members of the public here.

What we'd like to know

We'd like to know your views on 13 questions related to a number of issues. These include:

• Your thoughts on the 'summary guide' and 'regulating plan', positive or negative
• Your general likes and dislikes about the design, use and management of streets and other public spaces
• Your views on a small number of important issues that we will be preparing design requirements on in the second part of the manual.

In addition, we are asking residents/stakeholders in certain areas about the sort of footway surfacing they'd like to see on their streets. This is because these areas currently use very different materials to other parts of the borough. However, in the past we have often had varied responses from people on whether they would like us to use the same materials as elsewhere or something different. The areas are:

• Rotherhithe and Canada Water
• Dulwich

Please complete our online survey now

What happens next?

The public consultation on the part 1 documents will run for six weeks from Monday 7 March to Monday 18 April.

After the consultation ends we will be reviewing and compiling the comments received and preparing a public summary of them. We will consider the need to make potential changes to the summary guide and regulating plan to respond to issues raised. Final versions of both documents will be submitted to the council's cabinet for approval in summer 2011.

We will use the information gained on general likes and dislikes in street design, the important issues and material preferences for certain areas to inform the design requirements that will be set in the technical documents within the second part of the design manual. These will be finalised once the part 1 documents have been adopted by the council cabinet.