Management of Conservation Areas

Character assessment

The designation of a conservation area is not an end in itself. Local authorities need to develop policies which clearly identify what features of the area should be preserved or enhanced, and set out how this can be done. Clear assessment and definition of an area's interest and the action needed to protect it, help to generate awareness and encourage local property owners to take the right sort of action for themselves. Character appraisals will also identify areas where enhancement through development may be desirable.

Conservation Areas can occasionally be centred around industrial buildings like these 19th century mills in Ancoats, Manchester. 

Enhancement

English Heritage advises local authorities to consult as widely as possible - not only with local residents and amenity societies but also with chambers of commerce, public utilities and the highway authority - over any proposals for a conservation area.

Some of the means by which local authorities can enhance the appearance of conservation areas are:
 

• preparing special development briefs for sites they identify as detracting from the character or appearance of the area;
• ensuring that new buildings harmonize with or complement their neighbours in scale, style and use of materials;
• making environmental improvements, for example by reinstating historic paving materials, sympathetic landscaping and planting, or removing unsightly elements such as hoardings;
• integrating road signs and markings as far as possible with the character of the street;
• controlling the position and design of advertisements and shop signs;
• ensuring that traffic safety and control measures harmonize with the landscape.
• making grants available for the repair of buildings.

Management plans

Building conservation area policies into the statutory development plan is the best means of integrating conservation policies with wider policies for the area, such as shopping and traffic management. The most important policy is the presumption against the loss of elements which have been identified in the character assessment as making a positive contribution to the special interest for which the area was designated.

Once policies for a particular area have been agreed, local residents and businesses should be made fully aware of why the area has been designated and how they can protect its character and appearance.