Approval of JTP's Design Code Ensures Quality Housing for Chilmington Green
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Approval of JTP's Design Code Ensures Quality Housing for Chilmington Green

Published on 3 August 2016

JTP’s Design Code for Chilmington Green, a landmark new sustainable suburb, has been approved by Ashford Council as a Supplementary Planning Document to set high quality standards and embed Garden City principles.

Illustrative masterplan of Chilmington Green

Chilmington Green will provide 5,750 homes in an exemplar new community with its own high street, a secondary school, four primary schools, a park and expansive recreational and informal green spaces. The flexibly designed homes will be set within five distinct neighbourhoods, each with different characteristics responding to their varying landscape settings.

The Design Code, which was prepared on behalf of a consortium of four developers, sets a high benchmark for quality. It represents a further development of JTP’s masterplan that won the Placemaking Awards’ National Award for Strategic Planning in 2014. Ashford Borough Council’s formal adoption of the Design Code is an important step in the planning process, establishing key principles to be followed as the developers prepare detailed plans for their sites, and will ensure that the place as a whole has a cohesive identity.

The masterplan and Design Code were developed using JTP’s trademark Collaborative Planning Process; involving the local community as well as key stakeholders in developing a shared vision for a new place through participatory workshops.

Sketch of proposed new Market Square
Sketch of proposed new communal Discovery Park

In response to the challenge of providing sufficient homes whilst also creating a socially, environmentally and economically sustainable place to live, JTP has designed Chilmington Green to be a 21st Century Garden Suburb for Ashford. A Quality Charter to which the four developers have signed up has also helped shape the Design Code by providing a re-interpretation of Garden City principles for the modern day.

Clare San Martin, one of our Partners, said “We are delighted that the Design Code will now be implemented and we can look forward to seeing Chilmington Green become a great place to live.”