IHT have set up an Urban Design Panel that will focus on the knowledge transfer between professional disciplines that is required to deliver effective urban design and to act as the liaison between the IHT technical boards and organisations such as the Urban Design Alliance (UDAL) and the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (CABE).

The Panel will look to develop the skills needs to deliver sustainable communities, it will also offer a range of opportunities for highways and transportation professionals to engage with, and develop skills in, urban design.

How Highways and Transportation professionals
Can Help Make Better places

The streets for people series of workshops was funded by CABE and English Heritage and delivered by the IHT between 004 and 006.

The series aimed to inspire and empower professionals to work towards achieving great places, as well as to expand the numbers of highways and transportation professionals with a working knowledge of urban design principles.

This report continues the work by spreading the key lessons from the streets for people workshops even wider. it introduces seven key urban design principles and outlines how to overcome some common barriers. it underlines CABE’s belief that individual acts of leadership at all levels can help to deliver streets for people.

Download paper >>

The Issues: Report of Focus Groups

Contents

Acknowledgements                                             
Foreword                  
Executive Summary        
1. The Shared Surface Street Design Research Project        
2. Policy Context        
3. Focus Groups        
4. Summary of Key Findings        
5. Conclusions and Next Steps in the Research Project

Appendices
1. The Shared Space Concept        
2. Guide Dog and Long Cane Mobility – an Introduction        
3. Description of Focus Group Locations

Front cover photograph: Newbury town centre. This shows a shared surface scheme where there is no kerb to demarcate footway and carriageway. Vehicles and pedestrians share the same surface.

All photographs are described for the benefit of blind and partially-sighted people who are accessing this report.

Copyright © 2006

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior permission of The Guide Dogs for the Blind Association.

Registered Head Office:
The Guide Dogs for the Blind Association, Hillfields, Burghfield Common, Reading RG7 3YG. Registered Charity No. 209617. Registered Company No. 291646
Tel: 0118 983 5555  Fax: 0118 983 5433  Website: www.guidedogs.org.uk

ISBN          0-9524038-6-9
ISBN          978-0-9524038-6-9

Published by:        
The Guide Dogs for the Blind Association, Hillfields,
Burghfield Common, Reading RG7 3YG

Tel: 0118 983 5555         www.guidedogs.org.uk

        
To obtain this report in alternative formats (Braille, large print, audio or electronic format), please contact Gill Kenyon at Guide Dogs’ Head Office. Tel: 0118 983 8359. Email: sharedsurfaces@guidedogs.org.uk
        
The report is also available to download here >>

Building on the success of last year's collaboration, CABE and English Heritage are working with the Institution of Highways & Transportation (IHT) to offer a second phase of urban design training opportunities for highways and transportation professionals. This is part of a wider strategy to develop the skills needed to deliver the Deputy Prime Minister's Sustainable Communities Plan.

Download Programme, word doc >>

CABE supported a partnership between the IHT, PTRC Ltd, the Urban Design Group and Transport 2000 to deliver a targeted programme of urban design training for highways and transportation professionals.

The programme, funded by CABE with money from the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (ODPM) developed the skills needed to deliver sustainable communities, offered a range of opportunities for highways and transportation professionals to engage with, and develop their skills in, urban design.

The programme for the overall initiative, the workshops and details of a national urban design summit that took place on 16 March 2004 is listed below.

How best to push urban design to the fore of transportation schemes in towns and cities was debated at the IHT/CABE Streets for People summit held in March 2004. The Urban Design Summit for highways & transportation professionals ­was the central event of a major urban design training initiative. The Summit ­generated a great deal of enthusiastic discussion.

IHT Past President Professor George Hazel OBE, giving the keynote speech, said: "The streets are the living room of the community. Floorscape needs to be a fundamental part of the built scene."

Professor Hazel pointed out that three factors:   consultation, community involvement and communication ­are critical for successful urban design.

He then introduced Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Transport Tony McNulty, who congratulated CABE's Chief Executive, Jon Rouse for pushing urban design up the agenda.

For a full account of the day please click here >>

The Streets for People CABE/IHT Urban Design, conducted in February 2004, received 1023 responses. The Internet based online-survey took approximately 15 minutes to complete and was the biggest survey of its kind to be conducted in the industry. It looked at how urban design is perceived by highways and transportation professionals.

The survey results were presented to the delegates at the Urban design Summit on 16 March 2003.

Results revealed at the Streets for People summit include preoccupation with cost rather than quality as the biggest barrier to better performance and concern that urban design is seen as a luxury rather than a necessity.

Jon Rouse, Chief Executive, CABE said:

"Street environments have been road dominated for too long. The heart of urban design is to balance pedestrian and vehicle needs"

Internationally renowned speakers gave a series of evening lectures on "What is urban design?" to highways and transportation professionals at venues around the country.

Contact:

Daniel Isichei, External Affairs Executive
Institution of Highways & Transportation
6 Endsleigh Street
London
WC1H 0DZ

e: daniel.isichei@iht.org
t: +44(0)20 7391 9976
f: +44(0)20 7387 2808

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