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Location: Waterlooville, Hampshire
Client: Havant Borough Council
Value: Not applicable
Status: Completed May 2024 / SPD to be adopted in line with the Havant Local Plan
Waterlooville Masterplan
ArchitecturePLB formed part of a multi-disciplinary team led by Feria Urbanism to develop the Waterlooville Town Centre Masterplan, commissioned by Havant Borough Council and delivered in a format suitable for adoption as a Supplementary Planning Document. The masterplan provides a strategic framework designed to stimulate regeneration, support development and attract long-term investment in the town centre over a 15-20 year timeframe, recognising that meaningful change relies on close collaboration with major stakeholders and landowners over an extended period of time. To ensure momentum is maintain, a series of 'quick wins' were also identified, allowing the council to act immediately and directly on positive short-term interventions. where the council could act directly.
The team implemented a comprehensive three-part engagement strategy. First, walking tours held across several weeks at varied times invited the community to set the agenda, identifying strengths and weaknesses and providing valuable on-the-ground insight. An empty High Street retail unit was then repurposed as a three-day Festival of Ideas hub for workshops, talks and open drop-in sessions, with each workshop curated by the relevant consultant focusing on specific disciplines from socio-economics to town planning, culminating in a co-created sketch masterplan integrating ideas for redevelopment, community uses, transport and parking. Finally, a two-day public exhibition in the same unit summarised the process, presented key findings and outlined crucial next steps, inviting final comments and hosting focused sessions with council and county officers.
Our contributions included:
– supporting the consultation process and contributing to workshops and engagement activities,
– preparing background mapping and spatial analysis covering building uses, condition, massing, amenities, connections, and key opportunity sites,
– assessing development capacity to establish a robust framework and inform future development potential, testing and refining masterplan options leading to SPD-ready diagrams designed to guide development over 20 years,
– producing illustrative sketches demonstrating potential outcomes that proved particularly important in building enthusiasm for the masterplan.
The final deliverable consolidated all engagement outcomes into five distinct character areas, St George's Walk, London Road North, London Road South, Stakes Hill and Maurepas Way, with specific design principles addressing movement, landscape, sustainability and land uses.
For Havant Borough Council, the major success was restoring community pride and optimism, fostering renewed ownership and connection demonstrated by strengthened relationships between local groups and new initiatives such as the classic car show now taking place in the pedestrianised precinct.
Project Team
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