What rules should guide development in Nottingham city centre? How should buildings and public spaces be designed? How should we deal with tall buildings?

These are some of the questions which could be raised next week at a public workshop. Business people and the public are being invited to the workshop on 11th December to talk about how Nottingham will look in the future.

A team led by consultants URBED has been commissioned by Nottingham City Council and Nottingham Regeneration Limited to prepare an Urban Design Guide for the city centre. This will provide a more detailed guidance for developers in the city centre over and above that already in the local plan. The guide will include a tall buildings strategy for the city as well as rules and guidelines for all new buildings and public spaces. It will play a major role in shaping the way the city centre looks and feels in the future as well as the quality of new buildings.

As part of the preparation of the guide, URBED is holding the workshop at the View from The Top at Waterstone’s Bookshop on 11th December from 5.30pm to 8pm.

Councillor Alan Clark, Portfolio holder for Neighbourhood Regeneration said: "The City Centre Design Guide is an important part of how we can successfully deliver the vision for Nottingham over the next ten plus years. It will build on the City Centre Masterplan and the Streetscape Design Manual which have already been agreed by Council.

"The guide will set out good design principles in three dimensions. In particular it will look at a strategy for tall buildings, integrating the Southside, Eastside and Waterside regeneration areas with the central core of the city centre. It will also focus as reviving rundown areas like the West End Arcade and Nottingham's historic alleyways. 

"URBED have been chosen through a competitive process and I look forward to their innovative ideas and recommendations. This public consultation event is key to the design process."

David Rudlin, URBED’s director responsible for the guide, said: “We are hoping everyone with an interest in Nottingham City Centre will come along to the workshop; anyone who lives, works, shops or socialises in the city centre has an interest in the guide. We hope to bring together these people with developers, voluntary groups and the different departments of the council who shape the city centre. It should be an interesting debate and will feed directly into the work that we are doing on the guide.”

Sue Churchill, Nottingham Regeneration Board Director, added: “We should aspire to the highest quality of design for Nottingham’s buildings and spaces. The Design Guide will assist us in delivering exemplar physical regeneration schemes that are assets to our City.”

Anyone who is interested in attending the workshop on 11th December should ring Helene at URBED on 0161 200 5500 to book a place. Reporters/ photographers are also invited to attend the event where there will be photo and interview opportunities.

The work has been commissioned by the City Council’s Environment and Regeneration Department and Nottingham Regeneration Limited. The Guide will not make new policy but will build upon the City Centre Masterplan  

Nottingham Regeneration Limited is a public/private partnership set up in 1998 to manage the City of Nottingham's regeneration areas - the Eastside, Southside and Waterside – as well as the regeneration in the wider city region of Greater Nottingham. The Eastside, Southside and most of the Waterside will be included in the design guide. These areas are currently subject to masterplanning and consultancy work by teams commissioned by NRL. This work will feed directly into the design guide.

URBED (Urbanism Environment Design) is an urban design and masterplanning practice based in Manchester (www.urbed.coop). The company has worked extensively for local authorities and private developer across the country including the preparation of similar design guides in Bradford and Manchester. On this study URBED are working with Gillespies, public realm designers.