This is a talking point published by the Hereford Times on October 31.

David Fowler, Hereford Civic Society

IT is worth remembering that the Civic Society was set up 50 years ago to encourage better urbanism, by which we mean making Hereford physically a more liveable place.

Achieving this is dependent on good strategic planning with developments done by people of good will and sound judgement.

The golden thread underpinning a successful plan is the notion that change must be sustainable; in other words, that it succeeds in making Hereford as least as liveable, if not more so, for our successors as for ourselves.

Reviewing progress in Hereford in October 2017, Historic England’s influential urban panel advised Herefordshire Council on the need for a city-wide masterplan to provide a proper sense of direction for its future.

It also emphasised the need, as the city sought to embrace a future as a university city, for a design code built upon the 2009 streetscape design strategy, to be backed by independent advice.

A design guide of sorts was drafted by consultants in January 2019 which the council promised to revise in early 2022 following the National Model Design Code.

Then late in 2022 the masterplan, which the Civic Society felt mapped a progressive future for Hereford, was produced with a promise this would be formally consulted on in early 2023.

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What are your thoughts?

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Letters should not exceed 250 words and local issues take precedence.

Alas we are still waiting for these, as for other requirements of the Historic England report, including rationalising city centre car parking, improving the environment round the station and Commercial Street and improving presentation of the city walls.

Design codes are essential to improving standards in the built environment and streamlining the planning system, by giving timely guidance to owners and specifiers.

Indeed, we need one for the whole county that is sensitive to our rich diversity of traditional styles and materials and which draws upondesign guides already produced by neighbouring authorities. It needs to be adopted as a special planning document ahead of the 2021-41 Local Plan.