This module explores the design dimension of current planning and development practice, and associated issues of investment and development objectives and processes.  It reviews the continuing debate over central government design advice, the development of design principles, and the role of design in local development frameworks. It considers how to write design policies and supplementary design guidance, including design strategies, guides, conservation area appraisals and especially development briefs.  It looks at how design is dealt with in development management and in design review procedures. Issues surrounding the design of commercial office and retail development and the requirements of investors, developers, tenants and consumers are examined in some detail.  Attention is also given to housing design in both the private and social sectors examining issues of layout, construction, diversity and the management of quality.  Students will be given the opportunity to improve their graphic and document production. This module will be a useful introduction for those interested in undertaking urban design as a specialised study at Masters level

• understand what might constitute design criteria to guide design and control.
• understand the panoply of urban design policy and guidance in the UK and how this sets a framework for 'control' and design review.
• understand the roles of landowners, property developers and financial institutions in the commercial and housing sectors.
• understand the requirements of space users and consumer preferences, and how these influence the built form of commercial and housing development.
• undertake research for the evaluation of the design qualities of a development and develop defensible qualitative judgments.

• present, discuss and understand their own aesthetic values/prejudices and compare attitudes amongst peers.
• debate the relative positions of lay vs. professional taste, and the reasons for the same.
• understand the development imperatives for particular places and the development requirements of particular groups of people.

The module will be presented through a mixture of lectures, student-led seminars and site visits. The lectures will present the basic ideas and thinking and show how the key concepts are applied in practice to a range of urban settings, in different types and forms of policy and guidance and to different types of development. The student-led seminars will allow students to practice the thinking in relation to a number of discrete projects. Site visits will allow students to see how the thinking has been applied in particular settings and to experience the results, whilst they will also meet and learn from practitioners using the concepts in practice.

• To undertake research for the evaluation of the design qualities of a development.
• To learn how to develop design policy and guidance documents.
• To apply appropriate design criteria to make more objective judgments about design quality.
• To present design opinions and defend them orally.

How the module will be assessed

Students will be assessed through 2 exercises:

Exercise 1: Student seminar 20% Evaluating the design of recent developments in Cardiff or Newport

To provide a forum for discussion, and some practical examples of day-to-day design control decision making, forty five minutes will be allocated each session to discussions of recent developments in Cardiff and Newport

Exercise 2: Individual Report (80% 3000 words or equivalent in images and diagrams)

Students will identify a significant recently-completed or nearly completed development which you consider has interesting aspects of design (good or bad), and critically discuss its design quality.

Type of assessment

%

Contribution

Title

Duration
(if applicable)

Approx. date of Assessment

Seminar

20%

Evaluating the design of recent developments in Cardiff or Newport

45 minutes

During the module

Individual report

80%

Student to determine through the brief

End of the module

The opportunity for reassessment in this module

Students who fail the module overall will be asked to resubmit the individual report to a standard to allow it to pass.

Urban design principles. Design and the development process. How to evaluate design quality: Using Quality Reviewer. Building for Life criteria and assessments. Design in the development management process. Design policies in development plans. Design guidance. Design Strategies. Retail Development. Private Sector Urban Design Roles. Public Sector Urban design Roles. Sustainable design and construction. Master planning. Conservation Area Appraisals, Development Briefing. Site visits.

• Cowan R. et al. (2010) Quality Reviewer, London, Telford.
• English Partnerships/Housing Corporation (2002/2007) Urban Design Compendium, Vols 1 & 2, London EH/HC.
• Hall T. (2007) Turning a Town Around. Oxford, Blackwell.
• Hopkins, O (2012) Reading Architecture: A Visual Lexicon, London: Laurence King (nice book to buy and keep which shows you how to look at and discuss buildings from different periods)
• Jones, A and Matthews, C (2014) Towns in Britain: Jones the Planner, Nottingham: Russell Press

Other public resources will be circulated via learning central.

• Carmona M, Punter J and Chapman D (2002) From design policy to design quality, London: RTPI
• Carmona M. et al (2003) Urban Places Public Spaces, London, Architectural Press
• Cowan, R (2002) Urban Design Guidance, London: Urban Design Group
• DETR (2000), By Design: Urban Design in the Planning System: Towards Better Practice, London, Telford.
• Department for Transport/CLG (2007) Manual for Streets, London, Thomas Telford.
• Farrell T (2014) The Farrell Review of Architecture and the Built Environment, Department for Culture, Media and Sport
• Punter, J.V. and Carmona, M.C. (1997), The Design Dimension of Planning: theory, content and best practice for design policies, London, E&FN Spon.
• Punter, J (2010) Urban Design and the British Urban Renaissance, London: Routledge
• Tiesdell S. and Adams D. (2010) Urban design in the real estate development process, London, Wiley.