Urban Design London (UDL) is launching a new scheme to provide expert design and planning advice to London authorities through an informal type of Design Review called London Design Surgeries.

Esther Kurland Director of UDL says; ”We are offering access to technical expertise and experience that local authorities might not have in house and can not easily get in other ways at the moment.  The idea is to support local officers as they assess, negotiate and decide on schemes, but we do not dictate or direct.  We have an excellent panel of experts available to help authorities achieve the best possible schemes for their area. This is a pretty unique a model.  It is relatively cheap and efficient, it is friendly and unintimidating and it pools expertise to offer great quality advice to a large number of authorities.

“Unlike more traditional models of Design Review, there is no formal written outcome and it is up to the officers present to decide how to use the advice given.  Surgeries let local authority officers learn, gain confidence and hone their design appraisal skills. Trial Surgeries have proved useful not only in supporting negotiations on pre- planning application development proposals, but with public realm schemes, where Transport for London (TfL) is taking a lead by using them to consider the design validity of street improvement projects.”

Design Surgeries take places twice a month. Each session focuses on either streets/public realm or mixed use/town centre or housing schemes. Each project reviewed in a session is given 1-2 hours depending on the complexity of the scheme.

Surgeries are free for boroughs who are members of UDL (27 out of London’s 33 authorities at present). They are not normally available for others.

For more information:

t: +44 (0) 207 593 8379 or visit the UDL website