Public Sector Housing From trouble to trophies… A former council estate which became synonymous for poor quality housing, crime and anti-social behaviour, is part-way through a major regeneration which is giving its new and returning residents a feeling of security, and a sense of pride about their new community. The playground overlooked by homes has replaced the site of the Swilly bonfire Originally known as Swilly and renamed North Prospect in 1969, the development, two miles north of Plymouth city centre, is the largest regeneration project in the South West. Under the management of Plymouth Community Homes (PCH), it involves demolishing 800 homes, building 1,110 new homes and refurbishing a further 300. Building commenced in 2011, and the third of five building phases is now underway. To help address concerns about the reputation of the former Swilly estate and to encourage confidence in the new development, PCH invited Secured by Design (SBD), the national police crime prevention initiative, to work with architects, developers and local authority planners to ‘design out crime.’ These planning meetings involving SBD’s specialist Designing Out Crime Officers started long before building commenced and have meant that security has been embedded into the layout, landscaping, and physical security of all properties in North Prospect. SBD’s advice on the built environment has included creating safer spaces through greatly increasing natural surveillance. Front garden hedges have been replaced by railings whilst high fences protect rear gardens. Properties have living rooms that overlook cars parked either in the street or within the curtilage of the building, and gable end walls with windows provide visibility over pathways and public spaces. There are no alleyways at the rear of gardens and no hiding places. The physical security of properties has included products that meet SBD’s Police Preferred Specification, such as external doors and a<strong>cc</strong>essible windows that are sufficiently robust to resist attack from a casual or opportunist burglar. Front doors have quadruple locking systems, door chains, and spy holes as well as letterboxes with protective cowls to stop thieves using rods to ‘fish’ for vehicle keys or other valuables left inside. Every property has been fitted with an external light. Rear garden gates have two bolts and a separate key-lock, and every lockable shed has a large metal ground anchor to help protect bicycles, motorbikes and mowers. Devon and Cornwall Police report a fall in recorded crime in North Prospect by 62% between 2007-2016 in four key neighbourhood crime categories: residential burglary has fallen by 49%, criminal damage by 84%, vehicle offences 78%, and violence against the person 14%. The results are testament to the vision and determination shown by PCH who have become well practised at making North Prospect su<strong>cc</strong>eed in many ways. These include the complex, lengthy and sensitive process of helping residents to move to better homes, obtaining the necessary grant funding at a time of constrained public sector finances to avoid a partially completed project, tackling the many construction issues including using existing infrastructure on a sloping site, and overcoming the many legal issues, such as identifying the owners of houses that had been left empty. PCH Programme Manager James Savage said regeneration goes beyond providing new and better homes to improve family lifestyle, health, education and security. “A case study we did with the Homes and Communities Agency reported that because families now have properly insulated homes, children would not have to do their homework wrapped up in a duvet on their bed and could use the kitchen table instead,” he explained. “It’s so easy to get lost in all the statistics around new homes, but children are achieving at school and health rates are improving.” North Prospect started to win architectural and building awards and even received a visit from Princess Anne in 2015. With many of the technical problems, rehousing issues, and funding difficulties overcome, the regeneration at North Prospect is continuing and is due for completion in 2022 at a cost of £130m. www.securedbydesign.com 38 Refurb retrofit magazine <strong>November</strong> 20<strong>17</strong> R6
Old houses New houses <strong>November</strong> 20<strong>17</strong> R6 Refurb retrofit 39 magazine
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