Addressing Health Check Issues in a Neighbourhood Plan

Broad Chalke Neighbourhood Plan group contacted Place Studio after having an independent Health Check undertaken on their draft Plan. The Health Check identified some technical points that needed to be managed in order for the Plan to meet its Basic Conditions. We worked with the group to tackle these points and ensure that the plan included everything it needed in order to pass examination.

One of the main objectives of Broad Chalke’s Neighbourhood Plan was to support the delivery of affordable housing in the village to be brought forward by a local Community Land Trust (CLT). We worked with the group to ensure their site allocation process was robust and to craft site allocation policies to support the local Community Land Trust project. Broad Chalke is wholly within the Cranborne Chase Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, and it has a village Conservation Area. We helped the group to shape planning policies that protected and enhanced its sensitive landscape and heritage setting, whilst bringing forward development to meet the local housing needs of the community.

The Broad Chalke Neighbourhood Plan successfully passed examination and referendum, and was formally ‘made’ in July 2021. You can view the made Neighbourhood Plan here.

"I couldn’t recommend Place Studio more highly. They are a small, friendly and thoroughly professional outfit. From the moment we contacted them they went out of their way to help us through the neighbourhood planning labyrinth. They struck exactly the right balance between meeting our wishes and the requirements of the statutory authorities and were excellent in explaining the complex issues involved in layman’s terms. They effectively rewrote our first draft for us and produced a very professional but readable document. I am aware that I am a very demanding client, but they could not have been more charming and cooperative."

Ashley Truluck, Broad Chalke Neighbourhood Plan Steering Group