Neighbourhood character refers to the 'look and feel of an area', in particular a residential area. It also includes the activities that occur there. In everyday usage, it can often be synonymous with local character, residential character, urban character and
place identity
Place identity or place-based identity refers to a cluster of ideas about place and identity in the fields of geography, urban planning, urban design, landscape architecture, environmental psychology, ecocriticism and urban sociology/ecological so ...
, but those terms can have more specific meanings in connection with
urban planning
Urban planning, also known as town planning, city planning, regional planning, or rural planning, is a technical and political process that is focused on the development and design of land use and the built environment, including air, water, ...
and
conservation
Conservation is the preservation or efficient use of resources, or the conservation of various quantities under physical laws.
Conservation may also refer to:
Environment and natural resources
* Nature conservation, the protection and managem ...
.
The neighbourhood character ascribed to an area can be both descriptive and prescriptive, and may or may not form an explicit component of
planning policy. However, planning policies inevitably impact upon the way a place is used and what it feels like to be there, along with a range of other social, cultural, ecological, physical and economic factors that shape human settlements. As interest in the concept of
place
Place may refer to:
Geography
* Place (United States Census Bureau), defined as any concentration of population
** Census-designated place, a populated area lacking its own municipal government
* "Place", a type of street or road name
** Often ...
has increased since the 1970s,
urban design
Urban design is an approach to the design of buildings and the spaces between them that focuses on specific design processes and outcomes. In addition to designing and shaping the physical features of towns, cities, and regional spaces, urban d ...
ers and
planners have accordingly become more focused on issues of character. The way that character is regulated varies from place to place, with some planning systems making more overt references to it than others.
Australia
Neighbourhood character has become a key term in the planning system of
Victoria, Australia
Victoria is a state in southeastern Australia. It is the second-smallest state with a land area of , the second most populated state (after New South Wales) with a population of over 6.5 million, and the most densely populated state in ...
. Since 2001, it has been the mandatory starting point for assessing all permit applications for residential development in established urban areas in that state. In its formal use in the planning system, it refers to the qualities that make one neighbourhood distinct from another, and encompasses a range of physical components of the built environment, architectural style, street width and layout, vegetation, fence height and style, and so on. Every urban place has a neighbourhood character.
There has been much dispute in Victoria with regard to the use of this term because of its qualitative aspects, which rely mainly on subjective judgement. The planning system is focused on physical planning and the built environment, but residents groups such as
Save Our Suburbs have suggested that the term is too vague on the one hand, and not broad enough on the other as it doesn't incorporate an understanding of the social and cultural character of residential neighbourhoods.
Neighbourhood character is regulated in Victoria through a variety of planning instruments within
ResCode, the statutory code for residential development. The
Neighbourhood Character Overlay is the most stringent regulatory device and works in a similar way to a
heritage
Heritage may refer to:
History and society
* A heritage asset is a preexisting thing of value today
** Cultural heritage is created by humans
** Natural heritage is not
* Heritage language
Biology
* Heredity, biological inheritance of physica ...
control. Its first implementation was for the
Hedgeley Dene Gardens
Hedgeley Dene Gardens is a public open space in the suburb of Malvern East in Melbourne, Australia. It is one of the most popular parks in the Malvern East locality. It is also significant as an example of public open space design that recreat ...
precinct in the
Melbourne
Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a met ...
suburb of
Malvern East
Malvern East is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 13 km south-east of Melbourne's Central Business District, located within the City of Stonnington local government area. Malvern East recorded a population of 22,296 at the 2021 c ...
. Since the mid-1990s, local governments in Victoria have begun to develop policies to regulate neighbourhood character and the majority of the 32 Melbourne local governments now possess some form of locally based neighbourhood character policy.
Canada
Neighbourhood character is a prominent term in the Canadian planning system. For example, since its adoption in 1995, Vancouver's strategic policy 'City Plan' has focused on the creation of a city of distinct neighbourhoods, each with its own identity and neighbourhood character.
UK
![Arlington Row Bibury](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6f/Arlington_Row_Bibury.jpg)
Neighbourhood character has become an important issue in planning policy in the UK, as a background study area for informing the Local Development Frameworks of the Core Strategies. This process is ongoing. A detailed and robust study of neighbourhoods is seen as essential to producing future plans for growth. It has been recognised in Brighton & Hove Urban Characterisation Study that people live in neighbourhoods, not character areas.
Brighton & Hove Urban Characterisation Study
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References
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Urban design
Architectural conservation