Selected Strategic Masterplans
Weston Williamson + Partners
We are a team of 150 professionals in the UK, Australia and Canada, of 15 nationalities, working flexibly and collaboratively with clients and the wider industry.
Our diverse international team members bring their own unique backgrounds and perspectives to projects and to the people that we work with. We are natural collaborators, keen to talk, to listen and to understand. It is by working closely with everyone involved – clients, stakeholders, colleagues and end users - that we deliver successful projects.
We are a design-led practice, full of people who relish a challenge and with a strong record of delivery. Our work is all about the people who use it; how they will inhabit and experience the buildings, places and artefacts that we design. We take a whole life approach, considering how our designs will adapt, retain their relevance and continue to be enjoyed for years to come.
We specialise in creating solutions for complex projects, large or small, international and local. We get to the essence of what people need from buildings and spaces, listening, challenging and responding to clients and stakeholders with elegant, bold solutions. We set out a clear and engaging vision that helps people get involved with the design and the process.
Our ambition is simple but expansive, shaping cities for the future, involving transport, master planning, public space, environment and living. People are at the heart of everything we do. We want to design buildings and places that are a pleasure to use and create civilised beautiful environments that enrich lives.
Selected Strategic Masterplans
As the populations of existing settlements increase, greater pressure is put on land use to accommodate this growth throughout our cities. With improved railway infrastructure investment comes greater potential for new places to live, work and play. Better connectivity and convenient, attractive public transport systems offer up opportunities for existing urban expansion or the creation of whole new settlements as desirable destinations in themselves.
Our master planning portfolio has grown beyond urban planning projects to include the technical challenges of delivering new development on and around railways, land use change and the implications for established settlements; together with developing architectural typologies which aim to address land use intensification and flexible development plot accommodation.
Our Method We begin our process with a site analysis, identifying constraints to overcome, and opportunities to capitalise on. We use hand sketches to efficiently explore site layout options, ensuring that design decisions are driven by our understanding of the surrounding context, as well as practical considerations such as access and servicing. We develop preferred options in Revit, generating highly efficient typical floor plan layouts in order to maximise value. Area outputs from our Revit models give our clients assurance in gross and internal development areas.
Presented over the following pages are a selection of recent masterplan studies where we have successfully generated a vision for high quality development, with an assurance of quantum and value for our clients.
Arden Cross
Birmingham, UK Client: Arden Cross Ltd RIBA Stages – 0-1 c. 2,500 new homes, 30,000 new jobs Dates – Jan 2019
View of station plaza
View of residential parkland
Arden Cross is a nationally significant development opportunity. Our masterplan aims to create a world leading economic hub that co-locates business, living and learning within a fantastic new urban realm supported by high quality infrastructure. The 148-hectare site will create over 30,000 jobs and 2,500 new homes with future workers, residents and visitors benefiting from unparalleled access to air, rail and road travel. In partnership with the stakeholders across the region, alongside HS2 and the government, we developed a masterplan that demonstrates the scale of opportunity through a shared vision and set of clear development principles. Focusing on early phase priority projects linked to the integration of existing road and rail routes the masterplan sets out an achievable project strategy. The final masterplan is an innovative and forward-thinking approach to the site’s development, to harnesses the areas unique landscape and infrastructure and to create an environment in which people and businesses can thrive.
Aerial view
Ebbsfleet Masterplan
Ebbsfleet, UK Client: Ebbsfleet Development Corporation RIBA Stages – 0-1 c. 2,500 new homes, 30,000 new jobs Dates – 2020 - 2021
View of residential square
View of residential square
Ebbsfleet Central is an area of land focused around the International Station and is centrally located within the Garden City and surrounding settlements. The area has exceptional rail links to London, the Thames Estuary Production Corridor and Europe. The area has been earmarked for development, with a vision to create a new ‘heart’ of the Garden City. This will be achieved by improving connectivity to the site and into surrounding communities, delivering a variety of homes and jobs, creating new open spaces and enhancing existing natural spaces including the River Ebbsfleet. We developed a series of City gardens with connecting routes. Plot sizing allows for adaptablity of the plot typology to respond to economic and social change, whilst setting out a strong masterplan framework. Public transport and active travel routes were a key aspect of the proposals.
Masterplan vision
Bristol Temple Meads
Bristol, UK Client: Arden Cross Ltd RIBA Stages – 0-1 c. 2,500 new homes, 30,000 new jobs Dates – Jan 2019
View of station square
Section through station square
We have prepared this masterplan for Bristol Temple Quarter for our client body which comprises of; Bristol City Council, Network Rail and Homes England. This masterplan looks to provide a mixed-vibrant city quarter with 11,000 homes, along with the remodelling and upgrade of Bristol Temple Meads Station. We developed multiple masterplan scenarios, which all focused on three-character areas, identified as key inputs for the masterplan development and deliverability. The team is now developing height and density scenarios to agree with client team on a single direction to be developed.
Aerial sketch view
Cardiff Station Masterplan
Cardiff, UK Client: Cardiff City Council, Transport for Wales, Network Rail RIBA Stages – 0-1 Dates – 2020 - 2021
Aerial view
Street view, station square
The station masterplan for Cardiff Central, aims to improve the capacity of the transport hub, whilst creating a fitting gateway to the Welsh capital. Station capacity improvements, such as options for the lengthening of an existing platform, has had significant impact on how the station masterplan could be developed. New station entrances, platform and commercial opportunities have all been driven by the platform extension scenarios Similarly, with how they could be delivered, in partnership with 3rd Party developers, who are currently undertaking a substantial redevelopment of an existing brewery site to the south of the station. WW+P identified opportunities for substantial development quantum on Network Rail land to support the business case for the station improvements. Safeguarding for future transport modes, has also influenced the masterplanning scenarios. Transport for Wales (TfW) ambitions for a new ‘tram-link’ to Cardiff Bay, has required the design team to develop options for passenger interchange and integration with development sites around the station.
Masterplan
Barking Town Centre Masterplan
Barking, UK Client: Be First RIBA Stages – 0-1 c. 2,200 new homes - 60% private sale, 40% affordable c. 245,000 sqft commercial / retail Dates – 2018
CGI view showing revitalised high street and station entrance
Aerial CGI
Our proposal for Barking Town Centre looked to reinvigorate and transform the area around Barking Station, delivering c. 2,200 new homes together with new commercial and social infrastructure all connected by over 2 hectares of new clean, green, accessible open spaces. A new high street serves as an urban cultural magnet, linking the existing civic centre and town squares to more isolated communities in the north. The scheme is characterised by a phased approach, with each plot bringing forward between 100 and 400 residential units within vibrant mixed use developments and landscaping. We considered the social infrastructure that is necessary to ensure that the potential economic benefits reach those most in need, so that no-one is left behind. Such intensification can only be successful if created through excellent place-making and through improved connectivity and surrounding environments. A new green spine, parallel to the high street, will connect public spaces and provide an improved retail offer. The new street layout is a loose grid that articulates more humanscale urban quarters complemented by green courtyard spaces, echoing the layout of exemplary town centres in London.
Aerial view