Understanding the key characteristics of your neighbourhood could help achieve more from your project
Each project can have positive and negative impacts beyond its site boundaries, and the cumulative effect of developments in an area can significantly influence the quality and enjoyment of a neighbourhood.
A neighbourhood analysis enables the design and development team to fully understand the wider environment and community that the proposed development will be part of.
- The range, scale and level of detail of neighbourhood conditions investigated within any neighbourhood analysis will be dependent on the scale and complexity of the project, and the scale and significance of anticipated effects.
- When determining what information is relevant to your neighbourhood analysis, it is important to define the extent of your neighbourhood. In some instances, this will relate to a suburb with clear boundaries. If less obvious, a 400m radius circle can be used.
- This distance is widely recognised as being the distance people will happily walk in order to meet their daily needs, and typically equates to a five minute walking distance.
- The attributes of a neighbourhood can include landform and natural environment elements, predominant street patterns, transport options and the way people move or travel through it, land uses, built form character, areas of cultural or historical significance and the over-arching cultural and environmental values of the area.
- The result of a neighbourhood analysis is often one or two A3 pages, consisting of annotated maps, supporting text and a collection of photos
