Interesting debate at the Planning Committee tonight. We were considering a planning application for works at a house in the conservation area in Kendal, to replace an existing porch / conservatory of little merit with a new design.

The owner and the architect had obviously studied the Green Building Bible and taken it to heart. From a “green” perspective the new design had everything, from its re-used brickwork, its low carbon footprint timber, its Thermafleece (local sheeps’ wool) insulation, its use of natural daylight, to its flat sedum roof. The porch was literally in the back garden of the property, and not visible from any public road. The ideal place you might think to experiment with how well “green” building could be blended with a traditional Kendal property.

However, on the other side stood the barrier of being in a conservation area, where there is a rigid policy of not just replacing like with like, but even replacing like with original to correct “mistakes” in the past. For example, people living in property with uPVC windows will not be given permission to replace them with uPVC, if the property traditionally had timber windows.

There was a lively debate, which came to a vote – quite unusual. For the record, the conservationist line won, and the application was recommended for refusal when it comes in front of SLDC. Kendal may be officially a Transition Town, but the transition to green building faces an uphill struggle.

This entry was posted on Monday, July 19th, 2010 at 8:17 pm and is filed under Greenery, Kendal Town Council. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.