Mobility, transport and highway design for Hemel Garden Communities and East Hemel Hempstead

Challenge

We are retained by The Crown Estate to undertake all mobility, transport and highway design aspects of this new community that extends Hemel Hempstead by 10,000 jobs and 11,000 residential units plus a wide range of schools, transport infrastructure, green space and everyday facilities. The Crown Estate own the land related to the majority of this development. This project aims to provide a major urban extension of Hemel Hempstead to meet the housing needs of the St Albans and the sub regional economic development objectives for growth in the M1 corridor.

Solution

We have developed a mobility strategy for the new Garden Town and are assisting in promoting the scheme through the Local Plan process. This has focussed on proposing a new community within sustainable transport at its core and sustainable transport connectivity priorities over roads with an aim that 60% of all trips across the day are undertaken by sustainable modes.

As part of our work we have demonstrated how a significant proportion of trips will be contained within the area by creating a new community with homes, jobs, education along with retail, leisure and everyday facilities. The design focuses on connectivity and aims to try to ensure journey times and routes are quicker by public transport and more direct by active travel while trips by private car are not as convenient.

In addition we are preparing a planning application for Phase 1 (East Hemel Hempstead) which comprises some 4,000 residential units and 200,000 sqm of employment space. East Hemel Hempstead is a dynamic and complex area of the town, with a variety of different needs. The area has one of the most important fuel distribution centres in the country. It also has the biggest and one of the most vibrant employment areas in the region and hosts some of the most vital services and facilities for the town.

Alongside the East Hemel planning application we are also progressing with the detailed design of major highway improvements at Junction 8 of the M1 and a new commercial Spine Road for early delivery.

Impact

This work was jointly funded by the Hertfordshire LEP and TCE and has sought to ensure that National Highways are accepting of the proposals and the commercial space is directly accessed from the M1.