Following the launch of the Broadland Heritage at Risk pilot in February this year the project team are delighted to confirm that the pilot has now been successfully completed.
The Broadland Pilot was designed to identify grade II Listed buildings that are considered to be ‘at risk’ from decay, vandalism, misuse or collapse using a team of volunteers from the local community.
Led by Ingham Pinnock Associates and Broadland District Council, the Broadland Pilot is one of 19 similar experimental exercises taking place across the country. The outcomes from the complete programme of pilots will be launched by English Heritage later in the year.
Broadland has over 900 listed buildings and an initial review of all of them was undertaken to establish those that required a survey. A combination of community volunteers and heritage professionals surveyed and assessed around 100 Listed buildings and structures across Broadland. The buildings ranged from historic walls, barns, village pumps, telephone kiosks, residential and commercial properties and even a set of village stocks. English Heritage will be announcing the results of the pilot projects and future plans on 10th October.
The team behind the pilot was determined that from the outset, the Broadland Pilot wasn’t just about identifying buildings that needed help but actually about putting steps in place to repair them and bring them back into beneficial use. Reflecting this, workshops with English Heritage and other specialists have already been held to review some of the buildings in detail and develop strategies to deliver repairs and maintenance and help bring them back to life.
Ingham Pinnock Associates, Broadland District Council and the rest of the team would like to take this opportunity to publicly thank all of the volunteers who took part so enthusiastically and dedicated substantial time, effort and integrity to making the pilot a success. The team would also like to thank the town and parish councils who gave their support and the general public and building owners who came forward with ideas.
Broadland District Council’s Portfolio Holder for Planning, Councillor Shaun Vincent said: “We are so impressed by the response from the public and town and parish council that we will shortly be setting up a Heritage Warden Scheme. We will train volunteers to work with Town and Parish Councils to protect and preserve their special buildings. We will also train volunteers to help with local listing projects.”
John Ette, Heritage at Risk Principle for the East of England, said: “The Broadland pilot scheme has been a very successful example of how grade II listed buildings may be surveyed and accounted for on a national register using a volunteer workforce. Although grade I and grade II* buildings are commonly seen as the icing on the cake, our built heritage is represented by England’s special grade II listed buildings. The enthusiastic involvement of local people allowed me to see Heritage at Risk through new eyes.”
Kate Pinnock, a Director from Ingham Pinnock Associates said: ‘We were delighted to have been selected to undertake the pilot initially and have been blown away by the response from the general public and volunteers throughout the process and would like to thank them for their involvement. Broadland has a fantastic wealth of listed buildings and the pilot has successfully identified buildings that require further help. We hope that this pilot will inform the way forward for establishing Grade II Listed buildings at risk registers in the future and start to establish solutions for some of the buildings most in need of support across the district.’
Editor Notes:
English Heritage has launched this ambitious programme to find out how the one major element of our heritage not already covered by the Heritage at Register – the nation’s Grade II listed buildings – can be assessed. Working with 19 pilot schemes across the country, understanding what makes these buildings at risk, would be a first step to securing their future.
There are some 345,000 Grade II buildings in England, accounting for 92% of all listed buildings. Beautiful, historic or architecturally special, they are the houses, cottages, shops, inns, offices, schools, town halls, libraries, farms, mills and other distinguished buildings that shape the character of our cities, towns and villages.
