Forest of Marston Vale Development Design Guidance

Developing in the Forest of Marston Vale – Design Guidance Supplementary Planning Document (SPD)

The Forest of Marston Vale is one of 12 community forests established in the year 2000 which have the overall vision to ‘create well-wooded landscapes for wildlife, work and education, with new opportunities for recreation, all on the doorstop of half of England’s population’.

At the outset the area was dominated by brick pits, landfill sites and had only 3% tree cover. Currently, tree cover across the forest area is approximately 16%. The target set in the Forest Plan is for 30% tree cover by 2030.

There is a need to balance the requirements for new development with the need to regenerate and green the area, and clearly planning and development activities have an important role to play in the creation of the Forest of Marston Vale. The forest falls across Bedford Borough and Central Bedfordshire and both councils’ development plans include almost identical policies requiring 30% tree cover across development sites.

Bedford Borough Local Plan 2030 Policy 36S – Forest of Marston Vale

Bedford Borough Council will continue to support the creation of the Forest of Marston Vale to deliver the environmentally led regeneration of the area. Development proposals within the Forest of Marston Vale area will be required to:

  1. Demonstrate how they will deliver 30% tree cover across their development site. This can be achieved through a combination of new planting of trees, woodlands and hedgerows within development sites and
  2. Contribute to the environmentally led regeneration of the Forest of Marston Vale, in line with the aims of the Forest Plan and
  3. Demonstrate how their proposals reflect relevant design guidance (supplementary planning document) for development within the Forest of Marston Vale.

The Developing in the Forest of Marston Vale SPD (PDF) has been prepared jointly by Bedford Borough Council and Central Bedfordshire Council in collaboration with The Forest of Marston Vale Trust. The SPD is intended to provide practical guidance to applicants, designers and planning officers to assist with the design of developments to enable them to positively contribute to creating the Forest. In particular it sets out the different ways of achieving the tree cover requirements.

Central Bedfordshire Council adopted the Forest SPD in December 2022 and Bedford Borough Council adopted the Forest SPD on 25 January 2023.

The benefit of achieving approval of the same document by both local authorities is to enable consistent decision making across the whole of the forest area.

The SPD is a material consideration in determining planning applications and all development proposals will be required to demonstrate that they have taken it into consideration.