‘Chapman Lily Planning were delighted to have sponsored the Dorset Young Planners event last Thursday with an informative tour of Canford SANG with Sam McKirdy from Canford Park followed by further CPD from two brilliant speakers, Jade North from Dorset Council and Chapman Lily Planning’s very own Brett Spiller.
It was fascinating to learn about the recreational pressures on Dorset heathlands and how SANGs can be used to mitigate this. A SANG is a greenspace that is of a quality and type suitable to be used as an area of mitigation to offset the impact of new residential development, similar to a country park but with a specific purpose to reduce recreational pressures on sensitive habitats. A tour of the Canford Park SANG highlighted attributes of a successful SANG along with the importance of management techniques to reduce the recreational pressures on the SANG itself.
Final food for thought from Jade North at Dorset Council included how we can look to layer up and harness wider benefits of SANGs such as flood alleviation, biodiversity net gain and the health and wellbeing of the community. We are interested to follow the progression of the collaborative Wild Woodbury at Bere Regis which seeks to bring forward 12.5ha of strategic SANG within the context of a re-wilding project and proposed nutrient reduction scheme.
A hugely informative evening with opportunities to network and share knowledge between enthusiastic professionals. A huge thank you to the speakers and to Dorset Young Planners for hosting such a great event.