INTRODUCTION
Landscape Character Assessment can be used to inform policies for
landscape conservation and management. Traditionally the focus has been
on the designation of special areas of landscape, and on their
appropriate management. Outside these areas there has been growing
emphasis on devising strategies and guidelines to help to conserve and
enhance character in the wider landscape. This has also involved the
use of Landscape Character Assessment to influence decisions about
land-use change, such as the planned increase in the extent of woodland
in the landscape, and interventions through mechanisms such as
agri-environment schemes. Landowners and managers can sometimes see
such approaches as lacking appreciation of the real world of land
market economics and the practical decisions which they are faced with.
It is therefore important that these stakeholders should be actively
involved, along with others, in discussions about appropriate
strategies and guidelines.
LANDSCAPE
MANAGEMENT STRATEGIES
Many local authorities prepare Landscape Character Assessments to
assist in the development of non-statutory countryside strategies or
specific landscape strategies. Other initiatives like Indicative
Forestry Strategies can also be informed by this tool. These exercises
generally rely on analysis of key characteristics, understanding of the
pressures causing landscape change, and the drawing up of landscape
guidelines. Some studies develop these guidelines within strategies or
objectives for individual landscape character types or areas, of the
type described in Chapter 7.
Establishing
a clear link between key characteristics, analysis of change and
landscape guidelines is particularly important and is best achieved by
the involvement of a range of stakeholders, especially those
representing land management interests. There are many examples of
Landscape Character Assessments being used in this way. In Scotland all
the assessments which have formed part of the national programme,
contain an analysis of the issues facing the landscape, and develop
guidelines for conservation or enhancement which are not highly
prescriptive but which indicate actions required. This approach has
been used in the Council area assessments (Box 9.1)
where it is common to prepare guidelines for
each landscape character type, and in some smaller-scale applications (Box 9.2).
In
England many counties have prepared landscape guidelines. In
the Warwickshire Landscape Assessment, strategies and
guidelines were prepared for landscape character types in each of the
countryside character areas within the county, helped by a series of
workshops involving all the main stakeholders with an interest in the
Warwickshire countryside. A project officer was subsequently employed
to facilitate implementation of the guidelines by working with
stakeholders, including local parishes. This exercise encouraged
discussion and interpretation of the landscape guidelines at the local
level.
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