Natural England

NCAF 16/2 Update – CROW work

Area 1 , South East – Provisional map issued 7th October 2002, currently at appeals stage.

Area 2 , Lower North West – Provisional map issued 18th November 2002, currently at appeals stage.

Area 3 , Central Southern England – Draft map issued, consultation on draft map closed 3rd December 2002. Currently determining comments.

Area 4 , Upper North West – Draft map issued, consultation on draft map closed 10th March 2003. Currently determining comments.

Area 5 , North East – Draft map issued 13th March 2003, consultation closes 13th June 2003.

Area 6 , South West – Draft map to be issued 13th May 2003.

Area 7 , West – Currently mapping, draft map to be issued Summer 2003.

Area 8 , East – Currently mapping, draft map to be issued Autumn 2003.

Appeals

Area 1

The appeal period for mapping area 1(South East) closed at midnight on 7th January 2003. The Agency has now received all those appeals which they are required to address, and are processing them through the various stages of the appeals procedure. The first decisions from the Planning Inspectorate on the early cases dealt with via the written representation procedure are expected before the end of April. 

Venues are being identified for the area 1 hearing and inquiry cases, the plans being for the first of these hearings to take place in May. As far as possible hearing and inquiry venues are being booked close to "clusters" of hearing and inquiry appeal sites. We anticipate booking around six separate venues, wherever possible using local authority facilities. Notices of hearings and inquiries will be posted in local papers not less than two weeks in advance of the event.

The majority of cases have opted for the written representation procedure, with around 25% opting for either a hearing or inquiry as their procedural preference. It is worth noting that some sites are subject to multiple appeals and these are likely to be heard consecutively.

The public can find out which appeals are live by accessing the Planning Inspectorate website at: www.planning-inspectorate.gov.uk/access.

Mapping Area 2

The appeal period for mapping area 2 (Lower North West) closed at midnight on the 18th February 2003. In total 711 appeals were received by   the Planning Inspectorate, of which approximately 60 were disallowed.

To date the Agency has received around three-quarters of these cases, of which in excess of 30% have chosen either a hearing or inquiry procedure. 

Local Access Restrictions

We have devised a full working draft of the Agency's statutory guidance to relevant authorities.   We have discussed this extensively with the other relevant authorities and Defra, and meetings about it with the key national stakeholders have been arranged for later in May.   The guidance will reflect the principles discussed at seven NCAF meetings since February 2000, the approach set out in our 2002 consultation paper, the responses we received to that paper and the expected content of regulations. We expect the guidance to be approved by the Secretary of State in the late summer and published in the Autumn.  

We are also working on:

a leaflet to help occupiers of access land understand their public liability position under the Act

a simple model risk assessment process for access land that land managers can use as appropriate: we will consult key stakeholders on this.  

The Met Office and ADAS are piloting and validating potential fire risk forecasting models on our behalf. This will help us develop a national fire risk forecasting system to inform relevant authority decisions about fire restrictions under the Act. 

Access Management  

The Agency is developing its policy on roles and responsibilities for access management is close association with NCAF (see NCAF 16/3).  

Defra will need to publish guidance to access authorities on their powers and duties in relation to open access.   The Agency is helping Defra with this by conducting background research, in consultation with the Local Government Association's Access Advisory Group.   We will be using the findings to inform our advice to Defra on how to frame their guidance to access authorities, which we anticipate will be published in the third quarter of 2003.

Access authorities, land managers and others will need advice on how best to coordinate the management of the new rights at a local level.   The Agency is funding and steering two projects which will demonstrate effective approaches:

With the Countryside Council for Wales, we are scoping a pilot project in the Black Mountains, which will look at management of open access across local authority boundaries.   We will report on the initial steps of this project at the joint meeting with the Welsh national Access Forum in July.

With the Moorland Access Advisory Group, we are contributing to a project in Grinton.   This will pilot a management planning approach to open access and produce guidance on the techniques and resources involved.   This is scheduled for completion late in 2003

Country Code consultation paper   is due to be launched week commencing 12th May. Country Code workshops will be taking place during May. Invitations for these workshops have been sent to Chief Executives. Members of NCAF are invited to take part in a workshop at the joint meeting in July.

A summary of the NCAD feasibility study can now be viewed on the CA website.

In January, a Capital Modernisation Fund bid was submitted to Treasury, seeking funds to roll out the study at national scale.   However, the bid was unsuccessful and we shall return to the drawing board for ideas on funds .