Cannock Chase is 69 km2 National Landscape to the north-west of the Birmingham conurbation. Marquis Drive is one of two visitor centres serving Cannock Chase that are owned and safety issues operated by Staffordshire County Council.
Although the visitor centre acts as major portal to the Chase, it has visitor offer of limited quality and most visitors pass through the centre without stopping.
Staffordshire County Council has identified Marquis Drive as a major investment priority and wished to procure a professional team to deliver a spatial masterplan and accompanying business plan to guide the early stages of a project to refresh the site and to enhance the visitor experience.
Client and Contract Period
Staffordshire County Council:
2024-25
Project Objectives
The visitor offer at Marquis Drive is currently of poor quality and the project is principally focussed on improving this. By diversifying the site offers and by improving the quality of these, dwell time can be increased and Marquis Drive can become a destination as well as a gateway, helping to generate additional revenue for the site to sustain the quality of the National Landscape.
The masterplan will focus on the site’s core offers – catering, play, education and heritage. A fully coordinated masterplan can enhance the physical condition and quality of the site’s landscape and architectural components. Design proposal will be informed by engagement with the site’s many stakeholders to ensure that site staff, project partners and everyday users understand the proposals and support the outcomes of the design process.
Issues, Challenges, and Outcomes
Marquis Drive is a highly sensitive site, abutting an extensive Special Area of Conservation. Proposals to enhance the visitor offer thus need to carefully balance the positive impacts in respect of reputation and income generation with potentially adverse impacts on the natural environment that provides the site with its principal raison d’etre.
The audience for Marquis Drive is widely dispersed and the site has multiple partners and stakeholders, including the political and leadership teams within the council for who this is a major investment initiative. Engagement associated with the project thus needs to be extensive and carefully structured.
The target outcome is a visitor centre that is physically transformed in terms of its landscape and built components and one that tells the story of Cannock Chase and supported the preservation of this precious landscape.
Services
- Masterplanning and Detailed Design
- Project Management and Lead Consultancy
- Research
- Business planning
