The public spaces review benefits from the expert advice and recommendations of Landscape Architect, Thirlwall Associates, whose brief was to review all 5 of the public space in Goring as a whole.
This approach was taken to mitigate some issues on previous projects where an individual location for an individual project was looked at and some residents would raise concerns and the project would then be passed over. This new approach of looking at the village as a whole is to ensure that no individual location is being singled out, and that there is a long term plan for the whole village.
The first consultation period was 2–22 August 2021 during the ‘Summer of Play’. Data collected during the events and feedback received immediately after from the participants was fed into the plans
The second consultation period was during February 2022 closing on 18 February 2022. A Public Spaces survey was available to all residents to complete, again to be analysed and feed into the strategy.
The Goring-on-Thames Open Space Strategy document, also known as the “Thirlwall report” was put forward by Thirlwall Associates (Landscape Architects) in December 2022 based on their independent views following review of Goring’s open spaces usage and potential, as well as extensive consultation with residents as well as sports clubs.
Following the publication of this report and after feedback had been received (see below for details), the Open Spaces Working Group proposed to Council that several separate projects should be taken forward concurrently if possible, but as separate workstreams:
- Replace / refurbish playground equipment at Bourdillon and Gardiner
- Consider improvements suggested within the report on Rectory Garden and Ferry Lane
- A major project on Gardiner and Sheepcot Recreation grounds – these need to run together as decisions on one are likely to impact the other
To avoid spreading resources too thinly 3 working groups have been set up so far
Feedback on Thirlwall report
The comments (redacted of personal details) received from the community on the Thirlwall report are organised by location / topic and can be found in the following documents:
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