Communities

Sustainable mixed communities are the way forward, but who should be responsible for delivering the nurseries, kids’ football pitches and other facilities that developers won’t provide but that make for a rounded community? And who should look after those amenities after the developers have gone?

Linden Homes’ answer at its 348-home Caterham Barracks development in Surrey was to put the power in the hands of the community, by establishing a community development trust (CDT). Here it explains, the what, why and how of its CDT, and whether it worked.

How did the CDT come about?

Linden bought the 57-acre Caterham Barracks site from the MOD in 1998 with a draft development brief produced by the district council. Although the brief was largely recognised as being uneconomic, it raised the aspiration locally of significant community uses being provided on site. Tandridge council did not want to own or manage the community facilities, so Linden had to consider other options.

A community planning weekend led to a “vision” being adopted for the development to include employment and community uses as well as private and social homes (the latter for Guinness Trust). The plan included a supermarket, offices, nursing home, health club, and an enterprise centre. The community facilities included an indoor skate park, children’s nursery, junior football and cricket pitches, a pavilion, nature reserve and outdoor adventure park as well as an indoor soft play area, cafe, gallery and theatre. The outline planning consent included the creation of a CDT to own and run the community facilities.

What is the Caterham Barracks Community Trust?

The trust was constituted in 2000 “for the benefit of those who live, work or study in the area of Caterham Barracks and Caterham”. It does this by providing facilities for recreational activity, further education and training for children and adults and by helping to preserve and enhance the natural and built environment, including, in particular, the site’s former chapel.

It has a board of trustees of between 8 and 12 people. These are drawn largely from the users of the facilities, so there is a sports, art and youth trustee as well as a resident and business member from the development and representatives from the wider community. It has a full-time chief executive.

The S106 agreement provided for a number of the buildings on site to be refurbished by Linden and most of them gifted to the trust. The sums available for trust use total around £1.5m. The trust has used the money from Linden to secure third-party funding to enable it to do more work and provide for a higher level of specification. Once the works are completed, the building or land is leased to the trust on a 125-year full repairing and insuring lease. The lease provides for the freehold to be transferred within 10 years. This ensures Linden has control of the assets, should the trust cease trading.

Linden has borne the start-up costs of the trust (about £50,000) and made a £250,000 endowment to the trust to help cover maintenance costs.

What progress has the trust made so far?

The former Naafi is now a children’s nursery and 5000 ft2 of office suites. This provides a revenue stream for the trust of around £100,000 a year. The cricket and football pitches and pavilion have been handed over. The former gymnasiums are being refurbished to provide the play area and party venue as well as a bar/cafe, gallery, studio space and theatre. The chapel is leased to Skaterham, a lively skateboard and rollerblading park. The building will ultimately be leased to the trust. The former officers’ mess was “sold” to the trust by Linden in March for a predetermined £500,000 (against a valuation of £1m). The building now runs as an enterprise centre, again generating income for the trust.

The trust has a trading arm, CBCT Trading. Revenue-generating uses are held by Trading and profits put back to the trust.

Has the CDT been successful?

The CDT has worked well and now has an asset base of more than £3m. The trust has achieved a balance between income from commercial rents and outgoings on charitable activities, benefiting the local community enormously.

One criticism of S106 agreements is the difficulty local authorities experience in demonstrating that the benefits coming from the S106 are being enjoyed by the local community. With the CDT model there is clear benefit accruing immediately adjacent to the new homes that have funded it.

However, within the Section 106 at Caterham there are obligations on the housebuilder to complete certain works within set timescales. In some instances the trust has been unable to meet these timescales because it has different priorities. Yet it is the developer that comes under pressure rather than the trust.

It has also become clear that there are fundamental differences between a developer carrying out a redevelopment project and the way the community or CDT may wish to develop its own facilities. A community needs time to grow and a CDT is no different. It has a different perspective and agenda and commerciality is not necessarily top of the list.

With many developers’ involvement with a scheme expiring two years after the completion of the last home, having an on-going management obligation over the longer term is a new and potentially frightening concept. However, with more pressure on keeping council tax bills in check and authorities not wanting to own property or assets, use of the CDT model will certainly increase.