Plan 2040 Full Survey

The National Trust is the owner and custodian of Knole House, a Grade I listed Jacobean Mansion. Knole is surrounded by a historic medieval deer park. The house and surrounding deer park are managed and owned separately. Knole Park is owned and managed by Lord Sackville’s Knole Estate, however the Trust own and manage 100 acres of land immediately surrounding the main entrance and mansion. The Estate is located to the south-east of Sevenoaks and is a significant open space within the Sevenoaks District, attracting between 200,000 and 250,000 visitors annually, with an additional 400,000 people through the parkland gates each year contributing greatly to the local economy.
Policy SEV1 will be formulated to raise the profile of Sevenoaks best assets, including Knole Park. The National Trust fully supports the vision set out within the draft Local Plan to strengthen connections between Knole Park and Sevenoaks Town Centre. We welcome the projects and development opportunities identified within the Sevenoaks Town Centre Strategy 2022, which will promote walking connections between the town and Knole, encourage sustainable travel and improved access for local people to the parkland. We particularly support the vision to provide an attractive green environment for people walking to the park by upgrading routes like Webb’s Alley and Akehurst Lane, including establishing active frontages which will help navigate visitors to the park.

The National Trust supports the inclusion of a planning policy that seeks to protect, support and encourage tourism business, visitor accommodation and visitor attractions, including heritage assets within the Local Plan. We are pleased that the policy considers existing tourism development and the acknowledgement that proposals may be required for the upgrading of existing facilities, including heritage assets. This is particularly important to ensure visitors expectations are met and exceeded, and to ensure the sustainable future of visitor attractions to the benefit of the local visitor economy.

No, proposed Policy HEN1 and Policy HEN2 are the same and can be combined.

Proposed Policy HEN2 could apply to both designated and non-designated heritage assets which should be conserved in a manner appropriate to their significance. This policy should make it clear that national policy within the NPPF will be applied when assessing significance of harm to a designated heritage asset and that great weight will be given to the conservation of the affect asset.
Policy HEN2 could be drafted in such as way that it also supports sensitively managed change within the historic environment, currently proposed through the formation of Policy HEN3.

Policy HEN6 is welcomed as it acknowledges that historic and standard modern buildings function differently when it comes to implementing energy efficiency measures. Taking a ‘whole buildings approach’ is supported to ensure energy savings can be achieved alongside sustaining heritage significance. It will be important for any future policy proposal to require any improvement or alteration of designated and non-designated heritage assets to also comply with the requirements of the NPPF in terms of assessing the significance of harm to the historic asset and its setting.

The National Trust supports the Local Plan including a policy which seeks to conserve and better reveal the significance of historic parks and gardens and additional policy guidance would be welcomed.