Transcript of a talk by Will Cousins

Will Cousins, architect & planner, arrived at MKDC in 1978, at a time when much public sector housing had been built. This transcript of an illustrated talk he gave is about Great Holm and his role in developing it; and Great Holm’s place in what he calls ‘MK’s First Renaissance’, the period in the 1980s, when MKDC began to rethink how Milton Keynes, as a New City of 250,000, was going to be planned for the future. He refers to a 1989-dated plan found in a skip, being one of the very first drawings made of Milton Keynes as a major city, showing the embryonic idea of a grid and other aspects of the Master Plan. He recalls the first, modernist master plan for Great Holm, produced in 1975/76 by Pete Barker. But by 1978 Stroud Watson had been asked to set up the Urban Design Unit and the document ‘City Structure Review’ was produced, which led to discussions about: ‘What sort of city are we building?’ Will recounts the six principles of planning which stemmed from this Review, much of it based on the Master Plan

Will was commissioned to produce a new master plan for Great Holm, working with Bob Brightman, Ian Smith and Stroud, and aiming: ‘to embed city structure principles into our work on the ground’. He describes how the team allocated the work required; Will worked on the overall plan of the streets & landscaping. He describes the housing mix, including specialist housing in Ted Cullinan’s scheme on Portway for MacIntyre Homes, and talks of the architects’ response to the landscaping and Lodge Lake, and also to interaction between roads, footpaths and functions. Displaying current views of Great Holm, he comments on ‘place making’: routes, landscaping, a school, a pub, meeting place, health centre, old people’s home, and the footbridge to Two Mile Ash, stressing the importance of grid connections. Will comments that the MacIntyre Homes building is really interesting and serves Milton Keynes well. He mentions also the use of sites for self-build homes and shows examples. And finally he shows ‘… the view that Andrew Mahaddie put on the front cover of ‘City Structure Review’ illustrating the well-structured suburban area in the park landscape’, typically recognised as Milton Keynes.