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Biodiversity and landscape

We’re proud of our natural environment and want to take care of it. That’s why we’ve brought together a range of strategies, planning policies and programmes to protect, maintain and enhance our biodiversity and landscapes.

In line with national policy and local concerns, we’ve underpinned these measures with a strong evidence base. This is to ensure that the importance of biodiversity and landscape issues are understood and taken into account as part of the planning process.

We expect development proposals to take account of biodiversity and landscape policies and we’ll work with our partners to ensure this happens.

Biodiversity

Newark and Sherwood contains an impressive range of habitats and species. The district also has a number of sites which receive specific protection because of their international, national or regional importance for nature conservation including:

Landscape character assessment

To assist the conservation and enhancement of our landscapes and to inform the production of the local development framework (LDF) we’ve carried out a landscape character assessment of the district.

This provides a clear and objective way to assess our varied landscape. It also contains information about the character, condition and sensitivity of the landscape, giving a greater understanding of what makes areas locally distinctive.

The study recognises local distinction through the identification of policy zones across five landscape character types.

Green infrastructure strategy

The protection and enhancement of the area's biodiversity and open spaces should be seen not just as the protection of individual elements of our towns and villages. It is part of the development of an overall green infrastructure network of greenspaces, landscapes and natural elements which intersperse and connect our settlements and surrounding areas.

To help create this network we’ve produced a green infrastructure strategy (PDF File, 9,769kb) championing the need for a high level of environmental quality, provision of recreational opportunities and access to green space by developers. It also highlights the need to respond to the threats and challenges of climate change for communities and wildlife.

Nottinghamshire local biodiversity action plan

The Nottinghamshire local biodiversity action plan seeks to focus resources to conserve and enhance biodiversity through local partnerships. It’s part of a national approach to biodiversity and identifies important species and habitats in our area, giving each one an action plan to aid in their conservation.

The plan:

  • assesses the current situation
  • identifies the main threats to species and habitats
  • sets targets for their conservation and restoration
  • outlines the required actions necessary to protect these elements of our environment.