The Island market square, Midsomer Norton

Bath and North East Somerset Council needed to transform a poorly utilised car park back into the thriving civic square it once was. Nicholas Pearson Associates was commissioned to provide complete landscape and urban design services from concept design stage through to construction support. We helped the Council and funding partners create a high-quality public space that celebrates the adjacent Grade II Listed Town Hall and would stimulate local business and community activity.

Working alongside MDA Consultants, Treeworks Environmental Practice, and Aecom, we led the design team through concept to construction stages for this sensitive heritage site. The 1,000 square metre space known as ‘The Island’ sits within the Midsomer Norton and Welton Conservation Area, bounded by the Grade II Listed Town Hall and White Hart Inn. Our task was to recreate this historic marketplace whilst improving the area for local businesses and residents.

Heritage-Led Public Realm Design Challenge

The key question was how to transform a car park dominated by highway infrastructure into a vibrant public square that would complement the heritage setting and serve diverse community functions.

The site’s complex history added layers of context. ‘The Island’ historically lay at the confluence of two River Somer spurs, long since culverted beneath the site. The culvert’s location, depth and structural integrity were initially unknown, potentially limiting where we could position new features and restricting construction depths. We needed to understand these underground constraints before developing sketch layouts that could accommodate farmers’ markets, cultural activities and civic events with some car parking in an attractive new setting.

Our Collaborative Design Leadership Approach

We worked closely with funding stakeholders, including Historic England, West of England Mayoral Combined Authority, and Midsomer Norton Town Council, throughout the initial concept design stage. In particular, we liaised closely with Historic England at the project outset to ensure that the design approaches aligned with the Highstreets Heritage Action Zone funding objectives.

Our feasibility work involved extensive collaboration with Aecom engineers to understand the culvert constraints and the influence on site layout possibilities. Preliminary investigations were essential before committing to specific design features – the underground context would dictate both surface loading limits and available construction depths.

A cornerstone of our design solution was to relocate the local access road away from the Town Hall entrance. This would allow the public space to connect directly from The Island into the Town Hall market floor, creating a more cohesive area for community functions. A significant challenge was balancing vehicle access requirements with the vision for pedestrian-friendly civic space. After liaising with local bus services, the opportunity to reposition an existing bus stop unlocked the site’s full civic potential and made a safer space.

Our design development process was communicated with concept visuals used for community engagement and construction phase communications, ensuring stakeholders could understand the planned transformation from car park to vibrant public space.

Design Solutions for Heritage Settings

Our landscape design method focused on creating spaces that would genuinely serve community needs whilst respecting the Conservation Area designation. We prepared spatially coordinated layouts that addressed the challenges of underground constraints, site access, parking and create flexible spaces for community functions, whilst celebrating the historic context.

The design process involved detailed material selection, working with Historic England and suppliers to ensure new paving would enhance  the Listed Building settings. The design included street furniture and planting schemes that would allow year-round use, supported by utilities infrastructure to facilitate regular markets and community events.

We collaborated with our subconsultant arboricultural specialists at Treeworks to ensure existing trees could be protected and retained within the scheme. The technical design development required close coordination with Aecom to balance structural loading requirements above the culvert with the requireents for market stalls, vehicles and event equipment.

Community Engagement Through Visual Communication

The work of our Visualisation team allowed clear visual communication of the proposed designs with our stakeholders. The concept visuals proved invaluable for community engagement, helping residents and businesses understand how the car park would be transformed into a space supporting cultural activities and regular markets.

We prepared planning and Listed Building application materials for works affecting the Town Hall frontage, ensuring Conservation Officers could assess and approve the proposals’ impact on the building’s setting. The submitted plans and elevations demonstrated how the hard landscape design would complement and enhance the adjacent historic architecture whilst creating fully accessible spaces for community use.

Our visualisations enabled local businesses and residents to understand how the relocated access road would improve both civic function and commercial access. The visuals were also used on commuity web pages and construction site hoardings, maintaining community engagement throughout the building phase and building anticipation for the completion of the works.

Our design communication showed how the project investment would deliver both heritage enhancement and genuine community benefit.

Successful Public Realm Transformation

The completed project delivers on all core objectives: highway redesign that reduces vehicle dominance, hard landscape that celebrates the historic Town Hall, and provides a year-round civic space supporting markets and events. Our design leadership, from concept stage through construction supervision, ensured the client’s vision was realised within budget and programme constraints.

The transformation of The Island, in partmership with B&NES Council, demonstrates how thoughtful landscape and urban design can restore historic civic function whilst meeting contemporary accessibility and safety requirements. Local businesses benefit from increased footfall during events, whilst the community gains a high-quality public space designed to enhance town centre vibrancy.

This project showcases our team’s creative thinking and attention to detail in delivering first-class public realm regeneration within sensitive heritage locations, supported by effective visual communication throughout the design and delivery process.

Please contact us to discuss how our team can help you with your next project.