Conservation Management Plans for Major Churches
Guidance for cathedrals on Conservation Plans has existed since 2002, but there has been no such specific guidance for parish churches of comparable scale and/or significance, here called major churches for ease of reference. The Church Buildings Council (CBC) has therefore undertaken the production of this advice following on from its Guidelines on Statements of Significance and Need, produced in 2002 and revised in 2007.
This was a response to the Faculty Jurisdiction Rules 2000, which stated that parishes intending to submit a faculty application for significant changes to a listed church should prepare such Statements to accompany the application. It has since become increasingly apparent that major churches are of such complexity and significance that a Statement of Significance and Need may not be adequate. Where this is the case, the PCC or other body responsible for a church should consider producing a Conservation Management Plan (CMP). You can find the CBC guidance for a CMP here: CMP Guidance (pdf format*).
This guidance aims to help parishes to produce a useful, succinct and inexpensive document which will fulfil their needs. To illustrate this, an example CMP for the church of St Mary, Totnes (Diocese of Exeter) has been prepared by the CBC, which can be accessed here: CMP St Mary Totnes (pdf format*).
Other examples which were informed by the CBC guidance include CMPs for:
- the crypt of St Mary-le-Bow, London (the CMP is available on the church's website),
- the parish and university church of St Mary the Virgin, Oxford: CMP St Mary the Virgin Oxford (pdf format*).
*If you don't have a (free) Adobe Acrobat PDF viewer, you can get one from http://www.adobe.com/.
June 2007; January, May & June 2008
