Burtree Garden Village - Lead Construction Manager

Homes England’s land interest at Burtree Garden Village comprises a 122 hectare site which was acquired between March 2020 and December 2022. The land purchased forms approximately 69% of Burtree Garden Village, a wider strategic mixed use allocation located at the north-western edge of Darlington.

Homes England acquired the Freehold interest in the site by way of an assignment of an Option Agreement held by a private developer Hellens Land Limited (Hellens) who had up until this time acted as lead developer/promoter. Upon acquiring the Option Agreement from Hellens, it was a condition of the assignment by Hellens that a Collaboration Agreement was entered into between Homes England and Hellens, detailing how the parties will collaborate to obtain planning and how costs of the acquisition and planning and infrastructure works and receipts will be shared.

The wider Garden Village extends to 178 ha (440 acres) and seeks to deliver over 2,000 new homes, village centre, primary school, employment space along with an extensive and integrated blue/green network incorporating a new 10 ha (25 acre) public park. Circa. 1,600 of these new homes, 600,000 sq. ft of employment space, park, nature reserve, land identified for a new primary school, village centre and park are proposed to be accommodated on the Homes England owned land.

Whilst Homes England have been involved in this site since late 2019, Hellens have been involved since 2015. Their role was initially working with the various landowners to promote the site, followed by leading the consortium in the preparation of a masterplan along with other technical works. This work resulted in the site successfully obtaining Garden Communities status in 2019 from MHCLG (now DLUHC) just prior Homes England’s involvement.

This along with the work Hellens has undertaken to date with Homes England means that they have been working on the Burtree project for eight years and as such have detailed knowledge of the site, its complexities and the relationships between the landowners.

Since the initial acquisition in March 2020, Homes England and Hellens have worked closely with the Local Authority to agree key principles around the phasing strategy and infrastructure delivery to ensure the successful delivery of the Garden Village. This has resulted in the need for a new section of road, along with a new roundabout, drainage basins, utilities and landscaping to be constructed at the beginning of the development, prior to any homes being built.

In December 2022 Homes England secured funding to take on a master developer role by providing primary vehicular infrastructure, SUDs, pedestrian and cycle links, village centre, landscaping and central park.

Homes England’s ongoing support for the Burtree site, which is part of the Government’s Garden Communities programme, helps fulfil this wider government objective whilst also proposing to invest in the town of Darlington, supporting the levelling up agenda. The site has also been masterplanned to achieve positive outcomes in terms of design, place making, sustainability and environmental considerations, resulting in a beacon scheme for the North East demonstrating the quality of place Homes England and wider government is seeking to encourage.

The Collaboration Agreement documents the agreement between Homes England and Hellens as to how the delivery of the site will take place, how the project is to be funded and the division of risk and receipts between those parties thereafter. The Collaboration Agreement also sets out that Homes England will consider how Hellens could be involved in the future delivery of the infrastructure, which is considered a significant benefit given Hellens experience and knowledge of the project.

It is now proposed that Hellens Land Limited be directly appointed as Lead Construction Manager.