NORFOLK & SUFFOLK BRECKS Landscape Character Assessment Page 51 Conifer plantations sliced with rides. An abrupt, changing landscape of dense blocks and sky. Page 34 The Brecks Arable Heathland Mosaic is at the core of the Brecks distinctive landscape. Page 108 Secret river valleys thread through the mosaic of heaths, plantations and farmland. BRECKS LANDSCAPE CHARACTER ASSESSMENT TABLE OF CONTENTS Page 04 Introduction Page 128 Local landscapes Context Introduction to the case studies Objectives Status Foulden Structure of the report Brettenham Brandon Page 07 Contrasting acidic and calcareous soils are Page 07 Evolution of the Mildenhall juxtaposed on the underlying Lackford landscape chalk Physical influences Human influences Page 146 The Brecks in literature Biodiversity Article reproduced by kind permission of Page 30 Landscape character the Breckland Society Landscape character overview Page 30 The Brecks Arable Structure of the landscape Heathland Mosaic is at the Annexes character assessment core of the Brecks identity Landscape type mapping at 1:25,000 Brecks Arable Heathland Mosaic Note this is provided as a separate Brecks Plantations document Low Chalk Farmland Rolling Clay Farmland Plateau Estate Farmland Settled Fen River Valleys Page 139 Brettenham’s Chalk River Valleys landscape today, explained through illustrations depicting its history 03 BREAKING NEW GROUND INTRODUCTION Introduction Context Sets the scene Purpose and timing of the study How the study should be used Status and strategic fit with other documents Structure of the report BRECKS LANDSCAPE CHARACTER ASSESSMENT INTRODUCTION Introduction Contains Ordnance Survey data © Crown copyright and database right 2013 Context Study Area (NCA 85) Study Area Buffer This landscape character assessment focuses County Boundary Castle Acre on the Brecks, a unique landscape of heaths, District Boundary conifer plantations and farmland on part of the Main Road chalk plateau in south-west Norfolk and north- Railway west Suffolk. It was commissioned in 2013 by River Narborough Swaffham the Brecks Partnership as part of the suite of Water bodies documents required for a Heritage Lottery Fund Settlement Areas bid entitled ‘Breaking New Ground’. However, Norfolk it is intended to be a stand- alone report which Watton Breckland District describes the distinctive character of the Brecks King’s Lynn & West Norfolk District and supports the positive management of the Suffolk area. Forest Heath District St. Edmundsbury District Feltwell The study area is the whole of the Brecks Cambridgeshire National Character Area (NCA 85)1, one of 159 East Cambridgeshire District Methwold such NCAs across England. The NCAs are areas that share similar landscape characteristics and which follow natural lines in the landscape Brandon rather than administrative boundaries, making Thetford them a useful framework for land management Lakenheath decisions. Objectives Mildenhall Landscape character assessment (LCA) has been developed as a means of identifying Bury St Edmunds 1 Natural England, National Character Area profile:85 - The Map 1 Brecks, 2013 The Brecks study area 0 2500 5000 10000m 05 BRECKS LANDSCAPE CHARACTER ASSESSMENT INTRODUCTION what it is that makes a landscape special and Status distinctive - its ‘sense of place’. By articulating 1. Evolution of the landscape - an overview and describing the distinctive characteristics of The study area covers parts of Norfolk, Suffolk of the physical character of the Brecks, the history different types of landscape, LCA can be used to and a (very small) part of Cambridgeshire. It falls of human settlement and the development of the inform decisions about landscape planning and within five different local planning authorities region’s distinctive land cover and biodiversity. management that can guide future change. The (LPA): aim is to conserve and enhance the distinctive 2. Landscape character – summary of landscape character that makes places like the • Kings Lynn & West Norfolk (Norfolk); existing landscape character assessments and Brecks special, counteracting forces for change • Breckland (Norfolk); description of the specific landscape typology that may otherwise erode local distinctiveness. that has been developed for the Brecks. These • Forest Heath (Suffolk); sections identify landscape elements and The twin objectives of the Brecks LCA are to: • St Edmundsbury (Suffolk); and features that are particularly sensitive to change • East Cambridgeshire (Cambridgeshire). and provide guidance for directing landscape • provide a technical assessment of the change so that it conserves and enhances area by developing landscape typologies and Each of these LPAs has its own policies covering distinctive landscape character. descriptions, with guidelines for their future environment and planning issues and this LCA management, together with appropriate digital sets out to supplement and complement these 3. Local landscapes – five case studies mapping. existing formal decision-making frameworks. which demonstrate how the Brecks LCA can It draws on the existing LCAs within the area be used to interpret landscape character and • develop a public-facing narrative (see page 31), re-interpreting the material to landscape history at a local scale. The case that tells the story of the landscape, defining provide a tailored, ‘Brecks-centric’ LCA which studies tell the story of these local landscapes, landscape areas that make sense locally and fits within the hierarchy of available landscape illustrating how the landscape has evolved with which people can associate. The intention characterisation work. The adopted LCAs will from post glacial times to the present day. They is that this narrative will help improve people’s remain the principal reference for development highlight the remnant historic features that help understanding of the Brecks, their connection to control policy, but this Brecks LCA will provide to create a strong local identity, contributing it, and thereby building their ‘sense of place’. supplementary detailed information on local layers of meaning and a sense of time-depth in landscape character and guidance for managing the landscape. The assessment and guidance will be used, change to conserve and enhance that character. outwith the Breaking New Ground project 4. The Brecks in literature -The Chairman to influence and inform land management Structure of the report of the Brecks Society explores how the decisions. landscapes of the Brecks have motivated and Following this introduction, the report is inspired writers through the centuries. subdivided into the following four sections: 06 BRECKS LANDSCAPE CHARACTER ASSESSMENT EVOLUTION OF THE LANDSCAPE Evolution of the landscape Physical influences Overview of topography, geology and soils Human influences Evolving history of the land, from prehistoric to present-day Biodiversity Land cover and the development of valuable biodiversity habitats BRECKS LANDSCAPE CHARACTER ASSESSMENT EVOLUTION OF THE LANDSCAPE Brecks geology, landform and soils Contains Ordnance Survey data © Crown copyright and database right 2013 Geological data derived from DGM50 BGS Digital data under licence DEFR IPR/139-2DY British Geological Survey. © NERC The distinctive character of the Brecks stems Study Area (NCA 85) from the underlying chalk bedrock, the effects Study Area Buffer of glaciations, which left only a thin mantle of County Boundary Castle Acre soil covering the chalk, and the freeze-thaw District Boundary conditions that occurred in the final stages of the Main Road last Ice Age. Railway River Narborough Swaffham Bedrock Water bodies Settlement Areas The Brecks lie on the broad band of chalk that Chalk Watton extends diagonally across England from the Mudstone Chilterns to north-west Norfolk. Generally Sand the chalk is upstanding as a gentle ridge, but Sand and gravel the Brecks lie on a slight depression between Sandstone Newmarket and Swaffham where the chalk Feltwell Sandstone and mudstone forms a low plateau, 15-30m above sea level. Methwold Brandon Thetford Lakenheath Mildenhall Bury St Edmunds Map 2 Geology - Bedrock 0 2500 5000 10000m 08 BRECKS LANDSCAPE CHARACTER ASSESSMENT EVOLUTION OF THE LANDSCAPE Contains Ordnance Survey data © Crown copyright and database right 2013 Study Area (NCA 85) Geological data derived from DGM50 BGS Digital data under licence DEFR IPR/139-2DY British Geological Survey. © NERC Chalk was formed around 90 million years ago Study Area Buffer from the minute calcite plates shed from marine County Boundary District Boundary organisms that accumulated in deep layers on Castle Acre the bed of a great sea. The resulting calcite ooze Main Road gradually consolidated to form rock which was Railway subsequently uplifted to form ridges. In East River Anglia, the chalk strata are inclined eastwards Narborough Swaffham Water bodies towards the North Sea, with the harder, grey Settlement Areas Lower Chalk forming the lower part of the chalk Alluvium escarpment which faces westwards over the Fen Banham Member Basin. The overlying Upper Chalk is paler and Watton Blown Sand typically contains nodules of flint, formed from Bytham Sand and Gravel the silica of sponges and microscopic marine Cover Sand Formation creatures. Happisburgh Glacigenic Feltwell Head Shaping the land Kesgrave Catchment Lowestoft Formation Methwold Nar Valley Formation The topography of the Brecks was shaped by Peat the Ice Age glaciers, particularly the Anglian R.Terrace Deposits Glaciation in which