The Borough Council covers an area of about 245 square miles, the vast majority of which is countryside. About 80 square miles is designated the North Wessex Downs Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB). The borough embraces a diverse pattern of landscapes, including rolling chalk downland, pastoral river valleys, historic parkland, remnants of ancient forests and intimate mosaics of lowland farmland and woodland, with a scattering of farms, villages and hamlets, and a few larger settlements including Basingstoke.These areas are divided into 20 distinct landscape character areas which are described in detail in the Landscape Assessment. This document also assesses the character of the towns and larger villages.
The Council has in place a strategy and action plan for dealing with landscape and biodiversity issues set out in the document Living Landscapes. This is backed up by a series of more specialist documents: the Tree Policy, Trees and Development, and Countryside Design Summary.
In addition to this, The Council acts as a coordinator for the Natural Environment Forum, a Network Partner of the Basingstoke and Deane Local Strategic Partnership (LSP). Membership of the forum comes from a wide range of environmental organisations and interests, and is represented on the LSP Board.
To supplement this, the Council supports a range of landscape and biodiversity partnership initiatives within the borough such as:
- A project officer for the Loddon and Eversley Heritage Area Initiative;
- The Hampshire Biodiversity Partnership;
- The Hampshire Biodiversity Information Centre;
- The Tree Wardens Scheme; and
- Community and specialist advisory etc groups, the Farming and Wildlife Advisory Group (FWAG) and Hampshire Wildlife Trust.
Details of the town's local parks and conservation opportunities, as well as local groups, are also available.
The Council’s landscape architects are extensively involved in the planning process, from site selection stage for the Local Plan through to approval of detailed landscape designs for particular developments, all with a view to achieving the most suitable solution for the landscape and countryside environment.