Localism & Regional Development / 地方主義下的地方發展

In preparation for the Part 3 interview in just over a week I have been studying the Localism Bill, laid before Parliament last December and due to be enacted by the end of 2011.

The aim of the bill is to fundamentally change the English Planning System by decentralising control from Central and Regional Government to local authorities and local neighbourhoods.

The main measures of the bill can basically be summarised under the following headings:

1/ Local Government

While there are currently only a dozen elected mayors in England, the Localism Bill will give more cities the opportunity to decide whether they want a mayor. This is in my opinion hugely beneficial in terms of raising the profile of English cities and strengthening the importance of urban planning.

London for example, would not have been the same without Ken Livingstone, who appointed Richard Rogers as Chief Advisor on Architecture and Urbanism. His expertise in the field and intuitive understanding of how cities and people interact have contributed greatly to London's recent development and hence his continued role as design advisor to Boris Johnson.

2/ Communities/Individuals

The Localism Bill is aimed at giving local communities groups the right to express an interest in taking over the running of a local authority service.

In consideration of the vast number of trained architects in the country, this will better allow proactive members of the profession with good educated ideas to put them forward and drive improvement at a more local level, potentially reviving the diminishing role of the profession.

3/ Planning Reform

This is in my opinion one of the most controversial part of the bill. The bill highlights that the current planning system does not give members of the public enough influence over decisions that make a big difference to their lives, and contains proposals to make the planning system more democratic. However, a careful balance will need to be struck between democracy and development in order not to slow development and jeopardise the global status of some of England's cities.

The proposal for neighbourhood development plans would be beneficial for smaller cities and towns where the bottom-up approach can sure be applied.

4/ Social Housing

I am most in favour of this section of the bill, which exposes the fundamental flaws of the current social housing system and proposes reforms that will mean more decisions about housing are taken locally, and to make the system fairer and more effective.

Currently, social landlords are normally only able to grant liftime tenancies. As exposed on national news, this can mean that people acquire a social home at a moment of crisis in their life, and continue to live there long after their need for it has passed. 人神共憤. This is only unfair and represents a poor use of valuable public resources.

In summary of the above, I am largely in favour of what the Localism Bill promises. In connection with the issue I had highlighted in my previous post - Rioting & Urban Planning - the bill will make it easier for people to take part in the development of the their communities and hence foster a personal sense of attachment and purpose.

方皓玟《WON'T YOU STAND》

The day it all changed

                                                                                                   Upside down....

Rioting & Urban Planning / 暴亂與城市規劃

'It is a question of building which is at the root of the social unrest of today: architecture or revolution' - Vers une architecture (1923), Le Corbusier

While poverty and culture are undoubtedly amongst the underlying reasons behind the mass rioting earlier this month in the UK, I strongly believe that these events have an intimate relationship with the urban planning of our cities. Britain is not alone in this problem, and historically, cities such as Paris have been reconstructed following the 1848 revolution.

The Haussmann Plan, initiated by Napolean III in the 1860s, encompassed all aspects of urban planning, both in the centre of Paris and in the surrounding districts. Strict regulations were imposed on facades of buildings, public parks, city facilities and public monuments, to create the Paris we know today. The most relevant aspect of the plan was in the widening of streets, constructed to facilitate troop movement and prevent easy blocking of streets with barricades. The straightness of the streets eased firing on rioting crowds and their barricades, while large open street intersections allowed for easy control - obviously influenced by the city's history of street revolutions.

Is a different kind of urban development form needed in Britain's cities? Strict urban strategies have been in place in London to prevent it from sprawling like LA, yet the tensions and ignored dividing lines have been so clearly exposed in the riots.

Of course I do not believe that the Haussmann Plan approach of attempting to make our cities riot-proof is the solution to the problem, we must instead create urban environments that provide young people with more appealing opportunities to build a deep personal sense of attachment and purpose, ie. investing in the prevention of further rioting. As a start, the careful planning of shared daily infrastructures may be able to bridge and integrate lives across the class divides.

Relevant research project: Camanchaca Fog Harvester (2009) - an investigation into infrastructure as a means of bridging social divides in the city of Iquique, Chile.