Commentary and Guide for Councillors by Create Streets*
* Create Streets is a non-partisan social enterprise and independent research institute focusing on the built environment. We publish below commentary and their ‘How to CREATE STREETS’ guide for Councillors to provide useful background.
A 2013 IPSOS-Mori survey of London’s views on architecture and design found that when asked to rank the importance of good architecture and design on a scale of 1 to 10, 62% gave an answer between 7 and 10 and only 9% said between 1-3. Similarly, when asked to rank how important it was that ‘buildings and public space in your local area look good and work well’ 71% gave an answer between 7 and 10 and only 5% between 1 and 3.[1] A series of local studies conducted in 2008 in which approximately 37.5% of the respondents were from London corroborates this. It asked participants what factors were an ‘incentive’ in moving to their new home. ‘Good interior space’ came first (85%) followed by three purely design-based elements: ‘appealing design of home’ (83%), quality of finish of home (79%) and ‘architecture’ (76%)[2]. If design matters, what do Londoners want? Some polling as well as pricing data can provide pretty good answers. Another recent MORI survey in London was imperfect as it excluded all those aged over 64 (a group less likely to support tower block living) and included those between 16 and 18 (a group more likely to support tower block living).[3] Despite this surprising bias in a poll that was then claimed by some to represent the views of London adults the results were still clear cut. Only 27% of those polled would be ‘happy living in a tall building.’ In contrast 56% would not be happy. The desire not to live in a tall building was also more strongly held. 29% felt strongly about not living in a tower block. Only 10% felt strongly about wanting to live in one.[4] This survey was corroborated by a YouGov poll which found that only 33% of Londoners supported more high rise residential towers.[5] |
Londoners prefer not just more human scale homes but also more conventionally-designed ones. A MORI poll that Create Streets recently commissioned asked respondents what buildings they would support being built on brownfield land near where they live. This survey found that 68% of London adults supporting the building of new homes locally on brownfield land. 11% oppose it. These were slightly higher than but still very similar to the views of the wider UK public. (64% and 14% respectively). Respondents were then shown five photos illustrating different types of housing and, for each, asked if they would support or oppose the building of 10 similar style homes in their local area. Although Londoners were consistently more supportive of building than in the UK as a whole, precisely the same pattern of design preferences emerged in London as in the rest of the country. The most conventional in form, style and building materials won 79% and 77% support. Less conventional, more innovative homes won 37% and 54% support. Popular design can change minds as well. Pricing data corroborates this polling. The Halifax data is even more marked in London than in the UK as a whole reflecting the galloping market for Prime London property. ‘Traditional’ pre-1919 homes in a ‘conventional’ street format in London have risen by 1284% in price since 1983. Their more modern contemporaries have risen by half as much. Older homes are worth 50-70% more as well.[6] Meanwhile, Savills research shows how parts of London which are well-connected and in the form of high-density terraced streets and squares are more valuable, other things being equal, than areas which are not.[7] Figure i – Streets provide better long term returns |
If this polling and pricing data is correct then proposing more conventionally conceived and designed housing should prove more popular ‘on the ground’ in London. And it does. The evidence over the last decade could hardly be clearer. For example, in a 2004 survey of residents’ views about the redevelopment of the failed forty year old Packington Estate, 91 per cent of respondents wanted no development greater than 3-5 storeys, 81 per cent opposed proposals to build up to 8 storeys and 86 per cent wanted a new development to reinstate the traditional street pattern.[8] In 2007, over eighty per cent of residents of one of the iconic British multi-storey housing developments, Robin Hood Gardens, wanted them pulled down.[1] In 2007, the chairwoman of the tenants association of another London development (the Aylesbury Estate in Southwark) also scheduled for demolition and for rebuilding with more flats and multi-storey housing commented simply, ‘I’d rather live in a council house.’[2] By contrast when Housing Associations attempt to pull down more conventionally conceived and designed developments such as the Sutton Estate in Chelsea, then they are met with stiff resistance and over 350 signatures of protest with only about 25 supporters. (Of course, the economic offer to tenants, the honesty of consultation and the proposed ‘decanting’ process also play crucial roles in garnering or not garnering support).[3] In 2012, the East London Community Land Trust consulting on how to develop the site of a former hospital, St Clements, near Mile End, found a clear preference from the members for conventional houses in conventional streets.[4] In 2015, the campaigner, George Turner, fighting against the monumental proposals for the Shell Centre complained that ‘99.3% of the square in the new Shell Centre will be in near permanent shadow’ and that ‘97% of the new spaces will have only two hours of sunlight each day all year round.’[5]
Create Street’s own experience working with communities in London backs this up without exception. We consistently find strong opposition not to development per se but to the type of very large and very high buildings which is increasingly typifying too much London building and regeneration. By contrast we find strong support for more conventional street-based developments; > At a 2013 meeting in Southwark a group of largely Somali and Eritrean mothers expressed a very strong, emotionally-charged, preference for a high density conventional urban form typified by such developments as Notting Hill or New York brownstone developments over post-war housing types |
> Between 28 June and 12 July 2014, the Mount Pleasant Association asked 258 residents to compare a ‘blocks in space’ design for the Mount Pleasant site in central London with our more conventional and street-based approach. There was an almost absurdly high 99% preference for the streets-based approach backed up by many of the verbal responses we received: [6]
> In January 2015 we participated in a short study of how well community-engagement had been run for an estate regeneration for a potential funder. The process had been procedurally well-managed but had been one of what you might term responsive consultation (‘this is what we’re proposing – what do you think’) rather not true engagement (‘what do you like’). The key questions had therefore never been asked. The tenants had never been asked ‘what they liked best’ & ‘what they most wanted.’ The ‘tenant’s friend’ (paid for by the RSL) was even surprised when this issue was checked. ‘Why do you ask that?’ he asked us. The reason we asked was that the answer from tenants was a stunningly emphatic preference for traditional streets with small private gardens. ‘Terraced houses just like in the old days….the old terraced houses were fabulous….we had little yards and we’d talk over the back fences….you could pop over the road….such a strong community.’ The architect had previously said that maximising open space and river views had driven the entire design. When asked if they would trade off some of this for a more conventional urban form, the answer was ‘yes, yes, yes.’ Given the size of the estate and the densities being targeted something much closer to the apparent preference of the community would have been possible but it was clearly never even considered. It is a tale that could be repeated a hundred times.[7] > Finally, over the last six months we have helped several London communities run local polls to discern local preferences for built form in their neighbourhoods. The results are consistent with our findings in Kingston. This demonstrates with sharp clarity that high density developments can secure not just the passive acceptance but the active support of London communities. For example, in March 2015, in a survey of 147 residents near Oval. 92% wanted streets and squares of Kennington to act as a template for development and only 8% agreed that the high rise towers of Vauxhall & Nine Elms should be the template. 91% wanted any development to be 8 storeys or below. Only 9% supported development above 9 storeys Nicholas Boys Smith Create Streets, August 2015 |
* Create Streets is a non-partisan social enterprise and independent research institute focusing on the built environment.
[1] MORI (20 Sep 2013), New homes: more Londoners prioritise building quality over quantity, https://www.ipsos-mori.com/researchpublications/researcharchive/3268/New-homes-more-Londoners-prioritise-building-quality-over-quantity.aspx. Accessed August 2015.
[2] Bretherton, J., Pleace, N. (2008), Residents’ View of New Forms of High Density Affordable Living, p.20. This corroborates UK-wide research by Savills which found that the two most important issues people search for in their home are the ‘neighbourhood’ and the ‘external appearance.’
[3] If this statement seems contentious, 33 per cent of those polled aged 16-34 were ‘happy living in a tall building’ but only 17 per cent of those aged 45 – 64.
[4] MORI (27 March 2014), High rise in the capital: Londoners split on merits of more tall buildings, https://www.ipsos-mori.com/researchpublications/researcharchive/3361/High-rise-in-the-capital-Londoners-split-on-merits-of-more-tall-buildings.aspx. Accessed August 2015. [5] Savills (2015), Regeneration and Intensification of housing supply on Local Authority Estates in London, p.5.
[6] http://www.lloydsbankinggroup.com/media1/economic_insight/halifax_house_price_index_page.asp. Accessed December 2013.
[7] Savills Research, (2010), Development layout.
[8] Packington Estate Planning brief, Appendix 4 (2005), available at www.isllington.gov.uk accessed in December 2011. The most popular spontaneous feedback to the survey was a request to prevent any building above four storeys.
[9] Cited in Stewart, G. (2012), Robin Hood Gardens – the search for a sense of place (Wild Research), p. 16.
[10] Jean Bartlett cited on BBC news report by Jon Kelly, dated 12 July 2007. Available at www.bbc.co.uk accessed in December 2011.
[11] Neville, F., (2015), Is it right to regenerate down?. Available at www.createstreets.com This is not to suggest for a moment that design and urban form are the only issue on residents’ minds when facing regeneration. In our experience, normally as or more important are the economic offer to residents, approach to decanting and the right to return but design and type of development can and often do play a key role as well. Estate-regeneration is proven to be stressful (not surprisingly) and when economic offer is wrong, consultation is wrong, process is poorly managed no issues of design are likely to compensate – certainly not in the short to medium term. Also see Halpern and Reid, ‘Effect of unexpected demolition announcement on health of residents’, British Medical Journal 304, 1992, pp.1229-1230.
[12] Private conversation. The Guardian, 20 February 2012.
[13] www.thebattleforwaterloo.org accessed July 2015. Again this it not to suggest that urban form was the only issue George Turner was campaigning on. He was also campaigning on nature and quantity of social housing.
[14] Boys Smith et al, (2014), Mount Pleasant Circus and Fleet Valley Gardens, p. 30.
[15] As the work was undertaken as part of a client review we are not at present able to give the name of the estate.
[1] MORI (20 Sep 2013), New homes: more Londoners prioritise building quality over quantity, https://www.ipsos-mori.com/researchpublications/researcharchive/3268/New-homes-more-Londoners-prioritise-building-quality-over-quantity.aspx. Accessed August 2015.
[2] Bretherton, J., Pleace, N. (2008), Residents’ View of New Forms of High Density Affordable Living, p.20. This corroborates UK-wide research by Savills which found that the two most important issues people search for in their home are the ‘neighbourhood’ and the ‘external appearance.’
[3] If this statement seems contentious, 33 per cent of those polled aged 16-34 were ‘happy living in a tall building’ but only 17 per cent of those aged 45 – 64.
[4] MORI (27 March 2014), High rise in the capital: Londoners split on merits of more tall buildings, https://www.ipsos-mori.com/researchpublications/researcharchive/3361/High-rise-in-the-capital-Londoners-split-on-merits-of-more-tall-buildings.aspx. Accessed August 2015. [5] Savills (2015), Regeneration and Intensification of housing supply on Local Authority Estates in London, p.5.
[6] http://www.lloydsbankinggroup.com/media1/economic_insight/halifax_house_price_index_page.asp. Accessed December 2013.
[7] Savills Research, (2010), Development layout.
[8] Packington Estate Planning brief, Appendix 4 (2005), available at www.isllington.gov.uk accessed in December 2011. The most popular spontaneous feedback to the survey was a request to prevent any building above four storeys.
[9] Cited in Stewart, G. (2012), Robin Hood Gardens – the search for a sense of place (Wild Research), p. 16.
[10] Jean Bartlett cited on BBC news report by Jon Kelly, dated 12 July 2007. Available at www.bbc.co.uk accessed in December 2011.
[11] Neville, F., (2015), Is it right to regenerate down?. Available at www.createstreets.com This is not to suggest for a moment that design and urban form are the only issue on residents’ minds when facing regeneration. In our experience, normally as or more important are the economic offer to residents, approach to decanting and the right to return but design and type of development can and often do play a key role as well. Estate-regeneration is proven to be stressful (not surprisingly) and when economic offer is wrong, consultation is wrong, process is poorly managed no issues of design are likely to compensate – certainly not in the short to medium term. Also see Halpern and Reid, ‘Effect of unexpected demolition announcement on health of residents’, British Medical Journal 304, 1992, pp.1229-1230.
[12] Private conversation. The Guardian, 20 February 2012.
[13] www.thebattleforwaterloo.org accessed July 2015. Again this it not to suggest that urban form was the only issue George Turner was campaigning on. He was also campaigning on nature and quantity of social housing.
[14] Boys Smith et al, (2014), Mount Pleasant Circus and Fleet Valley Gardens, p. 30.
[15] As the work was undertaken as part of a client review we are not at present able to give the name of the estate.