Want to save the area? Come to our first meeting about the Conservation Area on the basis of its Social housing will take on Monday 7th October – a radical idea?
On Monday 7th October 6.15pm
A Space for us! People’s Museum Somers Town
Address: 52 Phoenix Rd NW1 1ES
A workshop held on 14th of September to celebrate the Housing Story in the centenary year of the St Pancras Housing, at St Mary’s Church, showed clear support including from author John Boughton; Micheal Parkes; urbanist Nabil Al Kinani and others from Just Space.
More videos & photos about the Museum event held around Somers Town: Centenary theatrical Housing Event here.
Comment from Micheal Parkes:
“..it is exciting to view Conservation as a radical instrument rather than a toy of the elite and / or the nimby . Remember at the very least – new development can take place in Conservation Areas as long as it enhances the special (and in the case of Somers Town it would be) “historic” character of the Area . At best, however, in Somers Town it might be used to facilitate genuine community participation in novel Social Housing / Housing Delivery Vehicles of all kinds .
So I am also including a weblink to , and an extract from , an article I wrote for the People’s Plans project in January 2023:-
WAY AHEAD?
In terms of contemporary development and regeneration, the days of people or profit are sadly a distant memory. The 1947 Town and Country Planning Act was a fundamental part of the Welfare State. The associated tax on the increase in development value conferred as a result of high value land use planning designation has long gone. Promotion of Community Development via land use planning designations and/or tax-based carrots or sticks seems unrealistic. For the foreseeable future, I suspect we are looking at planning and delivery based on people and profit.
In high-value cities such as London, a Gold Belt of gentrification, including empty investment property, surrounds and extends out from the City Centre. Yet many essential (as we saw during the Pandemic) remaining working class communities and small businesses would prefer to stay and get a slice of the action. And I think it is strongly in London’s interest that they are enabled to do so. A pragmatic / imaginative approach may be the best that can be achieved.
If the growing gap between the wealthy and powerful and the poor and powerless is to be bridged then, under the umbrella of the current Levelling–Up policy, whenever a major threat or opportunity occurs, Community Planning processes and resources should be available to working-class and ethnic minority communities as and when required. I am tempted to say that this should be mandatory. The process should be high quality and far better resourced than it is at present. Neighbourhood Planning in disadvantaged areas might present such an opportunity . In such situations, if Community Planning is to be embedded effectively in the conventional town planning and property development processes, then many of the lessons set out above need to be understood and applied. Effective partnership working and delivery vehicles, possibly along the lines of the Spitalfields model, need to be considered as and when appropriate.”