Moving India
Austin Williams | November 2007 The Indian railway holds misty-eyed memories for hardened travellers, but even for those who have never ventured to the continent it symbolises both the history and mystery of that vast country. With 39, 500 miles of passenger rail – twice the length of the British rail network – India still recalls the era of steam trains, tea and tiffin. In his ‘Great Railway Bazaar’ travel writer Paul Theroux...
More than Bricks and Mortar
Dave Clements | November 2007 In a speech given at Battle of Ideas 2007, Dave Clements argues that housing has become a vehicle for contemporary prejudices, anxieties and orthodoxies about how we live. The figures … The government’s plan is to build three million homes by 2020 The annual target is to build 200,000 homes a year We are already falling short by around 30,000 a year The target will increase to 240,000 a year from 2016...
London Property Review
Austin Williams | 14 October 2007 The architects of David Cameron’s so-called eco-house predict that ‘sustainability will be the critical word in architecture over the next 20 years.’ This is undoubtedly true. The problem is that sustainability is actually going to be the death of architecture. The editor of Environmental Building News is currently promoting the idea of ‘Passive Survivability’; Nick Rosen, author of ‘How to Live...
ESSAY: The political engagement’s off
Austin Williams | October 2007 The e:petitions web page was launched on Number 10’s website in November 2006 ‘enabling anyone to address and deliver a petition directly to the Prime Minister.’ Presumably, someone thought that it would be a good wheeze to minimise the photo opportunities for aggreived members of the public to present a paper petition to the Prime Minister in full view of the waiting media. Oh well, back to the drawing...
Architects cannot save the planet
Austin Williams | 13 July 2007 In a recent public statement by the chairman of BDP, the largest firm of architects in the UK, Tony McGuirk claims that architects long for a ‘far more positive social role.’ It all sounds very caring, until you realise that in today’s parlance, a ‘positive social role’ means that architects want to interfere more. It is really a shorthand for wanting to improve the behaviour, ethics and attitudes of the...
Something Stinks
Austin Williams | 28 February 2007 I’ve just finished reading Steven Johnson’s “The Ghost Map” about London’s 19th C cholera epidemics. Until Dr John Snow located the source of the problem in the water supply, everyone believed that the killer disease has something to do with the all-pervasive stench of the city; the ‘miasma’ permeating the over-crowded slums of the city. Using painstaking empirical data backed up by meticulous...
Estates: An Intimate History
‘Estates: An Intimate History’ by Lynsey Hanley; Granta Books, 2007. 256pp Reviewed by Dave Clements | 26 February 2007 There used to be a sign on an estate I’d walk through in Hackney on my way home that read ‘No mind games’. I don’t know how long it had been there, so subtle and unassuming, but soon enough it was back to ‘No ball games’. Some pre-Banksy surrealist prankster had managed in their own small way to...
Building Esteem or Housing Discontent
Dave Clements | 27 February 2007 The government’s obsession with child poverty has always struck me as a little strange. I don’t mean to pretend it doesn’t exist. But why child poverty? Why not address poverty itself? Children are only poor because their parents are poor surely, not because they are poor parents. Perhaps by foregrounding the vulnerable child, awkward questions about how people can be so poor today in an otherwise more...
In the dark about energy policy
Alastair Donald | 14 January 2007 The Times recently carried news of an ‘innovative’ plan to save energy and beat global warming. Apparently trials in Exeter suggest that removing lights and illuminated signage, and dimming thousands of streetlamps throughout Devon will be a useful way to cut carbon emissions and beat global warming. The manner in which city lights are viewed has changed over time, and offers some interesting...
Environmental Impact Assessments: Guidance Documents
Alastair Donald | 10 January 2007 Future Cities Project respond to DCLG’s consultation paper proposals from two publications on the subject of Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) This paper responds to two publications: (i) proposed amendments to existing Circular 2/99 on EIA, and (ii) new draft EIA procedural and good practice guidance to replace the current publication “EIA Guide to Procedures”. The main changes...
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