Will the new towns programme fall at its first major hurdle?
I sincerely hope not!
At Centre for Cities we've done a lot of thinking about where it makes sense for public sector intervention to get large-scale building happening, and Crews Hill ticks all the boxes as far as we can see.
And London has Temporary Accommodation crisis. If there is any hope of getting numbers in TA down, opportunities for land value capture (non-grant funded) social housing simply cannot be passed up.
Down to the Mayor and housing minister to be bold and make sure it happens now
...because these postwar neighbourhoods are much less dense than the places around them
If the big cities are to close the density gap to their international peers, it is these postwar neighbourhoods in particular that will need to densify
I had a lot of fun making the graphics for this one!
As you can see, we identify a clear post-war 'collar' (blues) around the city centres of cities like Manchester and Birmingham
This matters because... (chart below)
My colleague @mauricelange.bsky.social on why @london.gov.uk should intervene to make sure Crews Hill new town goes ahead
www.centreforcities.org/blog/the-lon...
Click on the blog to explore the data for each of the big cities yourself
And read all our work on housing density on the CfC website :)
@mauricelange.bsky.social is one of the speakers - going into the details of how Croydon allowed anyone to convert houses into flats, and where else a similar scheme woudl work to increase amount of housing.
The final Land Talks of the season is the week after next!
The full lineup of speakers is up, and is too varied to compress into this post. Everything from co-ops and buyouts to freeing planning and land-value capture.
Get your ticket here, if you're near London:
luma.com/hkyckwm8