irishboyinlondon

Gehl Architects on the proposed introduction of congestion charging for Copenhagen: If the Betalingsring is the answer, then what was the question again?

Picture: Gehl Architects - Ways to add quality to the design of town centres

The problems that the Betalingsring is trying to solve originate not in our city centre but in our suburbs, we need to improve the quality of the town centers that comprise Copenhagen metropolitan region ensuring they are walkable, bike-able and provide everyday amenities. We need to improve connections and accessibility between these town centers and into the centre of Copenhagen. We need broad investment in a variety of transit options from car-sharing to public transit to ensure high quality alternatives and most importantly we need to consider the suburbs and promote medium density and quality housing. We want a city that works in the center and at the edges…

.…We aim to shift the discussion from mere political grandstanding to what ought to be the key question; how do we achieve good quality of life for all Copenhageners, a question which we all need to take seriously and responsibility for achieving. Improving quality of life and making a better city for our shared future is about more than charging motorists to drive into the centre. It should be visionary, ambitious and holistic in approach…

….Just as we have made our city centre walkable, bike-able and attractive – this should be applied more widely creating towns that provide everyday amenities. In our experience with working in transit hubs in both Gothenburg and Skåne, improving the quality within 1km of the transit hubs including park and ride schemes, reliable wifi connections that support working while commuting and other initiatives that improve convenience can greatly increase the attractiveness of public transport and really affect people’s transit choices.

01/24/12

Cool inspiring video by the City of Portland. Taking inspiration from some of the best cities in the world, Portland is delivering road space that can be safely used by all road users.

Listen up @MayorOfLondon…Portland is getting bikes and cars where they need to go safely and efficiently!

plantedcity:

Bikes in the City: ‘On the Right Track’

From Vimeo:

Catherine Ciarlo, Transportation Policy Director in the Office of Mayor Sam Adams in Portland, Oregon, explains how cycle tracks and buffered bike lanes work.

01/6/12

New Windows on Willesden Green

On my to do list for tomorrow!

New Windows on Willesden Green is one of the Mayor’s Outer London Fund projects, which is being delivered for Brent Council and Design for London by The Architecture Foundation in collaboration with Meanwhile Space and Blue Consulting. This project is an exciting opportunity to revive and improve Willesden High Road bringing positive change to the area. The project runs from October 2011 to March 2012 and will be delivered in two phases.

Picture: Meanwhile Space

01/1/12

Inside Housing: Time to roll back the Green Belt

Oh! So that’s the answer…simples! NOT! Seriously I read things like this and shudder…

12/19/11

Communities and Local Government Committee publishes report on regeneration strategy

A new report published by the DCLG on the current state of regeneration in the UK. The extract below is from the parliament website:

Ministers have no adequate strategy to address the complex problems faced by England’s most deprived communities. If further resources for regeneration are not found, there is a risk that major problems will be stored up for the future, warn MPs from the Communities and Local Government Committee in a new report…

…Launching the report of an inquiry looking closely at the Government’s approach to regeneration, Clive Betts MP, Chair of the Communities and Local Government (CLG) Committee, said:

“The Government has cut public funding for regeneration programmes dramatically and has produced no adequate ‘strategy’ for regeneration sufficient to tackle the deep-seated problems faced by our most deprived communities.

The measures identified by the Government focus overwhelmingly on the pursuit of economic growth. The Government’s measures will not attract sufficient investment for renewal into those communities where the market has failed. There is no sign that the private sector is filling the gap as public resources are being withdrawn. Indeed private investment is only likely to be attracted in partnership with public funding. Without further investment targeted at those places most in need, Ministers will store up serious social, economic and environmental problems for the future.”

..In its latest report the CLG Committee also warns that the cancellation of Housing Market Renewal Pathfinder funding had impacted profoundly upon the lives of people across the North and the Midlands…

“We saw and heard for ourselves what happens when the Government stops investing in regeneration. In Rochdale, we found row upon row of boarded up houses, the direct result of the withdrawal of Housing Market Renewal Funding. We met a family trapped in a half-abandoned street after the promise of a new home was not fulfilled.

We heard similar stories from other Pathfinder areas. People have been left stranded in appalling conditions: many are owner occupiers, often vulnerable people with no other options. The Government must act to help these people and to eradicate the blight that has been left in so many neighbourhoods,” adds Clive Betts.

…The report calls on Government to publish a national regeneration strategy that specifically targets the country’s most disadvantaged communities. This should be based upon a detailed understanding of what worked or failed in the past, incorporating lessons from places like Hulme where a successful regeneration scheme has transformed a deprived area into a thriving community.

“The City Challenge initiative, under which much of Hulme’s transformation took off, secured investment from both the public and the private sectors, encouraged high levels of community involvement, and concentrated dedicated resources upon a specific area. It addressed a full range of issues, including housing, education, employment and the quality of life.

It was also a long term, five year programme - and in the case of Hulme, regeneration continued well beyond the City Challenge period” adds Clive Betts.

The committee also calls for:

Further consideration of how Enterprise Zones could bring benefits to deprived areas, and better use to be made of public land and European funding to ensure they stimulate regeneration.

Community Budgets -pooling resources from public bodies across a given local area - to be used to generate massive efficiencies and bring in much-need private investment for regeneration

11/3/11

Start Up Street - What will you start up?

I absolutely love the ambition of this! It’s a very commendable example of using local skills, knowledge and assets to make something bigger!

Architecture+Design Scotland have launched ‘Start Up Street” in Stirling (Scotland), in response to an ideas workshop attended by the members of the local community, business owners and the Council, to examine how to generate sustainable economic activity and employment opportunities locally in Stirling.

The ‘start up street’ in Stirling is a local street that currently has 7 empty shops. They plan to use the underutilised assets to set up a hub to explore creative solutions that could stimulate and develop local enterprise and economic activity and deliver positive outcomes. To set the ball rolling the video also gives some great examples of various projects that could be launched that focus on health and well-being.

The High Street is a key element of our settlements. Its role as the central space of villages, towns and cities has been challenged by changes in the pattern of retail, of leisure, and living. In many High Streets in many settlements there are vacant and underutilised assets. In some cases the High Street is under pressure. It is an issue of concern for many, from businesses, to citizens, to investors.

Meeting the challenge of how to re-think the High Street as a central place requires creative thinking about how we make the best of what we already have. The communities in Stirling City Centre recently participated in a co-design exercise to re-think the centre of the City. The Urban Ideas Bakerybrought together citizens, officers of the Council, businesses and other stakeholders to look at how the people resources of the city and the spatial resources might be managed differently. Out of this thinking emerged an idea to re-consider King Street as a ‘start up street’, which enables business start ups, scaling of small business and curating events and activities in the public space. The proposal is to explore how people with ideas, talents and capabilities in the city can be matched with the available spaces in the city, supported by a community of interest. This idea is being tested in a prototype phase to engage a wide range of interests in exploring how the idea works, what is feasible, what is not. The objective is to use this practical method of testing the idea to develop a live project, to start small and build up a sustainable, self supporting enterprise.

The project is open to anyone with an interest in High Streets, how they work, and how they can be enhanced. This short video explains the thinking behind ‘Start Up Street’, whats involved and how you can get involved.

08/29/11

Guardian - Cycling worth £3bn a year to UK economy, says LSE study

Image: David Sillitoe -Guardian

Brilliant, exciting, ‘we told you so’ type news in the Guardian today courtesy of LSE!

In light of the fact that a ‘20% increase in cycling by 2015 would save the economy £207m in reduced traffic congestion, £71m in lower pollution levels and £52m in NHS costs’ perhaps now we might see real policy acknowledgement!

You can read the report “The British Cycling Economy” here.

Cycling generates nearly £3bn a year for the UK economy, according to a report from the London School of Economics. The figure includes £51m in revenue for British manufacturers from the 3.7m cycles sold in 2010 – a rise of 28% on 2009.

The gross cycling contribution of £2.9bn for the economy takes into account factors such as bicycle manufacturing, cycle and accessory retail and cycle-related employment.

Commissioned by the broadcaster Sky and British Cycling, the report said every cyclist in the UK has a “gross cycling product” of £233 annually.

Employing around 23,000 people, the UK cycling sector made a £500m employment contribution in 2010, including more than £100m in income tax and National Insurance contributions last year, the report said. A total of 208m cycle journeys were made in 2010, with a net addition of 1.3m more cyclists taking to their bikes compared to the previous year, bringing the total to 13m.

Of these new cyclists, half a million are now cycling regularly. New cyclists alone contributed £685m to the UK economy, with existing regular cyclists representing a total market value of £635m. The report also showed that regular cyclists take 7.4 sick days per year, compared with 8.7 sick days for non-cyclists.

It added that a 20% increase in cycling by 2015 would save the economy £207m in reduced traffic congestion, £71m in lower pollution levels and £52m in NHS costs.

Dr Alexander Grous, of the LSE, who conducted the research, said: “The good news is that structural, economic, social and health factors seem finally to have created a true step-change in the UK’s cycling scene.”

08/21/11

Hero or Villain? - David T Beers

Image: Reuters

What do do you think…hero or villain?? Is he making the world sit up and notice what is going on or is he creating havoc for nations, economies and citizens?

Some time last Friday night, someone created a Wikipedia page for David T Beers. Overdue, you might think.

Mr Beers might be the most powerful man in the world that you’ve never heard of. He is the head of sovereign ratings at Standard & Poor’s, which means that at the world’s largest credit rating agency, he is responsible for the grades it slaps on each of the world’s governments. And last Friday night, his team decided the US was no longer the risk-free AAA nation that it has been for the past 70 years. That night, Mr Beers changed the financial world….No one elected Mr Beers, and S&P’s pivotal role in financial markets has grown up only over many generations, but here he is at the centre of the debt storm engulfing the eurozone and now the US – and under fire from politicians on both sides of the Atlantic.

08/8/11

local economies close the distance between us [via yes!]

“Several years ago, a group of sociologists from the University of California-Davis followed people around as they shopped in a supermarket. They found that your chances of having a conversation with another shopper are about 1 in 10. They then tracked people at farmers’ markets and found that your odds of having a conversation in this setting are nearly 70 percent. It’s this social pleasure that I think is driving the very modest, but noteworthy, regeneration of local businesses in some communities.”

05/10/10

irishboyinlondon

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