Perspectives on Spatial Planning and Development - 190219855 Spatial Development Challenges in Manchester
1.1 The City
1.2 The City Centre
Greater Manchester is one of the largest metropolitan areas in the United Kingdom and is built up of ten boroughs as well as both the cities of Manchester and Salford (GMCA, 2019). These boroughs can be seen in figure 1. In 2019, Greater Manchester has a population of 2,812,569, which has risen from 2,685,386 since 2011 (City Population, 2019). This makes Greater Manchester the most populous urban area in the UK after Greater London (Demographia, 2019). The city covers roughly 500 square miles and the boundaries stretch from the west of the Peak District to the east of Merseyside and from the county of Cheshire in the south of the city to Lancashire in the North (Tameside Council, 2019).
Manchester city centre can be described as the area situated within the inner city ring road, also partially known as the Mancunian Way. However, due to a large and continuous growth in population, this area has begun to expand past this boundary, as seen in figure 2. Manchester City Council’s in-house forecasting model states that the population was 566,650 in 2018 and 575,400 by mid-2019 (Manchester City Council, 2019).
Figure 2: Manchester City Centre region (Manchester City Council, 2019)
1.3 Population Growth Figure 1: A map showing the boundary of Greater Manchester (City Population, 2019)
The increase in population can be seen as a result of continuous economic growth in the region, which in turn has led to an increase in
well-presented accommodation and leisure activities across the city. The economy of Manchester is larger than the economy of Wales and Northern Ireland (GMCA, 2019). These factors have led to a sharp incline in students, recent graduates and young professionals moving to the city centre, as seen in figure 3 (Manchester City Council, 2019). The amount of residents aged 20-40 in Manchester City Centre is significantly higher than the England average, whilst 40 and above is below, due to families residing in suburbs within the wider region. However, economic growth across the city has been uneven with Trafford and Stockport growing whilst Rochdale and Oldham lag behind (The University of Manchester, 2017).
Manchester has a population density of 43.6 people per hectare, making it the second most densely populated city in the country (UK Census Data, 2019). As a result of this, there is a distinct lack of public green spaces in the city centre. 1.4 Health In 2016, Manchester became the first city in the UK to be given control over its health and social care services. One of its biggest issues is life expectancy. Whilst life expectancy in general is on a rise, the city is in the top ten areas in the UK with the lowest life expectancy and the gap between the cities most deprived and thriving areas is growing. The difference in expectancy between Timperley (affluent) and Rochdale (underprivileged) is 8.6 years, as seen in figure 4. (Purdam, 2017).
Figure 4: The life expectancy across the city, depicted on the Metrolink routes (Purdam, 2017)
2.1 Affordable Housing Figure 3: Population pyramid of Manchester City Centre (Manchester City Council, 2019)
Whilst the city centre is seeing a large increase in the housing market, the proportion of affordable housing available is shockingly below
government expectations. Between 2016 and 2018, 14,667 new homes were given planning permission, however none of these are categorised as affordable. Where as in Birmingham and Newcastle, 14% and 18.7% of new properties are affordable (Pidd, 2018). Developers often submit viability appraisals once the development is underway stating that the project would be unprofitable if affordable housing was to be provided, leaving planners with no option as building work is already underway (Pidd, 2018). This has led to more than 80,000 people across Manchester waiting for social housing, whilst there are only 2000 affordable properties being built each year (Housing the Powerhouse, 2018) As well as the affordable housing crisis pushing existing residents out of their local areas, Manchester is also facing a large homelessness issue which has grown rapidly over the past five years, coinciding with the economic growth in the area and increase in housing costs. There are currently 5564 homeless people in Greater Manchester and this doesn’t include people who are ‘sofa surfing’ or living with friends and family. On top of this, 1 out of 62 households in Greater Manchester are at risk of eviction as they cannot afford their monthly rent or mortgage repayments due to price increases (Greater Manchester Together, 2019). 2.2 Lack of Green Spaces A planning issue which has arisen in the city centre is the distinct lack of green spaces; whether these be parks, playing fields/playgrounds, tree lined streets or flowerbeds. Whilst the city as a whole has a relatively high proportion of green space, the city centre is lacking this privilege. Greater Manchester has green spaces covering 16.9% of the city, putting it in the top 5 of UK cities for green spaces (Hunt, 2019). The city centre has far fewer green areas, which can be seen in figure 5.
Figure 5: Showing the quantity of parks across different areas of the city (Manchester City Council, 2009)
This issue has arisen as a result of rapid expansion during the growth of the industrialising city in the 1800s, when developers put profit before aesthetics and before the physical and mental benefits of city centre parks were understood. Green spaces amongst residential and business areas have been proven to reduce stress, anxiety, depression and the exposure to harmful levels of air pollution (Dadvand, et al., 2016). Furthermore, when open spaces became available as a result of the Second World War bombings, there was an overwhelming want for reconstruction and there was no funding for new public parks during this process, meaning all open spaces were re-built on (King, 2018). This continues today with more than £15million being cut from green space funding between 2016 and 2018 (Unison, 2018). As a result of this economic process, as well as investors being reluctant to spend on green spaces due to lack of profit return, there has been a need for provision of green spaces in the city centre for a number of decades. 2.3 Environmental Issues
As a result of an increase in traffic as well as heavily polluting buildings, the level of air pollution in Manchester has risen to dangerous levels in recent years. The economic cost of the poor air quality in Manchester is ÂŁ1billion a year, with central Manchester having the highest hospital admissions in the UK each year for pollution related illnesses such as asthma, whilst North Manchester was second (Taylor, 2018).
Figure 6: Red dots show where nitrogen dioxide levels are illegal, whilst orange shows areas where levels are extremely high (Williams & Cox, 2018)
Such illegal levels of nitrogen dioxide have arisen in the city as a result of poor transport planning and a delay in the introduction of electric buses, electric car charging points and a chargeable clean air zone for polluting vehicles as well as other factors (CleanairGM, 2019). Over 150 roads have illegal levels and are almost all in the most economically deprived areas of the city, linking to the fact that the difference in life expectancy between the most and least deprived areas is 8.6 years (Purdam, 2017).
These levels lead to 1200 premature deaths in Greater Manchester annually. Whilst road traffic accounts for 80% of emissions, the other 20% comes from buildings in the region which is worsened by tall buildings which “lock in� and direct the flow of these gases through wind tunnels (Williams & Cox, 2018).
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https://www.unison.org.uk/news/2018/06/budget-cuts-putparks-need-urgent-attention/ Williams, J., & Cox, C. (2018, October 24). The map that shows the 152 Greater Manchester roads with killer levels of air pollution. Retrieved from Manchester Evening News: https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greatermanchester-news/greater-manchester-pollution-chargingzones-15319275