ADAPTABLE UTOPIA -
Enchancing Vitality in New Towns
Dan Maguire
front cover photo credit : @newtownutopia
ABSTRACT The ongoing housing crisis in the United Kingdom shows little sign of stalling. Multiple arms of local governance are experimenting and implementing various ambitious plans in an attempt to solve the issue. There is an increasing focus upon building new communities or planned suburbs to help alleviate stress on the housing market with little attention being paid to already existing communities. This situation provides scope to investigating the omittance of former planned communities from the governments plans to provide the public with the opportunity to live, work and play. In response to this, the paper aims to investigate the current liveability of the existing British New Towns and the lifelihood of the population within their boundaries. The focus is upon Stevenage - the first designated New Town - and its founding principles. The essay outlines the requirement to adapt the original design characteristics imposed during planning and construction in the 1960’s to enhance the New Town’s urban realm. Alongside this, in order to fully prepare existing communities for modern and future living, I argue for the inclusion of new ideologies based on founding princples of new and existing communities within Britain and abroad, including EcoTowns and Garden Cities. The original design ideologies were purely a systematic checklist for creating a new community, I argue that to appropriately respond to an existing township the proposal framework must include views, values and habits of the existing population. The potential implementation of this new framework will be examined in conjunction with first-hand testaments and observations of the existing urban fabric and public values. The research methods utilised are adapted from theories tested and utilisied by Jan Gehl, Kevin Lynch and Jane Jacobs among others. The results of these investigations conclude a potential methodology for regenerating the existing communities of the New Town through emphasizing the inclusion of observing the existing users sociability and interaction with their public realm. Relating the narrative approach taken to study the public realm and the findings of these studies based upon Stevenage, with the proposals for an adpated framework this paper will provide the platform for regenerating an existing community with ambitions and the characteristics of a highly sought-after place to live, work and play, synonomous with the New Towns programme at their time of inception.
CONTENTS
Introduction pg. 6 Introducing Stevenage pg. 9
[Section One] Adapting the Ideologies pg.13 Conclusions pg.22
[Section Two] Methodologies pg.25
[Section Three] The Holistic Approach pg.27 Conclusions pg.36
[Section Four] Liveability + Vitality pg.39
Bibliography pg.40 List of Illustrations pg.43
INTRODUCTION The population crisis in post-war Britain provoked a radical response from the planning committees across the country to decant nearly half a million inhabitants out of the inner-city slums and towards the suburbs of London into the ambitious planned ‘New Towns’ scattered around the capital. The 1946 New Towns Act provided the apparatus, employing large development corporations to kickstart the planning of these ambitious projects. The large migration required a multitude of complex schemes to realise the projects. As time progressed and the plans gained momentum, inevitably, so did the opposition of the existing communities that lived within the designated construction sites. This did not, however, deter potential residents from relocating to the various new towns. The large amount of varied housing provided by the councils, prominently all of which was social housing (Municipal Dreams, 2013) resulted with a mixed community of all classes, races and backgrounds flooding towards the first designated new town, Stevenage. For the most part this was due to the overwhelming need for housing and all the perks that came with the new town developments; private gardens, improved transport links and indoor plumbing (Osborn + Whittick, 1963). The enforced relocation of the populace to the new towns caused an upheaval of social support networks that the pioneering population had built up over their lives. The New Town Development Corporations (NTDCs) which were responsible for building and sustaining the first wave of new towns in the 1950s and 60s combated this by providing welcoming packs and assigning each new resident a social development officer. This along with the voluntary social groups for sport, literature or art contributed to a strong, balanced community. The romance that surrounded the initial youth of the new towns was short lived due to a shift in focus by governance to the regeneration of the inner-city areas of major industrial cities throughout the United Kingdom. This resulted in a lack of funding for various civic and social projects, buildings and campaigns. The brutalist architecture conceived when creating New Towns also fell out of favour during the 70’s and 80’s with the rejection of modernism within the construction industry. This resulted in more technologically advanced projects - and the investments that came with them - to be located elsewhere. The 1980’s Thatcher government further invigorated the issue by facilitating the sale of publicly owned land and assets, and dispersing various branches of local housing associations, to pay for new policy proposals disassociated with the New Towns such as inner-city regeneration (TCPA, 2014).
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There are however, new concepts being pushed by modern policy makers in the construction and regeneration of new communities. This can be seen in multiple local authority schemes throughout the UK with many authorities pushing for growth through their Local Plan to curtail the modern housing crisis. This is evident through multiple policy makers encouraging the development and construction of Eco-Towns, new wave garden villages, towns and cities (Henderson, Lock + Ellis, 2017). Unfortunately, this cannot be the only solution to solving an ongoing housing problem throughout the UK and we must begin considering alternative means to house the population. The viability of regenerating existing communities such as the ‘New Towns’ should be one of the many options on the table. There has, however, been a reluctance to act on behalf of regenerating New Towns from policy advisors due to their apparent lack of relevance to contemporary spatial planning policies, summarised in this interview from a Homes and Communities Agency representative attested to by Dr Helena Rivera: “The New Towns programme depends, really, on national government. Identifying what they see as a suitable location for development and designating land for that purpose in a particular locality and then purchasing that land at present use value- and then using the uplift in value that accrued from the fact that it’s now a site for development as opposed to arable land or whatever it was previously partly as a means of delivering the infrastructure necessarily to support a settlement. Now, if you have an overriding policy objective [of Localism] that localities themselves need to take responsibilities for growth and development then you can’t really use the New Towns model in any way” (Rivera, 2015) Rivera goes on to argue that this is an illustration of why we – as a policy driven vocation – never learn and that there is a wealth of evidence available to be gained from the new towns growth in understanding how to foster new and enhance existing communities. This paper is not intended to argue the case for more pressing regeneration needs throughout the country, nor to suggest viable ways of improving the housing situation. It means to examine the case for modification to the existing thirty-two new towns to promote their ability to function as a more self-sufficient community. It intends to divulge possible evidence for the potential regeneration of new towns through their key ideologies and how we can utilise and tweak these in the modern era to help repurpose and expand the new town populace.
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figure 1 - locations of the mark one new towns surrounding London - Stevenage is highlighted.
figure 2 - Stevenage urban realm
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INTRODUCING STEVENAGE To compliment the literature review surrounding the birth and growth of New Towns I intend to focus on the first designated Mark I town of Stevenage. The town is located 30 miles north of London and is home to over 80,000 people (Figures 1-4). After its classification by Clement Attlee’s new Labour government in 1946, the town grew tenfold in the space of a single decade. Like other new towns the community grew quickly, supported by the abundance of activity and social groups available within its boundaries. The variety of social activities dwindled as the devolution of the development corporations that ran many of the new towns were forced to sell off their assets and land. Stevenage’s corporation was one of the less fortunate public groups amongst the thirty-two, having to sell their assets to central government only for those funds to be placed into other more deprived areas of the United Kingdom at the time (Rivera, 2015). There has since been a lack of public funding within the new town with multiple social and civic groups disbanding over the resulting 30 years since the tap was turned off. There has been an active attitude by policy makers to redevelop Stevenage since the turn of the millennium. The most recent designs – by BDP Architects - proposes a £250 million redevelopment of Stevenage’s pedestrianised town centre and leisure park (Architect’s Journal, 2012). The scheme includes all the varied services one would expect to find in any town across Britain with various shopping units, restaurants, offices, infrastructure hubs and new leisure facilities all dotted between existing structures. But in the fifteen years since the publication of the first proposed redevelopment masterplan, more shops have closed, more offices have been vacated, and fewer people are using the town centre. The promised progress and enhanced urban realm remains an illusion. This paper aims to address the utopian idea of New Towns and the original policies and principles that conceptualised and guided their physical construction. More specifically I intend to look at the aftermath and current vilification the New Towns suffer in the architectural community and propose a new set of criteria to analyse why New Towns have this associated stigma. This proposed set of principles will endeavour to recover the atmosphere of optimism, innovation and ambition that pioneered the New Towns into existence. Accompanying this will be an assessment of significance of Stevenage that will contain views and synopses from the current population in order to investigate their impressions of their existing community. Preceding this will be an indepth analysis on the original design characteristics and approaches synonymous with the New Town agenda.
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figure 3 - Stevenage urban realm
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figure 4 - Stevenage urban realm
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figure 5 - public space located within the boundary of Stevenage, the town centre is highlighted. scale 1 : 40 000
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SECTION ONE : ADAPTING THE IDEOLOGIES The New Town’s philosophies were derived from the original proposals by Ebenezer Howard’s (1902) Garden Cities of To-morrow in which he sets out rules of engagement for building a new community. The borrowed and modernised concepts utilised in designing and implementing the Mark I New Towns involved the creation of neighbourhood units. These units were an attempt to restore the lost sense of all community spirit that plagued the larger towns and cities of Britain in the post war years (Willmott, 1962). There was also an emphasis put on pedestrian friendly centres and an ease of movement throughout the town, enhanced by the alternative number of routes residents can take to travel around the town either by bicycle, vehicle or on foot. These networks were supported by an integrated green infrastructural network that floods into the town from the neighbouring countryside, providing each district with copious amount of public parkland. The design intentions mentioned above – along with others such as, low density housing, zoning of industrial and residential areas and an ambitious attempt at innovative architecture and design - could be seen in most of the new town sites across the UK. I will be analysing each specific design ideology proposed for the original new towns and conclude the adaptations required to regenerate Stevenage to a viable, sought-after town to live in once again. Initially all the fundamental concepts fostered a bright, innovative and modern place to live, testified by multiple residents throughout the early years of Stevenage. “People who moved to Stevenage…wanted no more than the basic right of a home of their own …somewhere to live and to bring up their children in a decent environment.” (Kynaston, 2009). The original residents of Stevenage welcomed the ambitious programme and embraced the challenge of pioneering a new community. As mentioned earlier, the primary populace were supported by NTDCs through social development officers, welcome packs, optional leisure and sports clubs and much more. These measures have been argued by some to have generated social clusters and therefore induced a greater sense of social conformity upon the original residents (Hornsey, 2008). However, I argue that the multiple avenues available for social activities and gatherings not only promoted a balanced community but helped enliven the public spaces spread throughout the new towns whether they were voluntary or otherwise. The amount of public spaces still available to New Town residents varies depending on the location. Stevenage for example still has a large amount of its urban realm dedicated to public use (Figure 5), although most of the public space is located outside the town centre’s designated boundary. This was not always the case. When the NTDCs were wound up, most development corporations had no choice but to sell their assets off privately due to the lack of time afforded to devolve the programme into multiple private sector driven models. NTDCs such as those at Milton Keynes and Peterborough anticipated the political change and moved most of their land into community land trusts. These public spaces still
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figure 6 - Stevenage town square.
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exist today and the available land still generates funds to regenerate and supplement public activities, architecture and open space within the towns (Henderson, Lock + Ellis, 2017). In towns like Stevenage most public land was sold off to generate payments for the Treasury and the impact of a lack of funding is visible in the public squares of Stevenage today (Figure 6). The lack of stewardship on these squares has resulted in the run-down aesthetic and the decaying materials, paving and shopfronts require consistent upkeep in order to improve public activity. On the contrary, the neighbourhood units in Stevenage are run by public bodies and are regarded by residents as being highly successful as a social centre. “The neighbourhood is a useful way of relating individuals to each other at a point closer to them, through a more readily understood natural interest, than at the more impersonal and sophisticated level of the town itself.” (Taylor, Keeble & Thomas, 1960). There are certain reasons that these smaller neighbourhood units could be considered communities in their own right with various shops, public houses and civic features still drawing activity from the nearby populace (Clapson,1998). The ongoing housing crisis is a constant reminder to continue building homes but more urgently needed are livelihoods people wish to buy into. Networks of social cities or suburbs around a central core has been a concept used throughout recent planning history that appears to benefit the growth of a community, these range from the early Garden Cities to modern Eco-Towns. Regardless, neighbourhood units have come in for much criticism from policy-makers and architectural scholars, where it has been argued that neighbourhood cohesiveness came at the expense of town cohesiveness (Pitt, 1959). This was exaggerated further by multiple critics suggesting that the mixing of social classes is too idealistic and that the neighbourhood unit itself is superficial due to the forced interactions perpetuated by the development corporations (Kuper, 1953; Willmott, 1962). There has also been a tendency to generalise the social mixes within the neighbourhood units of the new towns: “Instead, to attract professional classes in particular development, corporations ended up providing specific neighbourhoods for these social groups” (Willett, 2011). This was contested in the town of Stevenage by actual residents insisting that “there was no sense of incongruity in Stevenage between being a young professional and living in social housing” (Younge, 2012). These statements are remedied by the social rented housing stock numbers which remain at a healthy 30% of the total number of homes available – similar to that of Milton Keynes (Stevenage Borough Council, 2007). One of the more controversial New Town ideas was that of self-containment. The original masterplan intended that all residents of Stevenage held jobs within the town and that certain housing would be subsidized for those residents that were employed in the New Town. This was another attempt at catalysing the intended mixing of classes within each neighbourhood unit (Willett, 2011). As mentioned above, the mixing of classes did and still does occur across Stevenage’s neighbourhoods, but
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figure 7 - neighbouhood units from top to bottom: Marymead, Braodwater - Peartree, Shephall - Bedwell source : ourstevenage.org.uk
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due in part to globalisation and modern infrastructure many people commute in and out of Stevenage daily. Irrespective of this, Stevenage still has a net gain in migration in terms of employment (Nathaniel Lichfield and Partners, 2013). The wide range of professional, blue collar and unskilled jobs provided within the confines of the town help sustain a balanced community and awaken the social cluster of activity around each neighbourhood unit: “The people have had well-paid regular jobs in the factories and this has conduced to producing a feeling of contentment. It has enabled them to furnish their homes well, to acquire televisions, cars and domestic gadgets…” (Osborn & Whittick, 1963). Although this is a testament from the past, the fact that Stevenage has built six more neighbourhoods (with more planned) since the original construction shows that they are a successful and holistic way of expanding the town’s population without relying on self-containment. This is supported by the current employment statistics available which illustrate that the mixture of classes is evident in the wide variety of jobs in supply and demand at differing skills levels within Stevenage (NLP, 2013). All the above helped strengthen the neighbourhood districts in terms of place making, the public spaces that have remained a vital hub to the centre of each district and the ease of movement throughout these neighbourhoods have become more efficient with the organic growth outwards from their core. This has also been helped by smart investment in public transport and cycle networks, but has come at a detriment to the town centre. The spaces within the town centre lack the similar attentive place making details that promote the neighbourhood units as inclusive hubs. For instance, each unit has a distinctive colour, this is displayed on signs and located on all the wayfinding routes throughout the town. To add to this, each original district’s housing and main hub has its own unique architectural style (Figure 7) and each district has a large amount of public space afforded to it to encourage user interaction (Figure 5). The public spaces located within the designated town centre are minimal and are in urgent need of upkeep, regeneration and modernisation. Alongside this, the spaces within the town centre have fallen victim to a lack of diversity or a “duplication of the most profitable use…undermining the base of [their] own attraction” (Jacobs, 1962) where private investments have been replicated, as shown by the monotonous functions across the centre (section three studies this in more detail). As long as local governance struggle to find the funding for these crucial areas of the public realm, private sector investors and businesses will dictate the land use within the centre (Figure 9). The decreasing vitality of the New Town’s centre only exacerbates the frequency of users within it and the complete absence of varying activities has created a void within the supposed heart of the town. This lack of ‘things to do’ is potentially down to the inability to maintain and enhance vital community infrastructure. Since the designation of Stevenage over fifty years ago, there have been multiple closures of public houses, dance halls, ice skating rinks, bowling alleys, public cinemas, pool and snooker halls, various social clubs and garden centres have all been vacated and have yet to be replaced or restored (Figure 8).
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1966
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2017
figure 8 - masterplan comparison scale 1 : 5000
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figure 9 - public + private space within the town centre scale 1 : 5000
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The importance of these functions is highlighted by Clapson (1998) in that although the neighbourhood units created a ‘suburban neurosis’ forming much smaller prouder communities, the growth of the service industries and the multitude of leisure activities available, working class sociability was expressed in other aspects besides standard neighbourliness. Without these functions within the designated town centre, residents drove elsewhere to shop and play (Alexander, 2009) and therefore this sociability is limited to the districts housing the residents and neglected within the town centre itself. This is completely against the ‘self-containment’ principled by the New Towns. I don’t believe reverting to a self-containment model would work – nor did it work in the first place - as every place has a flow of people in and out of it for various reasons. Discussed earlier were the statistics surrounding Stevenage’s net migration and employment rates, both of which were in line with national averages (Nathaniel Lichfield and Partners, 2013). Although the infrastructural systems accommodating the migration of Stevenage’s residents and employees is at present sustainable, it may not continue to be if we manage to induce a greater activity level within the town centre through contemporary ideologies. This will be discussed later in this essay. It is obvious that the ideas and principles behind the conception of New Towns have a requirement for long-term stewardship, similar to how each small individual neighbourhood unit has retained their public governance which enables their continual function and growth. The supervision of public space within the New Towns needs to come from either a continuously publicly run system or a policy-driven private sector development company. This is evident in other built communities’ governance models working such as Letchworth Garden City’s not-for-profit Heritage Foundation and Milton Keynes’ MK Futures 2050 Commission (Milton Keynes Council, 2017) both of which plan activities, run workshops and upkeep public space within the two towns. There are new plans for contemporary communities which have borrowed, and modernised fundamental principles pioneered by NTDCs. These include moves by local governance to create Eco-Towns such as those at North West Bicester and Ebbsfleet. The principles include elements that could potentially be borrowed and implemented within regeneration schemes for the New Towns, including minimising the carbon footprint of the construction industry and the future community that lives there and an inclusion of innovative governance of new communities by including a resident’s forum (or land trust) from the conception of the project. It can also be seen in plans on the continent where there has been a real attention to the design ideologies based on the environmental impact of constructing new communities as seen in Freiburg, Germany and Malmö, Sweden (Henderson, Lock & Ellis, 2017). The key principles behind the New Towns, that were brought into realisation in all thirty-two designated communities have been implemented, morphed and modernised at varying degrees - depending on location - and are still evident in some way or another today. The interpretation to understanding how they work relies on who (or what) is governing each moving part. “The governance of New Towns is a key feature in its characterisation as an inappropriate, out-dated, administrative model” (Rivera, 2015).
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Realistically the effectiveness of the governance of public space comes down to how sustainable the public realm is. There are multiple ways to maintain the governance required, either through cooperatives, community land trusts or development trusts. The self-financing Milton Keynes Parks Trust was set up in 1992 as a development trust to retain the large number of parks, woodland and river valleys that run through the town. Its financial model is based on investments and operations in farming, letting of paddocks, leisure activities, events and the sale of sustainable construction materials (Henderson, Lock & Ellis, 2017). This system allows the community to continuously utilise and enjoy the wide array of parkland dotted throughout Milton Keynes.
ADAPTING THE IDEOLOGIES : CONCLUSION ‘It is more and more widely recognised today that there is some essential ingredient missing from artificial cities’ (Alexander, 2015). By artificial cities, Christopher Alexander is talking about cities and towns that have been deliberately created by designers and planners. As discussed hitherto the original ideologies that guided the construction of the New Towns are mostly still visible today, with the exception of ‘selfcontainment’. The town still regulates the zoning of industrial and residential premises, has a healthy stock of social housing, has retained its network of green infrastructure through the neighbourhood units and the multitude of cycle networks, footpaths and transport routes emphasise the ease of movement afforded to the residents in Stevenage. These characteristics have been the spinal narrative of this chapter and, as discussed, could all be updated and further integrated to restore the innovative architecture and design identified with the inception of the New Towns and to enhance the vitality of Stevenage. With this in mind, the essential ingredients that are missing can be identified. One of the main requirements involves the updating of governance of the public spaces within New Towns to modern capabilities, to ensure a future consistent maintenance and organic growth of the new towns centre. Another assessed feature would be to increase the capability of flow in and out of the town centre by improving infrastructural networks to accommodate a growing population and accommodate potential greater footfall to the town. This is a much-needed product for the reactivation of the centre as New Towns, Garden Cities and Eco-Towns are all part of a network of linked planned settlements (Henderson, Lock & Ellis, 2017) and therefore need a suitable framework in place. Finally, this should all come under the umbrella of design for the challenges in the modern (and future) day. A possible suggestion for the ability of New Towns to govern their own public space could be the inclusion of selfsufficient architecture. The inability to facilitate long term stewardship payments is the most common problem plaguing the New Towns, a contemporary and fundamental way of generating income for local governance is through sustainable energy output. Using the models discussed earlier in Germany and Scandinavia but also looking at organisations such as Thameswey Ltd in Woking (and its sister company in Milton Keynes), there are multiple precedents for cross-party collaboration being utilised to help generate profit for a public body.
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The suggestions throughout this paper are rooted in the sense of increasing the liveability of a place. This a crucial aspect of sustainability in small towns (Knox and Mayer, 2013). The liveability or the ease at which one navigates the space is essentially down to its sense of place. The identity within each of the neighbourhood districts can be perceived as strong, as discussed. The possible negative impact this has on the town centre has yet to be explored and will be investigated in the following chapters. To implement the proposals stated above, the existing urban fabric of Stevenage needs to be tested to validate the areas of liveability. The only way to do this is through a study of the public utilising the space. All our work as designers, policy-makers and developers must be done with people in mind. “The designer should be responsible to the users in creating socially suitable neighbourhood spaces.� (Hester, 1974). The predominant historical analysis of New Towns has been written by academic experts, proclaiming the legacy of living within them. To remedy this, a more narrative lead approach needs to be employed (Sanderson, 2003) into the views, aspirations and values of the exiting community. An investigation into rooting the community within the settlement is required to study whether there is an opportunity for increasing the livelihood of the people within the town. The next chapters will look at an objective first-person holistic approach to analysing the potential of regeneration within the New Town by considering first person perspectives of the people that live work and play within its boundaries.
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figure 10 - Stevenage urban realm
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SECTION TWO : METHODOLOGIES Before embarking upon the narrative assessment of Stevenage’s urban realm (Figure 10) and it’s user interaction, I would briefly like to introduce the studies undertaken and the knowledge gained from the observation and mapping studies. Using a study utilised by Jan Gehl in Life Between Buildings : Using Public Space (2011) I have analysed the urban fabric of Stevenage through observing the nature of interaction happening within the public spaces. The study categorises three activity levels; necessary, optional and social activitiesm, in theory, the more social activities occurring within a space the better the public realm suits its users. Secondly, I have used Kevin Lynch’s (1960) theory of symbolic value to ascertain which places or objects within the urban realm they class as valuable by way of navigation or through place-making. The symbolic value held within an object is intrinsic with the identify a certain area of the public realm, a design characteristic I argue is vital to the regeneration of the New Town. Thirdly, I use Jane Jacobs theory on diversity and land use to ascertain existing identifiable areas within the town centre that work, for instance where people go to shop, where they spend time in the evenings, where they go to participate in leisure activities and so on. All of these studies highlighted the voids within the urban grid emphasising the spaces which are lacking in life and activity, areas which need to attain an identity in order to facilitate a healthy public environment. The following section will highlight potential approaches and methods to analysing existing communities in order to regenerate them holistically.
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figure 11 - observation study of stevenage town centre scale 1 : 5000
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SECTION THREE : THE HOLISTIC APPROACH You can begin to understand the essence of the public realm of any town or city through a variety of different techniques and analysis. “The nature of towns and cities should be primarily the concern of those who live and work there, whose cooperation and participation is needed for the successful implementation of any urban policies” (Tibbalds, 1992, pg. 58). To fully investigate how to implement new urban design characteristics successfully we need to understand how to identify the spaces devoid of community life within the urban realm. Pierre Bourdieu’s (1990) field and habitus can be used to ascertain the certain lifestyle and ambitions communities identify with and which residents wish to possess in their daily lives. Stevenage’s original purpose was to clear out the slum-like conditions of inner cities and provide the New Town’s population with a greater quality of life. The pioneering residents relocated to Stevenage to provide themselves and their families with this virtue (Willmott, 1962). As mentioned herein, the New Towns were established with a set of principles in mind. This is demonstrated by Hardy when discussing the potential offered by the New Towns and Garden Cities, “[t]he pursuance of an ideal…is at the heart of it all” (Hardy, 2003, pg.294). The aspiration to live in Stevenage after the post-war period was enough for a large majority of the pioneers to voluntarily move there, the lifestyle of the new town utopia and the jobs promised within it were enough to draw people to move in before most of the town was even constructed. However, the effect of essentially building Stevenage in half a century forced a previously unaffiliated group of strangers to form social networks of their own. The initial residents accomplished this either through social development officers – which were supplemented through the NTDC for Stevenage - or through the creation of social clubs and sports teams to deter the ‘New Town blues’. The ‘blues’ were felt by a large percentage of residents (Willmott, 1962), diagnosed as a symptom of relocation and the loss of social support networks previously provided by family, friends and colleagues to the New Town residents. These new social networks involved the creation of “dramatic societies, arts clubs, horticultural and gardening societies, political groups, sports clubs for almost every sport, numerous women’s and youth organisations” (Osborn & Whittick, 1963) throughout the town. The abundance in variety of activities available were discussed previously and in much more depth in the last chapter, as were the reasons for their decline. This is not to say that in modern day Stevenage there is a dearth of activity across the town centre, but there are opportunities to strengthen certain nodes and places within the district. Opposite, Figure 11 illustrates an observation study of Stevenage town centre during the busy Christmas shopping period. It indicates two major centres for social activity and some spaces within the urban realm where the public optionally favour non-social activities such as people watching and where to eat or drink or wait. This adopted study (Gehl, 2011) indicates the voids within the public realm that are
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figure 12 - typology mapping of Stevenage town centre scale 1 : 5000
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lacking in any meaningful activity and where there are opportunities to insert a more substantial draw to specific areas of the town centre to increase the livelihood. The area to the West of the town square is full of necessary activity, “more or less those activities that are compulsory, going to school or to work, shopping, waiting for a bus, running errands…activities in which those involved are to a greater or lesser degree required to participate” (Gehl, 2011). One of the predominant reasons for the bare minimum of activity occurring in this space is down to the poor quality of the public realm, it only retains levels of necessary activity (as opposed to none at all) down to the promenade being the gateway to the town centre via the railway station. This is where a large chunk of the employed population filter into and out of the town for work, shopping or other activities. One of the initial design characteristics of the New Town not discussed in the first chapter is the zoning of residential and industrial areas. Although the two designated industrial areas within the town are full of large factories, small industries and offices there is a severe lack of light industry or white-collar office spaces within the curtilage of the town centre (Figure 12). The infrastructure to support the location of these businesses outside of the centre are good as there are multiple roads, cycleways and footpaths that link the industrial areas to the neighbourhood units within the town. I feel there does need to be a rethink in the lack of diversity within the town centre to boost its sustenance. “In our…cities we need all kinds of diversity, intricately mingled in mutual support. We need this, so city life can work decently and constructively…” (Jacobs, 2000). I am not simply suggesting that inserting more premises for businesses will help rejuvenate the area, but a greater variety in function would help increase the pressure of interactions within the public realm and therefore boost the liveability of the centre. “[T]he pressurised street is however not enough, there needs to be a reason for people to linger, watch and play” (Sennett, 2017): a potential way of proposing reasons for the public to interact with the public realm would be to understand its spatial and non-spatial patterns within the urban fabric. We can achieve this through investigating where people go out at night, where they work, where they eat, where they meet friends and why these places are known for these functions. Kevin Lynch (1981) discussed three branches of theory to explain the city as a spatial phenomenon and how each of these need to be intrinsically linked to define and support each other, in order to create and understand the form of a city. He interprets the narrative lead approach used through this chapter as “normative theory…a generalizable connection between human values and settlement form… or how to know a good city when you see one.” (Lynch, 1981, pg.37). He also discusses a set of values that are the primary instruments and ambitions of good city form. One of the more intriguing sets of values a city contends with are the ‘neglected values’, values which policy makers seem to interpret as dubious, unimportant or obscure. These include “the fit of environment to human biology and function, the quality of the symbolic and sensory experience of cities, or the degree of user control.” (Lynch, 1981, pg.56). We should be providing spaces within our towns and cities with desired
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old town
king george v playing fields town gardens
rail station
arts + leisure centre
leisure park
north herts college
fairlands valley park
industrial area
figure 13 - symbolic value study mapping exercise undertaken by stevenage residents sketching out the various objects within the urban realm they use to wayfind. scale 1 : 15 000
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activities that respond to the human form and stop neglecting those which fortify the habitability of our public space. Understanding the existing symbolic spaces within the town of Stevenage will help strengthen the ‘strong’ spaces within the urban fabric and identify those that need work. To ascertain the associated spaces the public value within the centre of Stevenage I conducted a short study involving sketch mapping (Figure 13). The intention of this exercise is to discover the legibility of the built environment and which spaces function in the citizen’s own view, either as a space to occupy or a way of orientating themselves about the town. This map indicates a clear barrier and an obvious inclusion of the automobile requirements within the original masterplan. Most interviewees, when prompted, were able to identify much of the pedestrianised areas within the town centre and the main public buildings that were situated within the ring road. To permeate the barrier from the adjoining neighbourhoods is simple if you arrive by bus, car, foot or cycle down to the inclusion of elevated walkways or underpasses and the large amount of car parking available in the town. There is however, a lack of activity that is outward looking from all directions emanating from the main centre, as illustrated by Figure 11. “The places that are worst of all, physically, are typically the zones directly beside the track” (Jacobs, 2000, pg.320). The boundaries of a district are typically devoid of life, as testified to by Jane Jacobs, and Stevenage’s town centre is no different despite the improved levels of permeability across the boundary. The absence of social activity can be attributed to the lack of diversity within the boundary spaces, the inessential reasons to visit the spaces or many more reasons to do with safety, access or the quality of the space itself. “If activities and people are assembled it is possible for individual events…to stimulate one another” (Gehl, 2011). There was a clear intention to place the pedestrian first when designing the town centre as over half of the external space is free from vehicular access. Therefore, much of the existing town centre can be reached on foot by any pedestrian that has permeated the ring road. The dispersal of people here is minimal, as all the entrances to shops, offices and food and drink establishments face the street. This makes it is easy to navigate and move yourself across the centre due to the traffic free zoning and the clear frontages. However, the design of the urban realm clearly has problems with concentrating people across various pockets of space within the centre of Stevenage. Assembling people and function should not be the answer to all problems associated with the public realm and should not be attempted in all circumstances due to the original intention of place-making. Every town and city must have a clear spatial pattern, a series of positive and negative spaces, solid and voids to help navigate and to ensure the urban grid is legible. The clustering of similar functions within the town was a clear design characteristic in the New Towns masterplan, enabling each individual area to have its own attributable function and its own identity. This singular function designation is argued to be a detriment to spatial performance within towns and cities.
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figure 14 - observation study of centre:mk scale 1 : 2 500
figure 15 - Stevenage arts + leisure centre
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“The diversity of city enterprises includes all degrees of size, but great variety does mean a high proportion of small elements. A lively city scene is lively largely by virtue of its enormous collection of small elements.” (Jacobs, 2000, pg.159). We do need diversity in all aspects of our daily lives to keep things interesting including our choices within the public realm, however the scale of a town can provide areas with singular functionality and still work as part of the bigger townscape. The centre:mk in Milton Keynes is a purpose built indoor shopping centre located across a large expanse of the central urban grid. It contains a multitude of shops and food and drink establishments alone. The centre opened in 1979 and has retained a high level of activity since its inception. It is perceived to have a singular function due to its designation as a shopping centre, but the variety of smaller elements that make up this space are vital to its continual function. These in turn contribute to the level of activities dispersed across the shopping centre (Figure 14). The insertion of the large shopping centre also benefits in design from its contextual setting across the grid which allows permeation through it at all intersections. The social activities available within the centre:mk are situated within the indoor plazas, they range from distinct areas for food courts to multi-functional indoor squares for performance, markets or advertisement to occur. These spaces tend to be placed at intersections of the urban grid to attract the greatest footfall of people. I am not proposing Stevenage should follow suit and build a mile-long indoor shopping centre, this is just an example where an attempt at place making by designating a singular function for a specific area allows a part of the urban fabric to function appropriately and healthily. “We need to find ways to give our urban areas this human quality or scale” (Tibbalds, 1992). This quote from Francis Tibbalds is as prevalent now as it was 25 years ago, as the analysis of the town centre through observation has identified some clear voids within the public realm that need addressing. By using Milton Keynes – perceived by policymakers to be a more successful New Town - as a comparison to Stevenage, we can understand how to implement architectural interventions that complement the more valued aspects of the urban realm. The openness of the centre:mk is a valid example that was inherently designed alongside the key New Town principles, the porosity of its form allows movement through it, the single function is zoned accordingly, and it is pedestrian friendly. On the contrary, the arts and leisure centre in Stevenage (Figure 15) denies an adequate level of activity even after it affords a minor level of permeability. “Openness can be planned, as in the flexible use of building materials, in transport technologies as minute as the automated bollard, in the porosity of monumental buildings, or in access to natural resources.” (Sennett, 2017). The fact that it is a civic building is completely ambiguous if you ignore the two large, grey signs proclaiming it to be an arts and leisure centre. The porosity afforded takes you through a dark tunnel without the ability to view any of the activity occurring within the facility. This destroys the potential sensory experience a user should have when making their way through a cultural or leisure centre. This is argued to be the detriment of modern architecture, “The inhumanity of contemporary architecture and cities can be understood as the
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figure 16 - void analysis of stevenage town centre. scale 1 : 5000
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consequence of negligence of the body and the senses…” (Pallasmaa, 2005). The inclusion of human form and sensory experience will improve the livelihood of a place and enhance the perceived identity of the urban realm within the New Town. A parameter required for building a good village, town or city is the identity it is bestowing upon its residents, workers and visitors. The coherence of place-making is projected outwards through how its portrayed by its users. Another word for this is imageability. There are multiple factors on an urban realms image “…such as social meaning of an area, its function, its history or even its name.” (Lynch, 1960, pg.46). Overlaying the field study information on typology, activity mapping and symbolic value of the residents it is easy to discern the voids of activity within the public realm (Figure 16). Void analysis shows the areas lacking with any meaningful sense of activity, the negative areas where the lack of people is apparent, or where there is a lack of identity associated with individual areas of the urban grid, these are illustrated by the white spaces opposite. These places need an injection of activity to contribute to the urban realm and increase the liveability of the town and the attributed identity of the district. Not only that, but these proposed spaces need to harness a certain capital to address some of the challenges associated with constructing a building in the modern day and the costs that come with this. To propose a legitimate intervention within the urban fabric of a New Town is possible when you undertake an analysis of the existing emotional connection and identity associated with the place. In the opening chapter it was suggested that an adaptation to the original design ideologies was a key driver in initiating regeneration in new town developments. Acknowledging this as a potential avenue for the overall regeneration of the town allows for a similar level of adaptability to be implemented within the public realm. “All but the very youngest and oldest can remodel their own settings to some degree and are to a degree responsible for their environment…” (Lynch, 1981, pg.310). Most of this essay has suggested that the approach to redeveloping New Towns should lie within the creation of positive, well designed public space. As policy-makers and designers we should be providing spaces within the urban realm to give the intended users some degree of control and choice over how they interact with their environment. “A manipulable environment is also one that increases opportunities for learning by doing, and this in itself increases creativity and control.” (Lynch, 1981, pg. 172). Allowance for adaptability within architecture has been a vital reason why many cities are lively - most city buildings other than houses are being used in ways for which they were not originally designed. Irrespective of the fact Stevenage’s history is not perceived to stretch as far back as some other historic settlements within the United Kingdom, the existing buildings within the town centre have retained their designated function since conception or have been unable to maintain their programme and have become abandoned (Figure 8). Designing in the potential for user interaction within
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the environment will fortify the identity associated within the place and therefore the structure of the urban realm. The identity and structure of a place are the aspects of form which allow us to recognise a pattern of space.
THE HOLISTIC APPROACH: CONCLUSION “No-one wants an infinitely manipulable world…place would be meaningless” (Lynch, 1981, pg.174). There is a line to be drawn however as place-making is a cornerstone ideal behind creating and sustaining a successful community. The earlier studies of symbolic value on Stevenage provide a variety of urban forms that are seen by most Stevenage’s residents as key to the legibility of their town, just as Tibbalds said: “good urban areas are legible – through landmarks, paths and nodes” (Tibbalds, 1992). To facilitate the proposed new ideals in the first chapter, the in-between spaces should be identified by some of the design characteristics and activities illustrated in this essay beforehand and should provide an identity to these spaces in terms of programme or activity. The activation of these spaces is vital to improve the livelihood of the centre, and the resistance to adaptability by many of the buildings and spaces within the town centre of Stevenage, have together resulted in the creation of out of town retail and leisure parks dispersing activity away from the proposed heart of the town. The inclusion of large place making districts within the town centre (similar to centre:mk or the theatre district in Milton Keynes) can help foster an associated identity within the larger New Towns. These place-making attempts will only improve the town’s vitality if an appropriate level of diversity and smaller elements or enterprises are included within the spaces. The urban spaces devoid of these elements within Stevenage have been identified within this chapter via observation studies and a more narrative approach to urban form than seen in other attempts to analyse town or city structure. The regeneration of a large area of a town such as a district must consider various valued areas within the boundary, and the only way to investigate this is through thoroughly studying an area to understand how the public utilise the existing space. This chapter has provided me with understanding of how to analyse the space within a district cohesively and with the users of public realm at the forefront of the investigation. The methods illustrated herein acknowledged the need for another proposed design characteristics in line with the ideologies explained within the first chapter. Alongside long-term stewardship of the public realm and selfsufficient architectural interventions, adaptable public space and environments should be implemented in order to promote place-making within existing and future communities.
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figure 17 - queensway south, stevenage
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SECTION FOUR : LIVEABILITY + VITALITY The principle design idea necessary to regenerate New Towns is to introduce a suitable long-term stewardship of public space within the urban realm. This essay has argued that the investment required to initiate the stewardship can be in the form of land trusts (communal or private sector led) like the MK Parks Trust. It can also take the form of an energy based service company, employed to produce, supply and manage the local delivery of decentralised energy to a regeneration scheme (Henderson, Lock & Ellis, 2017, pg.124) or it can be through multi-utility service companies such as Thameswey Ltd. Finally, it could come in the form of industrial societies, a firm conducting themselves as a private sector business, industry or trade (or as a cooperative) for the benefit of the community such as Letchworth Garden City Heritage Trust. However, to situate it within contemporary challenges of today’s society a suitable preference must be placed on the regeneration of a place and the associated environmental challenges that it brings. I believe it is in the best interest to increase the sustainable or environmental capital of the New Towns to fund the long term-stewardship, thereby introducing an enhanced capital and identity to an area within the new towns that has declined over the years. Also, this increased capital will attempt to ambitiously address an architectural problem in the modern era, similarly to how the introduction of the Mark I New Towns were received in post-war Britain. The self-sufficiency and sustainability of the public realm will be a welcomed advantage of adopting the environmental design characteristic. These proposals must respond contextually to the existing environment. An adaptation and not a complete overhaul to the existing and original ideologies is paramount to the future success of New Town living. Therefore these typologies need to be designed with the existing built fabric in mind and the associated value that this bestows upon the users of the public realm. “Open space might best be identified in terms of use rather than by the amount of kind of vegetation or degree of so called naturalness” (Hester, 1974). Section three discussed the potential spaces within the urban realm that could be utilised to implement the proposed ideologies for regeneration. These techniques could be used in any of the ‘artificial cities’ created by designers and policy-makers throughout the UK but only if they are fundamentally influenced by and aligned with the existing valued spaces within the proposed regeneration schemes. As mentioned at the start of this essay, the overall focus of this paper was to address the immediate urban problems within Stevenage New Town. Opportunities for implementation of the above strategies have been identified as spaces with minimal value or those reproducing insufficient activity (figure 17). The way to discern these spaces within the built fabric of a town or city have been illustrated herein. To address the requirements for prosperous architectural interventions within the urban fabric, a more in-depth site analysis needs to be undertaken.
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BIBLIOGRAPHY Stevenage Borough Council, 2007, Affordable Housing Strategy [pdf], Stevenage Borough Council, Available at: < http://www.stevenage.gov.uk/ content/15953/21310/22429/22464> [Accessed on 20.12.2017] Taylor, G. B., Keeble, L. & Thomas, W., 1960, New Towns and Neighbourhood Planning, Architecture and Building, Vol. 35, No. 4 (April, 1960) Tibbalds, F. 1992, Making people-friendly towns, London: Longman Group Town and County Planning Association (TCPA), 2014, New Towns and Garden Cities – lessons for tomorrow. Stage 1: An Introduction to the UK’s New Towns and Garden Cities, London: TCPA Willett, J. 2011, Eco Towns, Complexity and Understanding [e-book] University of Exeter, Available at: <https://pdfs.semanticscholar. org/435b/98dc7401cf1782f2aa28e599cdedd0779a52.pdf> [Accessed 20.12.2017] Willmott, P. 1962, Housing Density and Town Design in a New Town: A Pilot Study at Stevenage, The Town Planning Review, Vol. 33, No. 2 (July 1962), pp. 115-127 Younge, G. 2012, Stevenage: A Place Where You Can’t Be From, Interviewed by David Greene [radio] National Public Radio, 15 May 2012, 07:22
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LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Figure 1 – Mark I New Towns locations [drawing] Figures 2-4 - Photographs of Stevenage Town Centre [images] [photographed 4 January 2018] Figure 5 – Stevenage existing public space [drawing] Figure 6 – Stevenage Town Square [image] [photographed on 10 December 2017] Figure 7 – Stevenage neighbourhood units [images] [source : < http://www.ourstevenage.org.uk/> [Accessed 5.01.18]] Figure 8 – Stevenage town centre original + contemporary masterplans [drawing] Figure 9 – Stevenage public and private spaces [drawing] Figure 10 - Stevenage urban realm [images] [photographed 4 January 2018] Figure 11 – Stevenage observation map [drawing] Figure 12 – Stevenage town centre typology [drawing] Figure 13 – Stevenage town centre symbolic value sketch [drawing] Figure 14 – Milton Keynes centre:mk observation map [drawing] Figure 15 – Arts and leisure centre [images] [photographed on 10 December 2017] Figure 16 – Overlay of typographical, symbolic value and observation data [drawing] Figure 17 - Queensway South, Stevenage [image][photographed 4 January 2018]
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