three - The planning, design, and governance of sustainable communities in the UK

Summary

This chapter examines the Labour government's recent shift towards the building of sustainable communities in England and assesses the ways in which these new development blueprints define, identify, and tackle questions of security and safety. During the 2000s the discourse of the ‘urban renaissance’ has gradually given way to that of urban sustainability with its emphasis on the construction of sustainable communities or places “where people want to live and work now and in the future … [and which] are safe and inclusive, well planned, built and run, and offer equality of opportunity and good services for all” (ODPM, 2005c, p 1). The new frameworks represent an evolution in renaissance thinking by arguing that through imaginative planning, responsive forms of governance, and the physical construction of ‘inclusive’ urban environments, new places can be created in which citizens can feel secure and new forms of attractive community and neighbourhood can flourish. In the absence of security, it is argued, communities and citizens live in an atmosphere of fear and distrust. Any sense of ‘neighbourliness’ breaks down and individuals and their families become isolated units living disconnected lives despite living in spatial proximity to each other (Buonfino & Mulgan, 2006). Those who can escape such environments do, further exacerbating socioeconomic inequalities. There is a belated (although understated) recognition in the new agendas that the urban renaissance, for all its visible achievements in transforming the physical environments of Britain's cities, has failed to tackle growing social polarisation and urban insecurity.

In order to deliver on these objectives programmes have been introduced that reflect and reproduce broader trends and ways of thinking about security and spatial regeneration and renewal. There are two primary components to the new strategies. On the one hand, they draw on situational approaches in which the effective design of public places is seen as a vehicle for the reduction of crime and anti-social behaviour. They follow a long tradition in urban planning that elides criminal behaviour with the availability of criminal ‘opportunities’ and the extent to which these are opened up or reduced by the thoughtful design of urban spaces (see Atkinson and Helms's introduction to this volume, Chapter One).