Topic 4: EQ4 Flashcards
What are economic measures?
The term regeneration indicates a long-running process rather than a quick fix to economic, social and environmental problems, despite there being economic and political pressures for speed. Events that are designed as a catalyst, such as the Olympic Games, may be successful in attracting visitors and investment; creating legacies of success, all which tackle more systemic and longstanding issues of inequality and a poor environment.
What is legacy?
This refers to the longer-term effects of a regeneration scheme; and it can be positive or negative. It is judged on the reuse of any landmark buildings which are built for an event, the amount of government support required, the level of private investment as well as whether or not local people benefit from the scheme.
Why is evidence of success difficult to quantify?
The evidence of success can be difficult to quantify because there are many variables in regeneration and it’s outcomes. Success is measured by comparisons with other areas or with past conditions. The time taken for the regeneration scheme to actually have an effect can also vary. Research on the success of Area Based Initiatives (ABIs) has been inconclusive. With an austerity focus, the government has been less involved in large-scale regeneration programmes. One exception however, is the 2012 Olympic site in London.
What are the goals of ABIs?
Living in safer, cleaner and more attractive places is likely to enable individuals to become more economically active and live more fulfilling lives long term. This is supported by the Royal Town Planning Institution (RTPI).
What is a catalyst?
This is the method used or event that starts a regeneration scheme, such as the building of a new shopping mall, leisure facilities, creation of a country park or hosting a big event.
What are area based initiatives (ABIs)?
They aim to improve selected people or places within a specific location and include educational attainment, enhancing crime prevention and reducing unemployment.
What is poverty?
Poverty is relative to the place and time that people live in. The poverty threshold used in the UK is households with an income of less than 60% of the national median, after housing costs are included.
What are the three economic measures of success we need to know?
-Employment
-Income
-Poverty
These may be both absolute and/or relative changes, both within an area and by comparison to other more ‘successful’ areas.
How can the indicator of success vary between schemes?
Schemes that involve an immediate job focus, other than the construction phase, (e,g malls and science parks) will generate a greater initial rise in income compared to schemes that are refurbishing an area of housing. Even if the regeneration offers opportunities, they may be taken from outsiders rather than from locals.
Why may income rises not always point towards a successful regeneration scheme?
If peoples incomes have risen following a regeneration scheme, it usually points to success. However, it may also depend what groups have benefited from the increase in income. If the aim of the project was targeted specifically to those in poverty, but the middle class in the area have ended up seeing larger salary rises due to the scheme, it may not be right to say the scheme was actually successful.
What does getting out of the poverty trap depend on?
In the short term it depends on household income, but in the long term it will depend more on education attainment.
What criteria must be used to assess the success of a regeneration scheme?
It must be measured by criteria over both a shorter and longer term scale, as well as both within areas and in comparison to more successful areas. Success often involved a strong brand and identity. A sense of place is important, with architecture that may help people to identify a location. The Eden project and Olympic Park are both examples of this.
What can social progress be measured by?
-Reductions in inequalities both between areas and within in.
-Improvements in social measures of deprivation
-Demographic changes: improvements in life expectancy and reductions in health deprivation.
Looking at changes in indicators before and after a regeneration scheme will help to measure its success. The IMDs health deprivation and disability domain measures the risk of premature death and impairment of quality of life through poor physical and mental health.
What are some examples of smaller regeneration schemes?
Those which work to tackle ‘food deserts’. Stores may also help to break inequality and deprivation cycles. Tesco helped to achieve this through its use of stores in the Seacroft estate in Leeds in 2000, which lead to marked improvements in local diet and health as a result.
What did the Office of National Statistics find about environmental quality in a 2012 survey?
73% of respondents mentioned the local and global environment as an important factor in well-being.
What is the local environment?
This included having access to open, green space within walking distance of home and the quality of the local area.
What is the global environment?
This includes factors such as air quality and climate change.
How does regeneration help improve the environment?
Better transport links, provision and upgrading of retail space, creation of green space, parks and public areas as well as improvements in housing. All these will work to have positive impacts on health and also draw people to come and live in the area.
General improvement in aesthetics, security and safety via neighbourhood redesign and tackling environmental stressors (graffiti, litter and noise) are also common components of regeneration schemes.
How does IMD measure the environment?
It has a domain called ‘Living Environment Deprivation’, which measures the quality of the local environment. It has two subdivisions:
Indoor- Quality of housing (structure, facilities, insulation and central heating etc)
Outdoor- Air quality, which measures the concentration of four pollutants: nitrogen dioxide, benzene, sulphur dioxide, particulates) and the number of road traffic accidents.
How does tax payers money get used in environmental provision and improvements?
They fund national environmental watchdogs and planners in order to control the levels of pollution and overall environmental quality. The environmental agency, Natural England and English Heritage all come under the umbrella of Defra (Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs). However, cuts in funding to Defra and local authorities from 2015 means that businesses, community groups and individuals will all have a much larger role to play.
What is dereliction traditionally linked with?
It is associated with ex-manufacturing areas and redundant infrastructure, such as power plants. However, unused buildings, houses, shops, and discarded discarded infrastructure are found in most places. In rural areas, redundant dairies and barns also commonly feature on the list. The Campaign to Protect Rural England is a pressure group that campaigns for the greater use of such sites for new housing, rather than building on greenfield sites. They estimated in 2014 that 1million new homes could be built on brownfield sites alone.
What is baseline data?
This information is used to compare present day characteristics with the past or other places. Examples include land use maps and photographs, as well as basic statistics.
Why should environmental regeneration schemes deserve recognition separately from ABIs?
While improving the appearance and form of the built environment and public spaces can be goals in themselves, such improvements often have significant and diverse wider social and economic multiplier benefits. They can have two main basic affects:
-They can force out locals because of unintended regeneration, as it is happening now around the Olympic site in London
-Good planning and place making has a direct impact on individuals’ lives rather than just delivering ‘gentrification’ affects, as has occurred in Glasgow, Broadwater and London.
What factors influence a perception of success of regeneration schemes?
-Media coverage
-Personal perceptions and attachment
-Personal experience of change
-Gender
-Ethnicity
-Age
-Stance towards development and change
What may affect decisions regarding a regeneration scheme?
Party policies may affect decisions and the longevity of any scheme. According to the conservative government in 2015, successful regeneration involved ‘achieving additional economic, social and environmental outcomes that would not otherwise have occurred’. It should represent ‘good value for money’. They also only saw intervention necessary if market forces failed to resolve inequities.
What are benefit-cost ratios?
This is the balance between investment and outcome. A positive ratio is desirable. These ratios were based on cost per job and cost per hectare of open space improved.
How has the main leader of regeneration schemes changed in England since 2010.
In England, unlike the rest of the UK, delivering regeneration became a local matter. The national government only has a strategic and supporting role, and has stopped monitoring spatial inequalities or setting targets. The previous government’s neighbourhood renewal programmes were cancelled or replaced by small-scale schemes to support coastal and coalfield communities. Spending on these schemes has been £32 million per year, on average, where as Labour government’s Neighbourhood Renewal fund alone cost £500 million annually.
What is the viewpoint and role of national government and planners in regeneration?
They reconcile different interests, longer term national goals take their priority. They give planning permission and pump funding to start large, nationally important developments.
What is the view and role of local councils in regeneration?
-They believe they have a duty to tackle inequality in their areas. They make local planning decisions and are supposed to balance out the economic, social and environmental needs of a locality. They give permissive arrangements (e,g for skateboarders and street performers), make spaces like ‘alcohol free zones’ and organise small, local regeneration plans.
What is the role and view point of developers in regeneration schemes?
They want to make profit. They fund schemes
What is the viewpoint and role of local businesses in regeneration?
Views may differ. Those who expect a rise in sales and customers due to regeneration will be for it, but those who expect a loss as a result of it will be against it. The local chamber of commerce will often go with the general opinion of business leaders.
Their role is to lobby councils and invest in schemes.
What is the role and viewpoint of local communities in regeneration?
The silent majority of locals will usually be represented by a few willing locals with the time and confidence to be involved in a local council or pressure group.
Their role is to lobby councils, vote for local and national political parties as well as forming pressure groups.
