THE LAND FETISH A Suitable Case for Dr Freud

1
THE LAND FETISHA Suitable Case for Dr Freud?

• Professor Sir Peter Hall
• UCL
• LSE Debate
• 19 June 2006

2
Where Are We Now?The Barker Challenge

• Need for massive increase in housing completions
• Will need brownfield greenfield
• Political attack by shires unholy alliance
  with cities
• The architects crusade Barcelonise our cities

3
A Continuing Issue? Brownfield, Greenfield and
the Sequential Test Housing Completions
1999, 2004
4
A Continuing Issue? Brownfield, Greenfield and
the Sequential Test
5
Housebuilding Houses v Flats1999, 2004
6
What do people want?The Survey evidence

• Home Alone (Hooper et al 1998) only 10 want a
  flat 33 wont consider a flat
• CPRE (Champion et al 1998) people want to live
  in/near country
• Hedges and Clemens (q. Breheny 1997) city
  dwellers least satisfied
• Conclusion we hate cities!

7
What do people want?MORI for CABE, 2005

• Over half the population want to live in a
  detached house
• 22 prefer a bungalow
• 14 a semi-detached house
• 7 a terraced house
• Detached house most popular choice, regardless of
  social status or ethnicity
• Period properties (Edwardian, Victorian,
  Georgian) most desirable overall 37

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Good and Bad Arguments

• Bad we must save farmland
• Good we should give people choice of access to
  public transport, shops, schools
• By public transport as well as car
• So concentrate growth around transport
  interchanges
• And raise densities there (pyramids of density)

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Land Lying Idle

• EU Set-Aside June 2004, 476,000 hectares, almost
  5.0 of England
• Greater SE 100,270 hectares, 8.6
• Essex 10.7
• Hampshire 9.1
• Oxfordshire 11.4
• Bedfordshire 11.6
• Far in excess of most generous estimates of land
  needed for housing!

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New Households, New Homes

• 80 one-person
• But only about one-third single never married
• Will demand more space per household Separate
  kitchens/bathrooms/loos, Spare rooms, Work spaces
• Land saving reduces as densities increase
• 30 dw/ha yields 60 of all potential gains, 40
  dw/ha 70 per cent
• So biggest gains from minimising development
  below 20 dw/h, not increasing 40 dw/ha
• So go for 30-40 dw/ha with variations higher
  close to transport services (Stockholm 1952!)
• But wont achieve same person densities as before!

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Densification Effects
Land needed to accommodate 400
dwellings Density Area required,
ha. Dws./ha. Net Gross
(with local facilities) Land Saved Land
Saved Total Cumu- Total Cumu- Saving
lative Saving lative   10 40.0 46.3   2
0 20.0 20.0 50.0 50.0 25.3 21.0 45.4
45.4   30 13.3 6.7 16.7 66.7 17.9 7.4 15.9
61.3   40 10.0 3.3 8.3 75.0 14.3 3.6 7.8
69.1   50 8.0 2.0 5.0 80.0 12.1 2.2 4.8
73.9   60 6.6 1.4 3.5 83.5 10.6 1.5 3.2
77.1  
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Density Gradient (RudlinFalk)
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Lessons from Land Use

• Public Transport needs minimum density
• Bus 25 dw/ha
• LRT 60 dw/ha
• Exceed recent densities
• Big gain from 30-35 dw/ha
• Plus pyramids up to 60 dw/ha round rail
  stations
• Urban Task Force
• Traditional Stockholm, 1952!
• Or Edwardian suburbs!

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The Challenge

• Deliver the houses
• Defend a balanced portfolio BF/GF
• Build sustainable suburbs
• But can be New Towns too (seldom just that)
• Sustainable urban places linked along transport
  corridors
• Fund the infrastructure/ Coordinate development,
  transport
• Countryside for people!
• A big challenge equal to 1950s, 1960s
• They did it so we can we!