ISSN:
1572-9893
Quelle:
Springer Online Journal Archives 1860-2000
Thema:
Geographie
Notizen:
Abstract A paper delivered to the IGU Applied Geography Commission meeting in Warsaw (House 1970) referred to the achievement and opportunity for geographers working on the New Towns of Britain. Much has changed, often for the worse, since that somewhat optimistic assessment of prospects. Widespread and severe economic depression has led to a steady state trend in planning, and to diminished expectations as the result of falling rates of population growth in many western countries. The role of the New Town itself as a planning tool has most recently come under increasingly ciritical review (Ward 1973,Eversley 1975,Hudson andJohnson 1976,McDonald 1976,Lock 1977). For the lack of an overall strategy for the British urban network New Towns have often been developed piecemeal, initially as alternatives to peripheral expansion of particular large cities. Through transfer of ‘overspill’ populations the New Towns were to help to relieve congestion and deprivation, most notably in the inner city and its surrounding ‘twilight’ zone. During the 1960s the potential of the New Town as an employment growth point in slow-growth or declining sub-regions received greater planning emphasis. Throughout, the New Town has been regarded as offering a total new living environment, as economically efficient as it was socially desirable. Whilst not denying the considerable achievements of the New Towns it is claimed by many, though opposed by some, that the achievements have been made at the expense of renewal and job provision in the inner city, the older industrial tracts, existing local authorities and deprived social groups in the urban community. British urban policies are currently being reshaped as result, and in this reformulation lie new opportunities for all social scientists, not least for the applied geographer. Such a challenge is indeed all the greater since the contributions by geographers to New Towns research have remained disappointingly limited, alike in theoretical and practical terms. The potential for contribution relates to: the objectives of New Towns; the stages in their designation, planning creation and management; the problems which emerge; and, finally, the wider questions of priority among urban policies.
Materialart:
Digitale Medien
URL:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/BF00845197
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