Briggate in the crunch

the landmarks montages

2008-12-12T15:23:00.002Z

Ribbon experiment

2008-11-30T19:56:00.002Z

ideas for lower briggate

2008-11-18T14:31:00.001Z

proposal, originally uploaded by john.nall.

areas of interest

2008-11-18T14:28:00.001Z

areas of dev, originally uploaded by john.nall.

2008-11-18T14:26:00.002Z

"gentrification" of Leeds

2008-11-17T20:43:00.001Z

Experts ask: 'Is Leeds going in the right direction?'

Published Date: 18 December 2007
By Debbie Leigh
AN imposing collection of Leeds academics researching cities have joined the clamour objecting to the "gentrification" of Leeds.

The group of professors from Leeds University and Leeds Met have written an open letter to Leeds City Council posing the question: "Is Leeds going in the right direction?"

They were inspired by the Yorkshire Evening Post's City at the Crossroads series over the past two weeks, which has been looking at this very issue, along with the challenges facing the city in the future.

Rachael Unsworth, author of the City Living in Leeds reports in 2003, 2005 and 2007 and geography lecturer at Leeds University, said the decision to pen the letter and voice their opinions was also prompted by the proposed changes recently revealed for the Corn Exchange and Kirkgate Market.

Issues

She said: "That was the straw that broke the camel's back.

"But the wider issues raised in the letter are the long-term views of many of my colleagues."

She added: "We are used to thinking critically about the way cities change over time and we don't expect our voice alone to be the ultimate deciding factor but it's adding considered opinion to the debate."

The letter, signed by 14 city specialists, begins: "As academics researching and teaching on urban regeneration issues locally and internationally, we are concerned to learn that most traders from the Corn Exchange will be evicted after Christmas to make way for an 'International Food Emporium'.

"We also share the fears of stallholders from Kirkgate Market that the planned refurbishment will price many out of existence. Despite the obvious success story that Leeds has become in certain respects, these recent proposals confirm our fears that the overarching regeneration vision for the city centre is now taking Leeds in the wrong direction.

"The Kirkgate Market and the Corn Exchange are both icons of the Leeds landscape, truly unique results of the city's history. The plans currently tabled for their regeneration could strip away their character and turn them into yet more corporatised and exclusive shopping centres."

It continues: "Gentrification by its very nature actively works against efforts to narrow the gap.

In the obsession to compete with other cities, to go up a league and be the Barcelona of the North, Leeds is in danger of simply becoming a ‘clone city’, a place like anywhere else.”

Petitions

Thousands of people have signed petitions in shops and online to “Save the Corn Exchange” since Zurich Assurance announced plans to kick out its tenants to make way for an upmarket food hall in the Grade I listed building and two protest demonstrations have been held.

The group of campaigning academics is following up its letter by holding a series of public debates.

They will complement a conference planned by the council for January – Developing a Vision for the City Centre – which will see key national and international speakers share their views.

The group has said it would welcome the council as as partner and is open to suggestions on themes for debate and how to put people’s suggestions into practice.

The first event will take place on February 28 at 6pm in the Rupert Beckett Lecture Theatre, University of Leeds.

debbie.leigh@ypn.co.uk

Exchange or refund

2008-11-17T20:37:00.000Z

In Leeds and all over Britain, urban quarters with character are being transformed into soulless, sanitised environments

* Ciara Leeming
* guardian.co.uk, Friday January 4 2008 16.00 GMT
* larger | smaller
* Article history

This month's closure of Leeds Corn Exchange is the latest blow to be struck against individuality in the name of regeneration.

The shopping centre - whose independent traders specialise in alternative fashion and curiosities - is being turned into an "international food emporium" by its leaseholder Zurich Assurance and the traders have been given until January 14 to leave.

The firm has yet to secure new tenants but promises a huge range of upmarket foodstuffs, plus a branded "statement" restaurant.

It claims the changes are essential to recoup £1.5m of refurbishment costs but traders suspect their wares and clientele - students, teenagers, goths and emos - are surplus to requirements in shiny, regenerated Leeds.

Last year the youths who loiter outside the centre were threatened with dispersal orders and asbos, and shop contracts specifically ban the sale of gothic, pagan or fetish clothing or accessories.

The surrounding Exchange Quarter is the centre of the city's vibrant alternative scene - gritty, grubby and full of cutting-edge nightspots, vintage shops and tattoo parlours. Elsewhere, the bland chain stores, dull chain bars and prestige department stores reign supreme. The evicted traders are struggling to find new premises in the booming city, where rents have leapt fourfold in a few years and vacant units are in short supply. Some will quit Leeds, while others are looking for jobs.

The plans have prompted some to question the direction of Leeds' regeneration and the squeezing out of quirky, independent shops and those whose lifestyles don't fit the norm.

Similar things are happening in other cities, where individuality is being crushed by profit-driven big business, intent on sleek, gentrified spaces and products that attract the "right sort" of consumer.

Quiggins, a legendary Liverpool hippy emporium that was home to 50 stalls, fell victim in 2006 to a massive regeneration scheme linked to the European capital of culture preparations.

Campaigners in Birmingham are fighting the planned closure of the Fiveways Centre - home to a progressive publishing company and a Fairtrade music venue - by its owners Mars Pension Trustees.

The future of Manchester's bohemian Afflecks Palace is uncertain. Stallholders have been in limbo since their leases ran out in June and any hike in rents - on what is a prime site - could put many out of business. London's Queens Market is also fighting for its survival.

Critics claim Leeds is on its way to becoming a soulless "clone town" peopled by wealthy yuppies and corporations - and with few spaces where citizens of all classes, ethnicities and ages can mingle. Their fears are compounded by plans to redevelop the city's Kirkgate Market.

In an open letter, 14 academics specialising in urban regeneration warned the drive to open exclusive retail centres is stripping away its character. They wrote:

"Gentrification by its very nature actively works against efforts to narrow the gap. It also erodes what is left of the public realm.

In the obsession to compete with other cities, to go up a league and be the Barcelona of the north, Leeds is in danger of simply becoming a 'clone city', a place like anywhere else.

And a clone town promotes clone people. As the city changes shape, there is a real danger that it actually narrows the type of people that it attracts."

Their warning should be heeded by other cities, where corporatised developments continue to suck the life from independent enterprise and leach away individuality.

The key to effective regeneration must be safeguarding a town's uniqueness, public spaces and sense of local identity - and small businesses are a vital part of that. This, surely, is exactly what makes many continental cities so special.

briggate council maps

2008-11-13T16:11:00.002Z

Traffic light with timer

2008-11-12T15:20:00.001Z

Traffic light with timer, originally uploaded by teemueemeli.

Scramble Intersection

2008-11-12T15:17:00.001Z

Scramble Intersection, originally uploaded by News46.

Shibuya-ariel view

2008-11-12T15:02:00.001Z

Shibuya-map9.jpg (image)

Blogged with the Flock Browser

Shibuya_crossing

2008-11-12T15:01:00.001Z

Shibuya_crossing_2.jpg (JPEG Image, 800x600 pixels)

Blogged with the Flock Browser

scramble crossings

2008-11-12T14:59:00.001Z

home is., originally uploaded by yuki.

re def presentation

2008-11-09T23:16:00.000Z

Social Affluence/Architectural Interest/Urban Grain - Elevation 2

2008-10-23T17:58:00.002+01:00

Social Affluence/Architectural Interest/Urban Grain - Elevation 1

2008-10-23T17:51:00.003+01:00

A brief tangent to the 'knowledge economy'

2008-10-21T12:36:00.000+01:00

Just a few words about the ‘knowledge economy’ and its value, so we can draw a line under or even come back to it.

The man to credit this to is Peter Drucker, a business philosopher who defined 2 types of worker in his book, ‘The Effective Executive’. One would work with his hands, the other with his head, and it was these thinkers who were the changing face of commerce now. The manner of its conception can bring about parallels in Marxist/Hegelian philosophy.

The problem being that while ‘thinkers’ are the new business, these terms are too simplistic. Labourers now use thought as an important tool.

If this mode of thought has academic merit, it is in two interpretations. An ‘economy of knowledge’ the production and management of knowledge in economic constraints. The ‘knowledge based economy’ the use of knowledge technologies to produce economic benefits.

The concept has some spacial thoughts, the first, (and incorrect as it proved) was a utopian suburb idea, in which knowledge workers could work form their home/office via the internet. The actual ‘true’ effect was of the need to be surrounded by other knowledge workers, for the direct interaction and exchange of ideas. This has led to the reasoning that a knowledge economy is the very thing that defines an urban area.

Elevation of Affluence levels

2008-10-20T20:38:00.002+01:00

Social Hierarchy Graphs

2008-10-20T20:32:00.003+01:00

Other internet Sites

2008-10-17T10:02:00.001+01:00

http://www.trinityleeds.com/ - New trinity shopping centre website

http://www.broadgateleeds.co.uk/ - New Broadgate shooping centre website

http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?p=25896344 - Forum on Retail in leeds

Useful Website for inspiration

2008-10-16T19:58:00.001+01:00

http://www.skyscrapercity.com

http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=408009 - Future Developments in Hull

define brigate pres

2008-10-14T13:52:00.006+01:00

This is a quick power point pres to accompany our definition of briggate A0 board

The effect of the credit crunch

2008-10-14T13:40:00.003+01:00

This is a sort of mind map or web, as to how Briggate (in the worst case scenario) will change. This is heading into the re-definition territory, but in my opinion ive possibly missed some factors.

Social Hierarchy / North and South Divide

2008-10-14T10:43:00.000+01:00

Useful Quotes

2008-10-13T15:54:00.002+01:00

Quotes from:
Richard Rogers, Cities for a small planet

'The city has been viewed as an area for consumerism. The pursuit of this narrow objective has sapped the city of its vitality. The complexity of 'community' has been untangled and public life has been dissected into indivdual components'.

'The emphasis is now on selfishness and separation rather than contact and community'

'The existing streets of the city are drained of commercial life and become little more than a no-man's-land for scurrying pedestrians'

'Presence of people need to be replaced by 'security' and the city itself becomes less hospitable and more alienating'

'Soon our public spaces are percieved as downright dangerous and fear enters the scene'

'The street market becomes less attractive than a secured shopping mall'

'In the twenty first century city the economys reliance on small scale employment and creative exchange will generate far more diversity and personal needs'.

Shadow analysis within Briggate

2008-10-13T15:39:00.000+01:00

Movement within Briggate

2008-10-13T15:36:00.001+01:00

Building Uses within Briggate

2008-10-13T15:34:00.000+01:00

define briggate

2008-10-08T23:01:00.001+01:00

a0 definition, originally uploaded by john.nall.

this is the groups opening attemp to defien briggate

Briggate represents a social hierarchy of Leeds with a diverse collection of shops catering for wide range of society. The centre and spine of the retail quarter of Leeds. A necessary node which intakes and redistributes consumers around all surrounding circulatory streets. The credit crunch and the larger recession that we are currently entering are putting a squeeze on peoples finances. How will the results of a reduction in consumer spending affect Briggate. Can Briggate be seen as a character for wider society and how it will feel the pinch in the recession. The affluent north and the more value orientated south.

2008-10-06T15:59:00.000+01:00

2008-10-06T15:57:00.000+01:00

Briggate in the credit crunch

2008-10-06T15:02:00.001+01:00

credit, originally uploaded by john.nall.

just testing out uploading from flickr acount straight to the blog, lets see how it turns out

Hello

2008-10-06T14:52:00.000+01:00

briggate in the crunch

pgdip year 2

define briggate