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SUBURBAN REGENERATION
London Women and Planning Forum Seminar
Jointly convened with the Centre for Suburban Studies, Kingston University
Wednesday 23rd February 2005
2 - 6 pm
The Women’s Library
Old Castle Street
London
E1
www.thewomenslibrary.ac.uk
Although suburbs are home to 86% of England's population (In Suburbia
Report, 2002), they are largely ignored in the debate on the urban
renaissance and in current regeneration policies. In their form and
design, suburbs are also gendered spaces, shaped by assumptions about
home, work and family. The suburban lives of women and men are often
very different. Women are more likely than men to work as well as live
in suburbs and to use suburban shops and public transport. This seminar
will investigate why suburbs need to be included in regeneration
policies and the ways in which suburban regeneration can improve the
everyday lives of women. The seminar also considers media and other
representations of women living, and often working, in suburbia.
Suburban regeneration is now on the national agenda. In 1998 the Civic
Trust (www.civictrust.org.uk) began a 5-year Sustainable Suburbs
Project, funded by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, and devised a
Sustainable Suburbs Toolkit to assist local authorities in measuring the
nature of decline in suburban areas. In 2002, a report entitled 'In
Suburbia' was prepared by the Local Government Association, the South
East England Regional Assembly, the Civic Trust, Bury Metropolitan
Borough Council, London Borough of Harrow, Hampshire County Council and
Rushmoor Borough Council to raise the national profile of suburbs
(www.hants.gov.uk/urbanliving/mew_html/suburbia_html/sub_index.html).
Two speakers at the seminar - Claire Codling from the London Borough of
Harrow and Alex Rook from the Civic Trust - will talk about their work
as part of the In Suburbia National Partnership, focusing on two case
studies: East Finchley High Street and Wealdstone District Centre.
The seminar is jointly convened by the London Women and Planning Forum
and the Centre for Suburban Studies at Kingston University. Established
in 2003, the Centre for Suburban Studies is the first research centre
dedicated to the study of the suburb in the UK, and is the world's first
research centre to study the suburb in cultural, multi- and
interdisciplinary terms. The Centre seeks to define Suburban Studies as
'an important, timely and original area of inquiry for both the academic
and the wider community'
(http://fass.kingston.ac.uk/research/centres/css). Vesna Goldsworthy,
Director of the Centre for Suburban Studies, is the third speaker at the
seminar, and will discuss gendered representations of suburbia.
Speakers
Claire Codling London Borough of Harrow
Vesna Goldsworthy Centre for Suburban Studies, University of Kingston
Alex Rook The Civic Trust
Discussant
Alison Blunt Queen Mary, University of London
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