Ever since I was at John Prescott’s Urban Summit at Brindley Place, Birmingham in late 2002, and was collected by my wife and youngest lad on our way up to visit family up north, I have had a bee in my bonnet about our so-called ‘urban renaissance’. Birmingham’s regenerated canal district has become home to Britain’s National Sea Life centre. I took my lad in at 4.30pm on a midweek afternoon only to be told it was closing. On asking why, it was explained that there were no families living close by, and that the centre was only busy at weekends and in school hols.
Here I was, among shiny new buildings, landscaping, canals, restaurants, shops and hundreds of new homes, but the whole emphasis was on singles and childless couples. The concept that a child could enjoy the freedom of a city just hadn’t crossed the minds of the planners.
Over the next months, on regular visits to northern cities such as Leeds, Manchester and Liverpool, I became increasingly fixated on new apartment blocks with all units sold and yet, quite clearly, judging by how few lights were on of an evening, and by the few people actually visible in the streets, those units not bought ‘to leave empty’ and sell in pristine condition a couple of years later were occupied by a monoculture of young professionals and students. Surely this was far away from the ‘sustainable communities’ that we were being encouraged to deliver. Surely ‘sustainable communities’ was about a mixed set of people putting down roots, not about a transient – no matter how cool – one-dimensional demographic. Yet for most, putting down roots still means starting a family, and try starting a family in the type of accommodation available in these cities. Try feeling comfortable about your kids popping out to the shop to pick up some milk.
I contrasted this to our second home in Perth, Australia (OK I know it sounds flash: the carbon footprint concerns us but we learn a lot about urban design and sustainable living from travelling there every Christmas, and we bring back ideas and put them into practice to the benefit of many … promise!), where with our four kids of varying ages we live right in the centre of a medium-size city (1.9 million), have wonderful play, recreation and sports facilities right outside our door, where we can get onto cycle routes and go for miles without having to negotiate the city traffic, where public transport from our front door is free and regular. We have no anxieties about allowing our nine-year-old to nip to the video store or buy milk, or go and kick a ball in the adjacent park. The streets are ‘traffic-calmed’, kids are out and about, it feels normal, it feels like they should be there.
We love our city-centre home in Perth, it’s got everything and more than our UK home in rural West Sussex. OK, the climate helps but it isn’t just the weather – our kids have always felt free there, and I want ‘free-range kids’….
