Lewes in the 21st Century
The UK is in the midst of a housing crisis to compare with the periods after the two world wars. However, this time, it’s not bombs and lack of materials and labour that has caused the problem, but the consequences of the 1980’s Right to Buy policy coupled with vastly inflated land values.
At the same time, we have a crisis of community, where trust has been lost within and between the generations, and inequality is growing ever more quickly, leading to a heightened sense of anomie.
To put the tin lid on it, conventional construction and development models are completely unsustainable in the context of climate change and dwindling natural resources.
What are we to do? In particular, what does all this mean for Lewes in the 21st Century?
Andrew Simpson is an experienced planner and mental health worker, with a particular interest in the impact of place on health and well-being. As well as recently securing a planning consent for a new urban village in south-west London, Andrew is a director of the Lewes Community Land Trust.
Andrew will lead a discussion on Lewes in the 21st Century in the context of the impending submission of a planning application for the largest development that Lewes has seen in recent times, the proposed new North Street Quarter on the Phoenix site. He will propose that unless the town builds on its tradition of co-operative ownership and direct citizen participation, Lewes will drift towards becoming a commuter dormitory clone town, the death of Lewes. Andrew hopes that the meeting will be part of the process of coming up with some practical solutions that can be taken forward in the next phase of the town’s development as sustainable Lewes.