Design for Social Sustainability – Saffron Woodcraft, 2010

4.1 AMENITIES & SOCIAL
INFRASTRUCTURE
New communities need services
and support, not just buildings
“If we are to have any chance of creating vibrant new
communities that offer residents quality of life and that open
up new opportunities – communities that are well balanced,
integrated, sustainable and well connected – then we have
to think about building for the wider needs of the whole
community, not just focus on building homes.”
A good place for children? Attracting and retaining families in inner urban mixed income communities, Emily
Silverman, Ruth Lupton & Alex Fenton, Chartered Institute of Housing/Joseph Rowntree Foundation (2005)
Barking Reach, London, UK
24 DESIGN FOR SOCIAL SUSTAINABILITY
Experience from around the world has shown
that new communities need local services
like schools, shops and public transport, at
an early stage. Equally important though are
the less visible types of support that make
people feel at home in an area and create
opportunities to meet other residents; like
community and cultural activities that create
a sense of shared history, and community
workers who can help residents to meet their
neighbours and enable residents to set up
their own local projects.
This type of social infrastructure needs to be
in place early in the life of a new community
– preferably before new residents move
in. Central to the English New Towns
concept was the idea of ‘walking distance
communities’ where each neighbourhood
would contain a school, shops, post office,
chemist, church, pub, community centre and
sports facilities. A review of transferrable
lessons from the New Towns 31 to provide
practical lessons for England’s new growth
areas concluded that,
AMENITIES & SOCIAL INFRASTRUCTURE 25