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Overview

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Sense of Place; a Historical Context

New Awareness

Defining ‘Sense of Place’ 6 Defining ‘Place Making’ & ‘Place-Shaping’ 8 Creating ‘Place Strategy’ Policy 10

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Overview Over the last 100 years the practice of urban design has been undertaken via an amalgam of different disciplines, theories and organisations. Whilst there is a shared lexicon between these disciplines the meaning they each attach to commonly used terms often can vary considerably.Therefore in defining a specific place strategy it will be important to also define terms which are to be used so everybody shares the same starting point. ‘Sense of place’, ‘place making’ and ‘place-shaping’ are terms which are now permeating through planning narrative and policy. Our ambition for this discussion document is to establish a reasonable consensus for their meaning. We start with the concept of ‘sense of place’ which was originally coined by geographers investigating phenomeno- logical analysis of subjective experience of place.Then we approach ‘place making’ that has various interpretations relating to more practical issues of implementation and management. Finally ‘place-shaping’ has its origins in local governance and its role in creating the circumstances whereby a place supports and stimulates community activity, there is significant overlap with place making.

But what are the consequences for place related policy and how can we reach consensus over the roles of both local planning authorities and developers in achieving place related visions?To shed light on these issues we have referred to geographer Professor Edward Relph’s widely respected book ‘Place and Placelessness’, Professor Jill Grant’s book ‘Planning the Good Community’ [RTPI ‘leading edge texts’] andThe Lyons Inquiry into Local Government entitled ‘Place-shaping: a shared ambition for the future of local government’ [2007]. By starting with views which have evolved from academic research rather than polemic from interest groups we aim to achieve a useful and independent balance of the issues. Although the terms relating to place are becoming widely used in both planning policy and theory, surprisingly they are rarely defined nor is there much established methodology for assessment.These terms are inherently ambiguous suggesting that, for practical reasons, they should either be replaced by ones which are concise and self- explanatory or at least fully explained. This process will assist the successful implementation of a planning authority’s ‘place strategy’ vision.

Overview

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Sense of Place; a Historical Context Since the earliest of civilisations humans have enjoyed an inner experience linking them with particular places which had individual and community spiritual or emotional significance.The Romans had their ‘Genius Loci’, a protective spirit of place of which there were over 250 in Rome alone underscoring the importance

locations. As a result most people spend less time in one place and more time experiencing others. Many individual’s personal sense of place rooted through long term attachment has been replaced by multiple experiences. An unbridled enthusiasm in the developed world to embrace modernity was stimulated by the promise of progress. In post war England this was expressed by a strongly held view that traditional areas were in need of replacement by efficient rationalised locations. In hindsight we now see that whilst mankind has moved forward in many ways, in many others change has brought unforeseen negative consequences including an erosion of the specialness of place caused by over simplification.The sensitivity and importance of day-to-day experience were simply ignored. Globalisation, industriali- sation and urbanisation have moved us away from the Roman’s God of place to modern homogeneous functional towns. The unintended consequence of which has been the creation of another place concept, that of placelessness.

of local identity within a large city. Historic towns constructed within different cultural backgrounds

nevertheless commonly demonstrate two enduring elements of place and space. Firstly, a necessity for destinations which provided structured social and economic encounters shaped for this purpose. Secondly, a diversity of distinctive and authentic places capable of stimulating a range of positive inner experience for an individual or community. Historically human relationships with the space they occupied generally changed little from one generation to another. Fast forward to today and we see that within as little as two generations social and technological changes have had a significant impact on our lives generally and our relationship with place in particular. Access to cheap travel and higher earnings are key drivers in enabling previously rooted communities to work, recreate or live in different

Sense of Place; a Historical Context

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New Awareness

The rapid growth of twentieth century rationalised, but placeless, new towns and their suburbs rang alarm bells with writers like Jane Jacobs andWilliam H.Whyte in the 1960’s.They criticised the determination of the mainstream professional planners to produce tidy organised and entirely homogenised towns, Jane Jacobs mockingly accused them of: “The pseudoscience of planning almost neurotic in its determination to imitate empiric failure and ignore empiric success.” The unpopularity of rationalist towns left planning the profession eager to embrace a new theory and they readily accepted new movements in the 1980s likeThe Congress for New Urbanism in the USA and examples like Poundbury in the UK. The new theory was broadly to revisit what was perceived to be the lost art of urbanism by going back in time to traditional nucleated European style towns with busy streets and market squares. At this time focus was also placed on the regeneration of existing but run down urban areas particularly in the USA. For example ‘Project for Public Spaces’ created a manifesto for place making which emphasised action by local

multidisciplinary groups often involving the arts rather than actual plan making by professionals.

New Awareness

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Defining ‘Sense of Place’

negatively as ‘toy town’. Clearly neither view can be a definitive assessment, but is simply an indication of how a location can be experienced differently. Poundbury is an exceptional case because it generates such opposite views, but are there tools which designers can use which would increase the chance of a location being experienced positively? Conversely are there characteristics of a location which a designer should avoid? Relph addressed these issues by devising the concept of ‘Insideness’. In declaring a positive personal experience with a place research showed the associated feelings were: “Here rather than there, safe rather than threatened, enclosed rather than exposed and at ease rather than stressed”. The more ‘insiderness’ one feels the greater sense of place is experienced. Conversely no positive experience of place was accompanied by a feeling of ‘outsideness’ which is associated with alienation and discomfort.These observations are clues for those seeking positive sense of place outcomes which need to factor in the demographic profile of all those who will experience the

Sense of place is the subjective experience felt by an individual in a particular place .

Relph’s book ‘Place and Placelessness’ was first published in 1976, but was revised and reprinted in 2008 with a new preface to take account of the changes within the debate about place. He points to a sudden elevation of interest in academic enquiry in the early 1990s probably, he says, due to post-modernist theories about “diversity and difference”. But importantly he adds: “ Place, however else it might be interpreted, is unquestionably about difference, and as a phenomenon of everyday experience is part of the public domain rather than the invention of a particular discipline.” For the phenomenological perspective it is logical that sense of place as a personal everyday experience can only exist within the mind and cannot be expressed in terms of an inherent quality of a place. Take for example Prince Charles’ Poundbury, an acknowledged example of the New Urbanism planned by the eminent Leon Krier, has divided opinion, many experiencing a strong positive sense of place whilst others perceiving it

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location, their cultural values, age, gender and many more variables.The complexity of the matter is compounded by the range of components which can be experienced in each place. Some of these are experienced consciously and others subconsciously, they include diverse manifestations of; space, weather, culture, cities, nature, landscape, memory, rootedness, time and many more things that our senses can recognise. Other studies have referred to further issues such as the importance of distinctiveness, integrity and authenticity. For all these reasons we can see the process of understanding and creating sense of place opportunities is complex. Furthermore assessment of sense of place potential at the planning application stage will prove problematic if a local planning authority does not have a clear-cut ‘place strategy’. From this complexity we can deduce that experiencing place is subjective and not confined to normative behavioural predictions or achieved via a set of rules. To create the best opportunities for new places to be considered by most to have a positive sense of place it needs to give the feeling of “insiderness” with a holistic combination of being distinctive, diverse and contextual. Neighbourhoods will need many different ‘places’ to appeal to a

range of cultures and age groups to encompass as many different positive subjective experiences as possible.

A key theme arising in the majority of writing on the subject of sense of place is the importance of authenticity and integrity. In his bookTown Planning in Practice [1909] Raymond Unwin [one of the architects responsible for the iconic buildings in Letchworth], addresses this issue when talking about the importance of studying old towns and their buildings. He points out we cannot reproduce the conditions under which they were created: “The informal beauty which resulted from the natural and apparently unconscious growth of the medieval town may command our highest admiration, but we may feel that it arose from conditions of life which no longer exist and that it is unwise to seek to reproduce it. Possibly other forms of beauty will be found more adapted to our present conditions”.

Defining ‘Sense of Place’

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Defining ‘Place Making’&‘Place-Shaping’

new nucleated urban patterns based on active busy streets reminiscent of the pre-new town functionalist era. However the results have not generally matched expectations. In her book ‘Planning the Good Community; new urbanism in theory and Practice [2006] Professor Gill Grant says her research on how completed New Urbanism projects showed the new streets did not generate the intended ‘people activity’ hoped for.The well-designed ‘retro look’ architecture and compact town centres failed to recreate the busy street life found in old towns.This outcome possibly reflects Raymond Unwin’s prediction that we need to take account of irreversible change to ‘conditions of life’ when considering how new places can work. No doubt there will be other urban design theories which try to be all encompassing; Gill Grant predicts that it is unlikely that such a model exists and concludes by saying: “The nature the planning profession is to help communities respond to changing economic, technological and cultural trends. In dynamic societies, that requires constant adaptation to local circumstances and international conditions.The good community remains an important but illusive target.”

These terms are most commonly used in the context of creating destinations which foster a sense of community through promoting casual social interactions in appropriately designed locations. Like most things in Planning the evolving nature of designing successful urban destinations is a moving target. Historically, settlements were formed around destinations initially relating principally to commerce or security; destinations were people magnets. Communities enjoyed the social encounters which in turn attracted more people.This is a significant oversimplifica- tion but the magnet notion helps to explain busy active streets, diverse and vibrant neighbourhoods with strong communities.Today our task is to invent new urban areas to accommodate a burgeoning population and new industries. But has this caused an inversion of the concept of destinations because previously they attracted population growth, whereas now the reverse is true? In the post-functional new town era of sophistication and complexity were the new urban design challenges. Under the general heading of ‘New Urbanism’ planners and architects looked to move away from ‘placelessness’ by establishing

Defining ‘Place Making’ & ‘Place-Shaping’

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In March 2007 Sir Michael Lyons published the ‘Lyons Inquiry into Local Government’ entitled ‘Place-shaping: a shared ambition for the future of local government’. He envisaged: “… a wider, strategic role for Local Government, which I have termed ‘place-shaping – the creative use of powers and influence to promote the well-being of a community and its citizens.” The twenty-first century has witnessed the emergence, at national level, of a wish to devolve decision making, not just for local Councils, but also to local neighbourhoods.The experience has been that whilst some community groups have acted positively to support initiatives to support place-shaping initiatives by local Councils, others have merely objected. There has also been a divide between professionals and academics over their approach to place-making.The former returning to their training concentrating on physical shaping, whilst the latter tended to concern themselves with wider social dimensions of the relationship between a location and community.These are not necessarily mutually exclusive approaches and most agree that an element of both is required.

From these observations we conclude the best approach to ‘place orientated urban design’ of any scale does not lay in prescriptive design theory but understanding social evolution and complexity. Local Councils have a clear role in both leadership and governance to achieve the best possible outcomes in the new development required to support communities, health and prosperity. Despite the divergence in the origins and usage of the three terms relating to ‘place’ most of us instinctively attach an affection to the concept of good places.To assist in their attainment councils will need to open their narrative to develop their place strategy policies as part of their place- shaping governance role.

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Creating ‘Place Strategy’ Policy

Vision Creating opportunities for individuals to experience a positive sense within a place and the establishment of new destinations which create social interaction will require special attention at the design stage of a major project. Arguably how a place functions is equally as important as how it works. If a Local Planning Authority has ‘place’ associated policy it will need to define its terms through dialogue with stakeholders and expressed in supportive policy notes. Such notes could also draw attention to the authority’s expectations regarding a planning applicant’s methodology of approach which will probably need to be set out within the accompanying application documents such as the design and access statement.This could promote public participation during the pre-application consultation and provide a basis for considering the merit of any proposals.

Method Large urban projects are likely to need detailed analysis of their public realm space strategy, indicating distinctive places of diverse character and the proposed range of destinations. Proposed destinations could be supported by evidence of how they will function, be managed and reviewed in perpetuity.

Brian Morgan RIBA MRTPI

Creating ‘Place Strategy’ Policy

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Stuart Cock | Mersea Homes Managing Director t | 01206 383159 e | [email protected] w | www.merseahomes.co.uk

Brian Morgan | ADP Ltd Planning Director t | 01206 242070 e | [email protected]