WHY SO MUCH EMPTY SPACE IN LONDON?
During my daily walk the other day I crossed 4 large parks in the space of an hour, and that was all in the same area of town. This is typical across the city actually. In outskirts, there are very large parks everywhere. In the centre of the city, there are numerous squares, many with greenery.
It got me thinking "why?". In such a highly dense city like London, with many people living rough on the streets, and with our ongoing housing crisis, why is the city so built up in some areas and virtually empty in others. In fact I believe the surface area that's empty is larger than that which is developed.
I figured the answer is somewhere in the question. Well, there are multiple answers.
For one, those large parks were historically (and probably still presently) properties of the "Lords"; kings, princes, dukes and earls. It is usual to find some kind of palace or mansion adjoined to, or in the middle of, said parks. Kensington Palace for Hyde Park, for instance. It's the same for Hampstead Heath, Regent's Park, Richmond Park, St. James Park, and so on.
As such, these were meant for the recreational pleasure of the lords, and could not be built on for the unwashed masses.
In addition to these, we also have commons. Clapham, Blackheath, Wimbledon, Tooting, to name a few. These are communally owned by, and are meant for the communal use of, the masses. We also have a couple of downs, designated agricultural spaces, gardens and areas around water reservoirs. All these have to be "empty" and can't be developed (yet).
Even though the city has grown astronomically, I think London has done a good job so far in maintaining the open spaces. A lot of the new developments have gone up over the past two decades have done so at the expense of existing developed areas. East London, for example, has seen a lot of gentrification and re-development of older areas. Many of the vintage structures and warehouses in the Bow and Stratford areas have been torn down and replaced with American style towers to accommodate the demand. London has been building up, not sideways.
This won't go on forever though. I have seen some new developments encroaching on open spaces in the past few years too. Some of those mansions or places have been bought by developers and converted into "luxury flats". It's also common to see some stand-alone houses built along side those palaces too. It's only a matter of time before they build more of those on the greenery.
It's not just private developers. London councils are also at it. The above green space is in danger of being turned into a residential estate. You know the ones; mini concrete towers with chain shops on the ground floor.
At present it's mainly used by families. You can usually observe children running around freely here. In summer time it's full of picnic mats and people just sitting around chilling. It's the perfect dog training space too, unfortunately for me, especially in the late evenings when you can observe human-sized alsatians speeding around and play-fighting.
So yes, there's a lot of empty space in this city, but just because they're empty doesn't mean they're not in use. We need them to stay empty. It also goes without saying that the trees help us balance out some of the pollution we create in this city.🌲
Peace & Love,
Adé
