Peripheral housing estates in Britain
Peripheral housing estates in Britain

Summary/Abstract: In Britain, the peripheral Local Authority housing estates, built during the 30 years 1945–1975, now present serious problems. The introduction of non-traditional methods, together with cheap and hasty use of conventional building without craft skills, (rat-trad) resulted in a wide range of long-term construction problems. Peripheral estates often lack community facilities and have a higher proportion of children, teenagers and lone parent families, while elderly poor are now presenting additional problems. Poverty has increased on outer estates during the 1980s, and a high percentage of residents on such estates now feel unsafe from crime. Partnerships in which public and private sectors operate together with the local community offer a model for regeneration of peripheral estates. There have been isolated examples of successful community based approaches to these problem estates but community estate action requires cooperation from range of departments in a local authority, especially housing departments, and residents need to be involved at all stages of regeneration.

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