Urban
policy and development
Cities
are relentless, intractable, baffling and contradictory.
And they are the future in a rapidly urbanising world.
‘Regeneration’ can be a dangerously vague and loaded term
(see also ‘sustainability’), but clear analysis, ambitious
realism, long-sighted planning and the right delivery
mechanisms can make a difference.
I work with clients to make sense of – and sensible plans
for – complex places.
Click
here to see relevant projects….
Urban
governance
General
de Gaulle famously asked how one could be expected to
govern a nation with 246 different cheeses. I’m stretching
the metaphor, but the institutional framework of many
cities is equally complex. London is a case in point, and
East London – on which I have spent several years of my
life – is a sometimes maddening tangle of government.
Finding a way through this pungent diversity requires a
balance between control and chaos, direction and
opportunism, partnership and purpose. I know my way round.
Click here to see
my experience…
Urban
design and architecture
Architects
and urban designers make our cities what they are – places
that work for, with or against their people. But architects
cannot create plans from thin air: without good clients,
their plans will be rootless fantasies or dangerous
exercises in rhetoric.
I’m no architect, but I can work with them and show clients
how to get the plans and visions that they want – through
putting time into preparing briefs and managing the
consultants they appoint.
Click here
to see my experience…
Writing
and speaking
The best
ideas in the world are powerless if unexpressed. The work I
produce for clients communicates clearly, succinctly and
compellingly.
Click here to see some
written projects…
You can also look at my blog and occasional published
work.
I enjoy public speaking, I don’t read off my slides, and
have spoken at conferences nationally and internationally
(including Barcelona, New York, Shenzhen and Hong
Kong).
