An Overcrowded Island? - The Great Myth of Urban Britain

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  • Lateralthinking1

    #16
    The principal concern about growing population numbers is the limited capacity of infrastructure - water, transport, energy, health service, support services etc - particularly in London and the South East. For example, Victoria underground station is closed daily at regular intervals during the rush hour. That is needed so that people are crushed in crowds on the outside of the station rather than falling onto the rails inside it. Frequently it prevents other travellers from being able to leave the mainline station.

    On biodiversity, while it is a wonderful thing, and should always be advanced, policy makers need to recognise first and foremost the needs of humans in conservation. Green spaces and unspoilt attractive looking places are almost certainly valued more highly by the public, even if in science terms they are without merit. Psychological health across society is dependent on them.

    On housing:

    1. Whatever the economists say, I see no automatic correlation between house prices and supply and demand. Both supply and demand varied enormously between 1957 and 1987. House prices rose throughout the period.

    2. There are 930,00 empty homes in Britain. 350,000 of them are long term empty. 720,000 of them are in England and a large number of those are in London and the South East of England.

    3. In 2007 the shortfall of new homes being built annually (185,000) to new additional annual demand for homes (223,000) was 38,000. The current 930,000 existing empty homes could meet that kind of annual shortfall for 25 years with no new build.

    4. Of the homes to be built, Labour's target of 60% at brownfield sites was woefully conservative. The HCA estimated that there are around 64,000 hectares of brownfield land – enough to build over 2 million homes at 35 to the hectare. I believe that the basic permissions for most of that building already exist and have done so for many years.

    5. HCA argued that the number of households is set to grow by nearly 6 million by 2033. It concluded that means we have to build at least 5 million homes to meet demand and redress past under-supply, hence that 60%. This doesn't make sense in the context of Fact 2. The Government is notoriously awry in all of its economic projections.
    Last edited by Guest; 28-06-12, 22:22.

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    • Budapest

      #17
      Originally posted by Eine Alpensinfonie View Post
      The bit of tarmac you happen to live on is hardly the point. Britain is massively overcrowded because it cannot feed its population by growing food on its own land. To sustain a large population, you need huge areas of open land.

      Simple mathematics.
      Exactly.

      When World War Two broke out (in 1939 - I have to add the date because thesedays many people don't know it) Britain depended on food from its empire; ie, Britain was not self-sufficient. The Nazis/Germans cut most of the supply routes and more than 11,000 British sailors died on the Atlantic conveys, just to keep Britain from starving.

      After the war, the British Government said 'never again' and introduced a massive scheme to make Britain self-sufficient in food ('The Archers' radio programme came out of this government propaganda). It lasted until about the 1980s, and has since gone downhill to the point which the UK can no longer produce enough food to feed its own people.

      The UK population now depends on overseas suppliers to keep it from starvation. This is extremely worrying in such an uncertain world and is incredibly reckless on the part of UK governments, from both sides of the political divide.

      Comment

      • french frank
        Administrator/Moderator
        • Feb 2007
        • 30256

        #18
        Originally posted by Budapest View Post
        The UK population now depends on overseas suppliers to keep it from starvation. This is extremely worrying in such an uncertain world and is incredibly reckless on the part of UK governments, from both sides of the political divide.
        This is just an enquiry - not a challenge. How much of this is about the demands of the public who have come to expect certain kinds of food to be available all year round? Presumably when we were self-sufficient we didn't expect to have tomatoes all the time, for example.

        Is it an insufficiency in terms of quantity or what people want to eat now?
        It isn't given us to know those rare moments when people are wide open and the lightest touch can wither or heal. A moment too late and we can never reach them any more in this world.

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        • Budapest

          #19
          Originally posted by french frank View Post
          This is just an enquiry - not a challenge. How much of this is about the demands of the public who have come to expect certain kinds of food to be available all year round? Presumably when we were self-sufficient we didn't expect to have tomatoes all the time, for example.

          Is it an insufficiency in terms of quantity or what people want to eat now?
          french frank, yes, this has everything to do with what people expect, and nothing to do with what people need for their basic security. It's interesting that people in this thread have talked about 'infrastructure' with regard to roads, housing, etc, but no one has mentioned the most basic thing of all, which is food. People seem to think that it just magically appears in the stores for them to buy. Most of this food comes from overseas. The UK does not have the ability to feed itself.

          I often wonder about the economics of how they can fly in beans from Kenya, or potatos from Egypt, or fish from Japan (let's not go into foodstuffs from Japan!), etc, etc, but they do.

          If this supply chain stops there would be complete anarchy within about 3 days. Thats how dependent the UK is on overseas suppliers.

          On a more cheery note, I live in a very rural part of France. I don't grow much myself, yet get a lot from my farmer neighbours: potatos, strawberrys, veg, a freshly slaughtered lamb, etc, all seasonal. When you eat real food like this you get some understanding of the tasteless rubbish they sell in the nearest big supermarket.

          Not everyone can - or would want to - live in middle of nowhere France. However, it does give you some connect as to how the land, in all its various ways, feeds people. This connect has been lost in urbanised areas all over the world.

          Comment

          • Quarky
            Full Member
            • Dec 2010
            • 2657

            #20
            Originally posted by amateur51 View Post
            An interesting piece by BBC's Mark Easton:

            http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-18623096
            This report is a load of balls in my view. Useful ammunition for speculators and property developers. But anyone living as I do in central Hertfordshire, being assailed on all sides with threats of developments of all kinds, will be appalled at this. The figures quoted are meaningless.

            Comment

            • Eine Alpensinfonie
              Host
              • Nov 2010
              • 20570

              #21
              Originally posted by vinteuil View Post
              ... poor old Singapore.
              Exactly.

              I'm alright, Jack - at the moment.

              Comment

              • MrGongGong
                Full Member
                • Nov 2010
                • 18357

                #22
                Originally posted by french frank View Post
                This is just an enquiry - not a challenge. How much of this is about the demands of the public who have come to expect certain kinds of food to be available all year round? Presumably when we were self-sufficient we didn't expect to have tomatoes all the time, for example.

                Is it an insufficiency in terms of quantity or what people want to eat now?
                Indeed
                I don't know the figures but was reminded of things i've been told from a friend who used to live in Java. Indonesia is one of the most densely populated countries in the world but having a very different type of society feeds it's population in a different way. If we think (as seems to be the case) that a measure of "development" or "progress" is the freedom to eat Aspragus in October then there's no way that we can provide this......
                I do think there's an element of "script" in the "overpopulated little island" rhetoric

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                • MrGongGong
                  Full Member
                  • Nov 2010
                  • 18357

                  #23
                  Originally posted by Budapest View Post

                  On a more cheery note, I live in a very rural part of France. I don't grow much myself, yet get a lot from my farmer neighbours: potatos, strawberrys, veg, a freshly slaughtered lamb, etc, all seasonal. When you eat real food like this you get some understanding of the tasteless rubbish they sell in the nearest big supermarket.
                  .
                  That's what you get when you have a government that wants to support local non "economically viable" food production coupled with the effects of the EU............

                  Comment

                  • Lateralthinking1

                    #24
                    Originally posted by Budapest View Post
                    Not everyone can - or would want to - live in middle of nowhere France.
                    Just my kind of place. What time does the next boat leave from Dover?

                    I'll do a deal. Just say yes and I will put up with a broken down caravan for the next 20 years.

                    Comment

                    • jean
                      Late member
                      • Nov 2010
                      • 7100

                      #25
                      Originally posted by Budapest View Post
                      Not everyone can - or would want to - live in middle of nowhere France.
                      Not even the French, apparently!

                      I spent some time last year in the beautiful town of Le Dorat, in the Limousin. Practically deserted.

                      Comment

                      • amateur51

                        #26
                        Originally posted by Oddball View Post
                        This report is a load of balls in my view. Useful ammunition for speculators and property developers. But anyone living as I do in central Hertfordshire, being assailed on all sides with threats of developments of all kinds, will be appalled at this. The figures quoted are meaningless.
                        People need houses, Oddball.

                        Meaningful fact!

                        Comment

                        • MrGongGong
                          Full Member
                          • Nov 2010
                          • 18357

                          #27
                          I think it's important to remember that the "countryside" is as much a constructed landscape as the towns and cities........ there is a kind of nostalgia for a fictitious rural idyll (which is what the Olympics opening looks like being about !) which never really existed. Its a salutary experience to walk in the "remote" parts of Scotland and to continuously trip over the traces of where thousands of people used to live until sheep became more economically viable than people.

                          I also remembered going to Ravenscar in North Yorkshire , which now is a beautiful "unspoiled" rural environment yet from from 1640 to 1862 had a huge industrial Alum works on the site a until a chemical process was discovered of making Alum synthetically ...............

                          which is NOT to say that we should build over every bit of green land , but save us from Poundbury

                          Comment

                          • amateur51

                            #28
                            Originally posted by MrGongGong View Post
                            I think it's important to remember that the "countryside" is as much a constructed landscape as the towns and cities........ there is a kind of nostalgia for a fictitious rural idyll (which is what the Olympics opening looks like being about !) which never really existed. Its a salutary experience to walk in the "remote" parts of Scotland and to continuously trip over the traces of where thousands of people used to live until sheep became more economically viable than people.

                            I also remembered going to Ravenscar in North Yorkshire , which now is a beautiful "unspoiled" rural environment yet from from 1640 to 1862 had a huge industrial Alum works on the site a until a chemical process was discovered of making Alum synthetically ...............

                            which is NOT to say that we should build over every bit of green land , but save us from Poundbury
                            Great stuff, MrGG!

                            Comment

                            • ahinton
                              Full Member
                              • Nov 2010
                              • 16122

                              #29
                              Originally posted by Lateralthinking1 View Post
                              Just my kind of place. What time does the next boat leave from Dover?

                              I'll do a deal. Just say yes and I will put up with a broken down caravan for the next 20 years.
                              Well, it'll be the boat from Portsmouth for me but, although I don't yet know when, I'm planning to go and live there eventually and have a wee plot on which to build; it's not in one of the most remote areas of rural France admittedy, although it's a long distance from urbanity and industriality (I'm referring to the southern Charente, very close to the border with northern Dordogne).

                              Comment

                              • MrGongGong
                                Full Member
                                • Nov 2010
                                • 18357

                                #30
                                Originally posted by ahinton View Post
                                (I'm referring to the southern Charente, very close to the border with northern Dordogne).
                                As in "Dordogne twinned with Borsetshire"

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