What makes a neighbourhood a good place to live? The people. Maybe the parks and schools and the local doctors and other public services… What about the shops, the job opportunities and the other things which are provided by local businesses…
Local schools can define a neighbourhood and attract people to a place – perhaps more than any other public service. Can schools, however, be involved in making better places to live through community planning?
Some neighbourhoods thrive on change and others seem to decline? One of the factors – perhaps the most important – in this is the local community network and the people and places which help generate it…
Planning permissions and local plans are not isolated decisions or policies – they are part of a local planning system which is joined up to national policies…
The way social housing is managed matters to tenants and to the wider community. Tenant panels enable tenants to get involved in making decisions…
If you are working together to improve the neighbourhood, then you might want to think about forming a neighbourhood co-op…
Planning is the process of working out what to do for the best. We use planning in all sorts of ways – as individuals and groups; and to achieve complex ends as well as simple objectives…
Freedom of information means that recorded infromation held by public authorities is generally presumed to be publicly available, but there are exceptions and limits…
The ‘community rights’ in the Localism Act can be exercised by certain designated groups on behalf of the community…