Collaboration between different layers of government, a clear regeneration vision, a spirit of innovation and shrewd public investment can revitalise neglected areas
Great piece Dave. I worked for LOCOG from 2008 to 2013 alongside some of the ODA people you interviewed, and one of my sidelines was taking groups on bus tours of the Olympic Park as it was being developed. From navigating by piles of mud and the ‘soil hospital’ in the early days to seeing the roof go on the Aquatics Centre, it gave me great pride to see the Park evolve. And it gives me great pride to visit it now.
But there are still sceptics. Oh yes, those who claim wholesale displacement of communities, destruction of allotments, the loss of thriving businesses. No. The area was a contaminated s**thole and what we have now is near-miraculous in comparison.
There are certainly arguments to be had around social value for residents in the Olympic boroughs. Around housing in particular.
But the Park? It’s a truly remarkable legacy for everyone. And proof that ambition and vision can deliver.
To the extent that the effect, long-term, on London as a whole, of the overall Olympics investment, won't really be known for a long time - as is the nature of major investments that have a life of a 100, if not 00s, of years, will not be known should qualify a little the enthusiasm. I have now led several walks in and around, and through, the Olympic Park. It has its moments, but is a mixture of planned and sanitised garden 'air' about it. Will the cultural centre of gravity move East? Hmmm ... the effect of the last 12 years of the barbarians in Westminster - the killing off of much that is significant all around the country - and it's not just London and the travails of ENO - are not harbingers of optimism, along with the closures of libraries and more, as local authorities have been, and are further, squeezed. Super-cosmopolitan? Maybe.
Ed Balls, of course, was never Chancellor of the Exchequer
Great piece Dave. I worked for LOCOG from 2008 to 2013 alongside some of the ODA people you interviewed, and one of my sidelines was taking groups on bus tours of the Olympic Park as it was being developed. From navigating by piles of mud and the ‘soil hospital’ in the early days to seeing the roof go on the Aquatics Centre, it gave me great pride to see the Park evolve. And it gives me great pride to visit it now.
But there are still sceptics. Oh yes, those who claim wholesale displacement of communities, destruction of allotments, the loss of thriving businesses. No. The area was a contaminated s**thole and what we have now is near-miraculous in comparison.
There are certainly arguments to be had around social value for residents in the Olympic boroughs. Around housing in particular.
But the Park? It’s a truly remarkable legacy for everyone. And proof that ambition and vision can deliver.
To the extent that the effect, long-term, on London as a whole, of the overall Olympics investment, won't really be known for a long time - as is the nature of major investments that have a life of a 100, if not 00s, of years, will not be known should qualify a little the enthusiasm. I have now led several walks in and around, and through, the Olympic Park. It has its moments, but is a mixture of planned and sanitised garden 'air' about it. Will the cultural centre of gravity move East? Hmmm ... the effect of the last 12 years of the barbarians in Westminster - the killing off of much that is significant all around the country - and it's not just London and the travails of ENO - are not harbingers of optimism, along with the closures of libraries and more, as local authorities have been, and are further, squeezed. Super-cosmopolitan? Maybe.
Ed Balls, of course, was never Chancellor of the Exchequer
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