Terry Farrell & Partners - General Development - Thames Gateway Event

Date: 04 Dec 2003

New kind of National Park proposed by leading architect, think tank and conservation authorities

The east has long been the poor, neglected side of London and was recently described in the press as the "Cockney Siberia". The Thames Gateway initiative provides a unique opportunity to alter this negative perception dramatically and to transform the region radically. As yet, the initiative lacks an identifiable, coherent vision. In reality, the initiative is as much about the rural renaissance as urban regeneration. These are the issues that will be debated at this thought-provoking event to discuss a new vision for the Thames Gateway tonight.

The evening event is being hosted by architects Terry Farrell & Partners, English Heritage, environmental charity and campaign group the Campaign to Protect Rural England and think tank DEMOS. The event will be chaired by Paul Hyett and will include a keynote presentation by Sir Terry Farrell.

This event proposes a radical and exciting alternative and vision for the Thames Gateway. We can achieve all the development proposed - 200,000 new homes and more - through high density, low-rise development. In fact most of the area in question will remain countryside. We need to seize the opportunity to focus on a big new vision for the landscape - the primary task is therefore to use landscape as the big coherent vision.

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The evening sets a challenge - to change the public perception of the Thames Gateway as a post-industrial landscape, into a new kind of National Park on the doorstep of London.

Sir Terry Farrell has said of the Thames Gateway, "We are looking at a fascinating but damaged landscape which has suffered from industrialisation and neglect. The landscape of the UK is almost entirely man-made and we have the opportunity to re-make the Thames Gateway.

'For too long we have been living off the landscape assets of the past, not creating anything. Why not create a new type of National Park for the Thames Gateway? A new place which is deliberately designed, planned and built as a legacy for the future - a new landscape asset, consciously located on the doorstep of London, proactively promoted by a new kind of organisation - a Thames National Park Development Agency."

A representative cross-section of politicians, planners, developers, corporate bodies and residents of the Thames Gateway are invited. The event will be an ideal forum within which to canvas and exchange views as well as a springboard towards "making things happen".

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