Communities and Local Government

• Cities and regions
• Outcome of the scoping report

Cities and regions

Outcome of the scoping report

Introduction

Work to produce the State of the Cities Report (SOCR) was commissioned in late April 2004 to a research consortium led by Professor Michael Parkinson of the European Institute of Urban Affairs, Liverpool John Moores University. At the inception it was agreed that a scoping stage would be built into the contract to:

• Refine, focus and develop thinking on the scope of the SOCR
• Assess the feasibility of addressing the key questions within the timeframe and resources available.

The scoping stage was also aiming to deal with the potentially very wide-ranging scope of the State of the Cities Report. It was envisaged a scoping stage would help ensure coherence and focus for the report thorough further work and consultation with a range of stakeholders.

Background

The State of the Cities Report is an Urban White Paper 2000 ¹ commitment and builds on the Sustainable Communities Plan launched in 2003. ² It is an important project given the growing recognition of the importance of cities in creating sustainable communities.

The report will be a major review of English towns and cities and will include a comprehensive assessment of urban conditions and an examination of what drives urban change. It will also assess the contribution of cities to national success and will evaluate the impact of policies on urban areas, reviewing their progress and performance.

The final State of the Cities Report will be published in late 2005 and an progress report will be launched at the Sustainable Communities Summit in January 2005. A substantial and user-friendly data set of indicators of urban performance, which will form much of the evidence base for the reports, will be made available in late 2005.

Key messages from the scoping stage

The response from a range of stakeholders has been generally very positive. Some key messages are:

• There is a great amount of enthusiasm, interest and support for the project.
• The project is ambitious, realism is required regarding what is feasible within the time and resources.
• There will be trade offs in terms of what is possible and what is desirable
• Key questions should drive the SOCR and not data availability
• The database should be simple, accessible and flexible. It should use tried and tested indicators which take account of current policy targets.
• The project needs to look at the impact of policies on urban areas, whilst recognising few answers may exist on the impact of recent policies.
• Qualitative evidence is important.

Who we consulted

In the scoping stage a range of presentations and bilateral meetings were held. Bilaterals will continue over the course of the project, as it is important to the success of the project to engage with stakeholders as well as those who have access to key datasets and evidence. Consultations have been held with:

• ODPM colleagues
• Other Government Departments, Government Offices and territories (including Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland)
• Non Departmental Public Bodies such as RDAs and the Housing Corporation

Key Achievements

The scoping stage has resulted in a number of positive outcomes:

• Greater clarity on the scope of the work and what is possible within the resources and timeframe
• Key decisions made on themes, spatial levels, geographical coverage, boundaries, choice of indicators, data sources and case studies.
• Views discussed and taken on board from a range of stakeholders
• Working relations established with some key stakeholders, technical experts and owners of the datasets.
• Links made with relevant other work from within Government and outside, including international State of the Cities Reports.

Key decisions

Themes

The report will cover four main themes:

• Governance and the Urban Impact of Policy
• Economic Performance of Cities
• Social Cohesion and Exclusion
• Urban Liveability

Spatial Levels

A range of spatial levels will be used in the report, reflecting the need to analyse data at appropriate levels. The spatial levels include cities (primary urban area level), city regions (Travel to Work areas), Local Authorities, regions (Government Offices), wards and neighbourhoods or 'tracts' (which are based on ward level information but unlike ward boundaries enable comparisons over time).

Geographical Coverage

There will be an in-depth focus on 56 cities (primary urban areas) at various spatial levels. Data for Local Authority areas and regions will be provided for the whole of England. Further in-depth analysis will be carried out on 12 case studies across England (see below).

Boundaries

The starting point for the project is the very recently published Urban Area definitions based on 2001 built-up areas ³ . This is in line with the United Nations guideline to identify major cities in terms of their 'bricks and mortar' physical extent and not in terms of the Local Authority areas, which can vary enormously between cities.

Choice of Indicators

The aim of the SOC database is not to replace existing datasets or reinvent wheels. We intend to make good use of existing data which will be pulled together to allow understanding of key urban conditions and trends. The indicators will be chosen on the basis of their being:

• Focused - relating to a key characteristic of urban success
• Measurable - the data should be readily available
• Robust - they should be transparent and understandable to a range of users
• Timely - and available for more than one point in time
• Selective - and limited in number.

Data Sources

The emphasis will be in using existing indicators from official sources and will be drawn from for example, the Regional Competitiveness Indicators, Public Service Agreement targets, Egan Review of Sustainable Communities Indicators and the European Commission Urban Audit II.

Case Studies

Case studies will take place in 12 urban areas across England. These are:

• London
• Manchester
• Birmingham
• Bristol
• Cambridge
• Derby
• Burnley
• Leicester
• Leeds
• Sunderland
• Sheffield
• Medway Towns.

Case studies have been chosen to represent a mix of successful and less successful areas in terms of governance, social cohesion, economic competitiveness and liveability issues.

¹ DETR (2000) 'Our towns and cities: the future. Delivery an urban renaissance', The Stationery Office, London.

² ODPM (2003) 'Sustainable Communities: building for the future', ODPM, London.

³ Published by the Office of National Statistics, see www.nationalstatistics.gov.uk/census2001/ks_ub_ad.asp