A New Policy for Britain's Cities: Choices, Challenges, Contradictions

Abstract

The general perception of cities has been transformed over the last decade. The purpose of the article is to consider the idea and reality of urban revitalisation and to examine whether the government's emerging spatial policy will help to strengthen and sustain the revival. Evidence shows that there has been a significant improvement in urban economic conditions in recent years, but the short-term outlook is less favourable. While the government has taken some useful steps along the road to a more effective policy for cities, there is further to go. There are also important dilemmas to be addressed that go beyond a simple spatial fix.

Acknowledgements

Thanks are due to Lorraine Temple for her assistance with the data analysis and to Richard Cairns, Ines Newman and Trevor Davies for their comments on an earlier draft.

Notes

¹ It should be said that this is not yet properly incorporated into the Treasury's Green Book or other guidance on the evaluation of spatial policy, which continue to assume that the effects are largely distributional. This probably reflects continuing tensions within and between the Treasury and other government departments on this issue.