Stratford london 2012 - an area under change. Scope for green development.
Stratford-An area for change
Stratford shopping centre
Water lane Road
Waddington Road
Gerry Raffles Square
2: I visited those places above to explore if my area is a sustainable community and find out what is needed in a development. In order to do that I have to create a questionnaire for public people to ask for their opinion about changes of Stratford, I took photographs to back up my points as well as note down the sustainability of those area and other useful information given by a talk from a representative of the Olympics 2012. Sustainability means proving long term needs for people and to make sure the environment is healthy so people would want to stay in the area. As I visited places I took pictures and gave each place a score out of 10, rating how densely the building is, building material, how water and energy being measured, transports, landscape, social mix, recreation, air pollution, recycling, economic opportunity and car parking.
3: Firstly, I went to Gerry Raffles Square building, which located behind Stratford shopping centre and to the north.
This building originally built for offices but then changed in to accommodation for local residents. Charles Dillon bought this area in the 1870s to set up a theatre then it later on became the Stratford Theatre Royal. The theatre was under threat with the construction of the shopping centre in 1970. Gerry Raffles managed to keep the area clean and redecorated it. After that building was built in the early 21st century, it was then chosen to name after him. This flat has 10 stories therefore it has high densities. Each storey has double glazing windows as well as blinds for blocking the sun. There is also a balcony but the view is not as nice as the shopping centre is right in front of it. The flat is made of metals, glass and bricks. I think inside is not as spacious because those rooms were used as offices. Balconies are almost touching each other. The maximum bedrooms are 2. By looking from the outside of the building I noticed that there is no staircases in sight like other flat, tenants have to use lifts. There is no recycling bin around and not a lot of plants around to reduce pollution. 80 metres away from Gerry Raffle Square, there is a parking area. It is free to park for residents but you have to pay at certain time. Despite all the disadvantages though, it is built in a good location. There is Stratford train station which is 5 minutes walk and later there will be an international train express. Furthermore there is an excellent bus routes near the accommodation. There is a cinema right next to it and Stratford Circus plus a theatre. Underneath the flats are two restaurants, Caribbean and Chinese selling international food. On top of that, it is adjacent to the shopping centre with loads of shops. Residents can shop in Sainsbury for food or Morrisons. For young children, there is a library and Stratford park, 3 minutes on the bus. Numbers of jobs are available in the area but people do not have enough skill to do that. Majority are on benefits. In the future, it is going to cost them a lot more to live in Gerry Raffles Square because of the Olympics 2012. I collected my data by using my list of sustainable scorecard, observation skills and comments as well as resources I found on the internet.
Secondly I walked to Waddington Road and had a look at the accommodation for older people, Holden Point. The area looked rather old and quiet. There were two recycling bins, a parking space for disabled people who live in Holden Point as well as paying parking facility for local residents. There is a small recreation ground for young kids. There is also a church nearby with an art centre not too far away from it. Atherton leisure centre is about 15 minutes away from this road. It is good if you want to relax and exercise to improve your health. This area is quite green because it has a lot of trees and bushes to make the air clean and smell fresh. The main type of houses on this road is maisonette, flats and houses with chimneys. Buildings built from bricks with wooden doors as well as PVC windows. Holden Point has 21 floors. There is no bus stop within 80 metres radius. You have to walk to the main road to get the 69 or to Maryland Station and walking to the shopping centre would take 10 minutes on foot. There is a limit of social mix; the main people that live here are elderly. There are a few jobs opportunity in the shopping centre or in the pubs. Personally I do not find it safe to walk around in this part at night time as there are a lot of hidden places and alleys. Next to the building there are old garages, by looking at the chipping doors and wood. I reckon they were built in the 60s or 70s. Holden Point uses meters on each dwelling to measure how much electricity they use.
Thirdly, Water lane Road was the last place I visited. It is a main road with houses on display. This region has medium densities with mainly townhouses (picture) and some terraces. The materials that were used in these buildings are mixture of bricks, PVC double glazing windows and doors. Including slate for the roof. This area measures their electricity in meters and there are pipes under the ground for water. It is not 100% safe for kids to be playing out on this road as they could get run over by cars. Maryland Station is right next to it therefore tenants are affected by noise and car pollution. Additionally, the access to recycling point is very poor; however tenants can still use recycling bags and place them in front of their house for dustbin man to collect it. Transport is not exactly good as there are only three buses that go by. Often takes long to wait too. The train station is good but there is no barrier therefore people can use the facility without paying. Trees are not planted on this road. There are more trees on small streets than the main road. The recreation grounds are very limited. Atherton leisure centre is close by and a library. They are probably the only local clubs for young adults. However it is very easy for adults to go shopping as it would only take 5 minutes. The shopping centre is also in the area. Since it is in Stratford, there are wide variety of jobs opportunities available in Reed but people are not qualified enough to take on the jobs. Parking space is very limited because I saw a ticket machine. It is a challenging area for disabled people because it is difficult for them to find a place to park on road. I believe these houses were built in the 1970s because they look quite old and the materials are not modern.
4: This is the Olympics Village under construction. I took this picture when I was on the top floor of Holden Point. The government decided to build it in Stratford because it is one of the poorest parts of this capital city. Their aim is to raise the economic profile of London. Stratford has great transport links, from national rail services to international station, which is being built. It is near major roads that lead to central London as well as Excel exhibition centre. After the game, we are entitled to use all the facilities there or even ...
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4: This is the Olympics Village under construction. I took this picture when I was on the top floor of Holden Point. The government decided to build it in Stratford because it is one of the poorest parts of this capital city. Their aim is to raise the economic profile of London. Stratford has great transport links, from national rail services to international station, which is being built. It is near major roads that lead to central London as well as Excel exhibition centre. After the game, we are entitled to use all the facilities there or even live in the Athlete's accommodation and use other facilities like the swimming pool. The councils are trying to make this community more sustainable after 2012 and keep people in the area, helping east London to reach the highest standard like other boroughs. Despite all the advantages, local people are already worried about their rent is going to increase; too much pollution will put them under pressure. But they only have to put up with it for a while. There will also be lots of job opportunities available for my generation. I am going to make the most of it when it comes to 2012.
This massive piece of land will be covering 70% of the game. There will be thousands of beds for athletes, high street shops like John Lewis, restaurants, medical, media and leisure facilities, large areas of open space for everyone and water feature. The Village also comes with International Zone for athletes to meet their friends and family. Everyone can enjoy free wireless internet access as well as other modern communication.
This picture shows the international station. The completion of this station was in April 2006 but yet still not in use. This service is going to be so helpful to assist people from France and other tourists to come to Stratford to watch the game.
The train connects London with Europe via Euro star. Next to the station are huge John Lewis and Mark and Spencer shops. There will also be lots of other high street clothing stores too. You can see the Gherkin building in the back ground, which means central London is not far away. Citizens can always get on the central line in Stratford to get there.
Within the blue fence, it is where the basket ball and hockey games are going to be competed. There are also so many games where children can play and train. Just outside the blue fence to your right is where the BMX track is. The Athlete village is not too far from the hockey pitch.
This is a bird's eye view of the Olympic Village (overlay picture), the council will try to make this area a sustainable area. This means to provide for peoples' current and long-term needs like jobs and accommodation, improving quality of life while ensuring a healthy and thriving natural environment. As the most high-profile event in the world, the Games give us the chance to show how changes to the way we build, live, work, do business and travel could help us to live happy and healthy lives, within our planet's resources.
The blue circle is for indoor sports like taekwondo, boxing, judo, wrestling, weightlifting, table tennis and fencing. They are going to be in the Excel exhibition centre, located in Royal Docks. This centre is near Stratford and near the O2 arena. This is very good location as it is near all the landmarks and leisure places in London including Canary Wharf building, the tallest building in UK. It is surrounds by a few restaurants and hotel. London City airport is not far away from this exhibition centre.
5:
* Gerry Raffle Square got a 105/140 for its
sustainability.
* Waddington Road and Holden Point received 90/140 for its sustainability.
* Water Lane scored 85/140 for its sustainability
Gerry Raffle Square has got the highest mark because the area is the most sustainable out of those 3 places. It has all the good transports and other modern conveniences. Unlike Water Lane and Holden Point, Gerry Raffle Square is right in the heart of Stratford. It is close to the station so if the residents want to go to central London, it would be really quick. In addition, the shopping centres with lots of shops so they have more choices of what to buy. There is good social mix such as people with different profession as well as age therefore this building is suitable for everyone. The job opportunities are better than Waddington Road because Gerry Raffle Square is central business district therefore they can find jobs in retails. They have access to recycling point and this helps to environment. The only disadvantage is that the place is very small because the building was used as offices. I believe people living in this building will find the sun facing their windows in the afternoon. They have blinds covering their windows. Majority people living in Gerry Raffle Square are couples with small family otherwise they will find it difficult to manage with so many people in so little space.
6&7: I made 5 graphs for the results of my sustainable questionnaire. I was in Stratford shopping centre and had to approach people to ask them questions. After that my teacher put together mine and other students' results together.
My first graph is the number of people that took part, there were 65 people together. I grouped them up into gender, male and female. My figure shows that there were more female in Stratford at that time than male. There could be two possibilities, the women stay at home or shop and the men go to work or it was just that ladies are more friendly and easy to talk to.
I also put them in different age group. 40% are 19-30, 24% are 31-40 and 14% are 18 or under. The rest are 41 plus. This suggests that 19-30 residents do not have jobs and under 18 did not want to be in school. There were 41 local residents and 24 who live outside Newham.
There were 65 people took part in our little survey and more than half lived in Newham and 24 were not Newham residents. This shows a lot of people passing through this area or go to work here.
Above graph shows people from different locations in Newham that were in Stratford. My figure read that majority residents are from E6 and E15. It is because E15 is Stratford therefore a lot of people would be out shopping; furthermore they don't have to travel far. E6 residents come to Stratford for shopping or going to work, there were 12 or more at the mall. Others just doing the same thing like people in Little Ilford or Manor Park. E7, E12 and E13 have got the same amount of people which is 5 but there is a possibility that more than 5 people from those area could be there too. Why would people from the Little Ilford come all the way to Stratford when they have a bigger shopping centre near them? That suggest they could come to Stratford for the transport. The lowest number of people is 2 and come from E16. This could be that they prefer Gallions Reach Retail Park over Stratford shopping centre.
There are 21 people who work in the borough. By linking this result in with my employment graph, people who live in work in Newham (21/24), their jobs probably are health career, hospitality, logistics and transport. Majority people are working for the education as teachers or the transport industry. People who don't work in Newham work in some where like in the city because they come to Stratford for the train to go to work.
My next two graphs are for area of employment. These are the departments of work which they may work for. However, there some unemployed whom I believe were student and people relying on benefits.
My figure shows that there are 7 people who work in the administration department, followed by education and health care. The jobs that not a lot of people do were finance, engineering, legal finance services, construction, tourism, transport, law and manufacturing. I think that the only factory in Newham is Tate and Lyle refinery in Silvertown, but this factory do not need a lot of people as everything is done by machines. Therefore engineering and manufacturing jobs are not popular. There were 12 people who did not have a job. People who have good jobs like in finance tend to live in different area. The reason I asked this question is because I wanted to find out what kind of jobs that are needed or missing in Newham like IT and human resources therefore we should provide businesses that need people in these kinds of jobs.
Yes we do need another shopping centre. People claimed that Stratford does not have a lot of shops. There are two retailers being built near Stratford station ready for the Olympics 2012.
My main question for them was the impacts of the Olympics 2012, majority voted for housing price increase and more jobs opportunities. The rental increase and improved services got a tie. The top 3 effects they were unsure are healthier lifestyle, relocation of home and relocation of business. I think they didn't have enough information or they believed that the Olympics won't make any different.
I constructed a different bar graph to show what people think about Newham's services. I asked them to rate the standard of our transport, street cleaning, education, youth clubs, police, provision for disabled, provision for elderly residents, parks, recycling/waste disposal and public housing. Some people were not able to comment some services like education as they don't live in this borough.
By looking at my graph, I can tell that our top 3 favorite facilities are parks, transport and education, followed by public housing, police, recycling and provision for disabled. The number of public thought that provisions for elderly residents are both good and bad. The only thing we need to improve the most is street cleaning because there are 16 individuals ranked it as poor and only 9 thought it is pleasant. Their view on the Olympics is that there will be a lot of pollution and traffic which residents might not be able to cope. However loads of jobs will be created and many will be benefit from this game. They believe local community will get together and do more things which involve everyone, making Newham a better and friendly community.
Overall, I consider that our services are quite good. With the game coming will make a huge difference to Newham society. People will want to live here and stay in the area. I think not only it will change the way we live but the way we interact with the world. I believe my generation will be so benefit from this transformation.
8: Choosing the right facilities, services and others that are missing in Stratford which I believe the council couldn't afford. Using the data I collected, disabled people will need more facilities to access buildings. Public housing needs to be more modernize and consist of sustainable material such as glass. There should be more recycling points so residents can help tackle the climate change. However since the Olympics is coming, lots of new facilities will be built. I think this will help local people's life much easier and more convenience. There will be more youth clubs to keep them off the street. The neighbor hood will be safer because there will be more police patrolling the streets. The only thing we need to think about is how to maintain these so generations after generations can still be able to use them. I'm going to include all the missing services or services that needed to improve base on the rating of services in Newham
Stratford will need more clean new bus stops because those ones at the moment are old and damaged. Some places don't even have a bus shelter.
New modern public housing for council tenant. This area needs more of this because the conditions of the present houses are not good. There is a garage.
More free cash machines in local shops or near bus stops. This will be so helpful and anyone can have easy access to it. It should be near every off license or corner shop.
Better park with more play grounds for kids. There should be more trees and benches for family to enjoy.
Youth clubs are quite important and Newham doesn't have a lot of these. Youth clubs keep young people off troubles and street.
As the Olympics is coming, we need to look after our environment more and start to do more recycling. More recycling bins and facilities should increase.
New patterns for pavements. Our pavements at the moment are uneven and ugly. New pattern should be built to make the street much more pleasant to walk on this link to street cleaning to keep our roads clean.
Renewable energy resources will be really useful. we are using too much oil and fuels, they will run out in short amount of time so more renewable energy sources like solar power is so useful and good for our environment.
Cycling lane, this is important if people want to ride to work. This type of transport has no pollution at all and keeps our planet clean. It also is a good exercise.
Newham is the 12th borough that has the highest crime rate in London. To prevent this we should have more police and increase street search for knives-carry-people.
Disabled people have the least facilities. There should be more provision for disabled and more facilities like car park or lifts
New modern flats are needed in this area because flats that we have now are old and dirty. A little area with green in front of it would be an ideal flat.
Elderly needs more help like a lift in a flat if they live in one. Wheelchairs should be available when they need to get around.
Streets need to be clean all the times with bins around for people to put their litter in. streets cleaners would go around hourly to make sure our streets are clean so the air will be fresher.
9: I would plan a lot of new developments consider people's needs. Newham residents are aware of the Olympics 2012 will have a major affect on them like the pollution. I believe there should be a lot of trees planted because there aren't a lot of them, instead there are more concrete. Wheelchairs users will have more facilities like the slope to help them get to places easier. I was given the task to redesign the Olympics Village where the retail parks, media centre and other services area are. By taking in people at Stratford's opinion, I would say their ultimate need is a job. I would put some hotels there and that business will help people to a job, even for students at UEL. There should be more restaurants with different culture foods because Newham is a very diversity borough. There should be a massive shopping hall with a few different retailers providing goods and services. There would be a monorail going around the village so everyone can have a good view of it. This village also features with water fountains and some free service like wireless internet. I believe this development will help thousands of people to a job.
0:
This is my ideal development. I would build a monorail around the area so everyone can get a good view of the beautiful park. This village includes a 3 stars hotel for tourists as it is near the international railway. There would be a day-care-centre in case parents want to go shopping and let someone else look after their kids. There would be an accommodation for everyone but majority rooms are for students because there is a university close by. There is a communication where people can surf internet for free within 100m range. There is a shopping centre provide goods and other services for everyone. People can go there to apply for jobs, there are also jobs available for teenagers too.
1: My first design which I believe isn't as sustainable as my new design. I kept some buildings the same and changed some. I also added a shopping centre to the area.
I used the round building for communication centre because I liked the shape. This centre provides people with services like telephone calls within the UK or international calls, internet and other information. People can enjoy surfing free internet within 200m range. This building is quite big so I want to include an ice rink for family -day-out. This ice rink will have 200 seats so schools can do competitions. I believe this centre will provide people with loads of jobs like administration and IT. Leisure jobs such as instructor or security.
I chose the building with glass window for the shopping centre because it is environmental friendly. They would use natural sunlight instead of using electricity. This centre has interesting design and large. River Island, 24/7Asda, WHsmith for students and other people and Bhs retailers will dominate this beautiful building. Local residents will be benefit from this because they can get a job in this shopping centre regardless their lack of skills. This is suitable for people that do not have high qualification. The two tall blocks joint together with a bridge is for accommodation. This building will have 15 stories each and made out of glass. 45% of this tall building is for students because students need rooms to stay while studying because there is a university near by. The rest are for people who can not afford to buy their own home. The rent to live there will not be high and some will be owned by Newham council. There is also another accommodation for private own, part buy part rent. There are also penthouses available. The final nice building is the triangle. This is the 3 star hotel for tourists, this completes with big car park for public giving out 23,000 free parking at certain time of the day. This will help people to find jobs in financial and human resources because they are going to employ people and will have to look after the hotel's finance.
This village has large grass area and loads of trees. There is a water fountain which lights up at night. There is also a huge restaurant for everyone; it will be selling international foods. These restaurants will help people to find jobs in hospitality and part time jobs for students. There is a security unit to make sure the area is safe 24/7 and CCTV cameras around this should prevent crimes rate in Newham. There is also a day-care centre for parents or career. Recycling bins and recycling points will be around the park. Disabled facilities will be built in every building in this area.
This will attract a lot of people to come here to view this beautiful village. I think it will help Newham become a better borough. People will not have to reply on income support and they can work for themselves. This could be the first step bringing Newham closer to the standard it should be. If people want to enter the park, they have to go by foot as there is no bus. They can ride the bicycle because it does no harm to the environment. There is a train station there so getting around shouldn't be a problem.
2: I have chosen these designs for my buildings in the village is because they are made of good materials such as glass. They let in lights and absorb sunlight to keep the heat in so people would use less electricity. Furthermore, they have got interesting shapes and are built on a good location. It is an excellent location because it connects with important places like central London. People can always use the trains. There is also a service for tourists using Euro star. After the Olympics, people in the area will have so many benefits of using the facilities. Tourists from all over the world would come here to view this beautiful park. This proves to people that Newham is a creative area and this development has regenerated the image of this borough. Additionally, local residents would have more jobs that available for all level of skills. This will make them stay in the borough and work for Newham. This park has plenty of services and other leisure facilities suitable for people of all ages. Newham residents would stay in their borough and wouldn't move to a different area. This will bring the economy of Newham to higher level.
I have included all people's need and took in consideration from their opinion when I did the survey in Stratford. There would be more street cleaners to keep Newham clean and more shops because people have such a high demand on this. Young people would not have to be on street instead they can get a part time job or seek leisure in the ice rink in the village. I believe this will reduce the knife crime in the borough. Everybody's safety is very important and there is a security unit which will keep them safe all the time.
HALLY 10R GEO