1. GEOG3025 Concepts of neighbourhood

2. GEOG3025 Concepts of neighbourhood Lecture overview: Objectives of lecture Introductory questions Neighbourhood defintions Neighbourhood boundaries Relationship with official geographies Lecture summary

3. GEOG3025 Objectives To understand why the concept of neighbourhood is –So important to residents and policy-makers –So difficult to define –So difficult to bound geographically

4. GEOG3025 Introductory questions… In which neighbourhood do you live? Can you identify its boundaries? Why do you think of it as a neighbourhood?

5. GEOG3025 Need for definition… Application of effective policy requires geographical definitions, measurable characteristics, baseline data – ways of measuring change

6. GEOG3025 Neighbourhood definitions Ecological –Distinct classifiable entity with boundaries Ecological-social –Incorporating elements of social interaction Attribute bundles

7. GEOG3025 A definition… ‘Neighbourhood is the bundle of spatially based attributes associated with clusters of residences, sometimes in conjunction with other land uses’ –Galster (2001) NB spatially based

8. GEOG3025 Neighbourhood characteristics Structural Infrastructural Demographic Class status Tax/public service package Environmental Proximity Political Social-interactive Sentimental Not all attributes present in all areas to the same degree: ‘degree of presence of neighbourhood’

9. GEOG3025 Distinctive neighbourhoods? Sentimental, environmental? Class status, infrastructural? Photo: Dave Martin

10. GEOG3025 Multiple scales of neighbourhood Block face –Where children play Defended neighbourhood –Smallest area posessing corporate identity Community of limited liability –Selective/voluntary involvement in l. govt. Expanded community of limited liability –Sector of city

11. GEOG3025 Neighbourhood externality spaces Congruence –Degree of coincidence with predefined boundaries Generality –Degree of correspondence across attributes Accordance –Degree of agreement between individuals

12. GEOG3025 Reality check Perceptions of neighbourhood are very important If generality and accordance are high, then the identification of neighbourhood boundaries is behaviourally meaningful

13. GEOG3025 Durability and pricing Different attributes endure over different timescales –Structural characteristics endure for many years –Political characteristics may change during the course of a local election campaign Most social interactive aspects are hard to price – often based on predictions

14. GEOG3025 Consumers AND producers Residents, businesses, Property owners, Local government … Neighbourhood Producers Consumers

15. GEOG3025 Neighbourhood boundaries Most boundary systems being used by government are artefacts of administrative systems ‘there is clearly more to “neighbourhood” than these rather crude statistical measures would suggest and especially so when neighbourhoods, and the people living in them, are expected to form the building-blocks of policy.’ (Meegan and Mitchell, 2001)

16. GEOG3025 Wards as neighbourhoods? ‘to get an idea of what is going on at the neighbourhood level, statistics from electoral wards are often used. This is only a proxy – but at the moment it is the best one we have.’ (Social Exclusion Unit, 2001)

17. GEOG3025 Next lecture… Administrative and statistical geographies –Introduction to the numerous systems for the subdivision of the UK, for each of which we are able to obtain statistical information –And none of which correspond directly with any particular concept of neighbourhood!

18. GEOG3025 References overview Urban Studies Volume 12, Number 12 (2001) Neighbourhoods theme issue esp. Galster ‘On the nature of neighbourhood’

19. GEOG3025 Second assignment Choose a neighbourhood with which you are very familiar and produce a sketch map Compare your concept of this neighbourhood with at least two alternative conceptual frameworks: how do they relate to your experience? Post your observations to the discussion board

20. GEOG3025 Lecture summary Neighbourhood concepts and definitions Neighbourhood boundaries Inadequate approximations through official statistics Second assignment