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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
23 of 23 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
very interesting read,
By SJ (UK) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Ground Control: Fear and happiness in the twenty-first-century city (Paperback)
The author deals with a wealth of issues in one slender volume - it's a fascinating up to date description + explanation of the rise of certain popularist (planning) policies in the UK, copied mostly from the US, which have or are having a negative effect on the towns and cities we live in. And the fact that these decisions are so unpublicised, we are sleep walking into a "clean + safe" yet extremely paranoid and unhappy world. This book made me angry and frustrated - a must read for anyone wondering where the "public" spaces are and who and what "public" bodies control these spaces. Clearly written and concise, and not at all boring or text booky (a book about planning policies??) it explains the links between and consequences of market lead planning decisions, and makes all the issues extremely relevant to every one of us. I now actually want to read alot more about the subject...
38 of 39 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A New Civic Space,
This review is from: Ground Control: Fear and happiness in the twenty-first-century city (Paperback)
The importance of this book cannot be overlooked. It is about how growing security, from CCTV to gated developments, is a manifestation of a paranoia that has arisen in society over the past generation. This fear, the author points out, does not correspond to a steady rise in crime, which has in fact gone down. Instead, it can be traced to factors such as the deregulation of the finance markets in the eighties, soaring property prices and boom and bust, as well as policies on crime and anti-social behaviour. Written in an accessible but compelling style it draws together changes in policy with the emotional effects these can have on our lives. By making use of the opinions of experts as well as testimonies of the communities most affected by the changes, the book, which is based on a journey around Britain, clarifies just how these changes happened. For those of us who wonder why all our high streets look the same, or pass a shop or housing that has been empty for some time, when there is a housing crisis, the answers point to the unregulated property economy adopted by the Labour government. The book is important because it also focusses on alternative European models of civic space that could be adopted in the UK. In short it addresses issues of personal well-being that affect society as a whole.
13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Happiness can be through design,
By
This review is from: Ground Control: Fear and happiness in the twenty-first-century city (Paperback)
An important book full of insight and understanding into the way that society and its design have been forcefully changed since the early 1980s. I knew about many of the individual subjects and have lived in parts of the country watching the errors that have been made. I'm a doctor and have spoken with the people looked on as dregs of society, and simply are not. I've lived in places where the design of the town has wrecked the interactions of people themselves. I've watched as commercial giants have told us what we want and how we want it in our town.
A brilliant breath of air, simply writing it all down. I have ordered a pile more of these books and will be giving them out to our planning department. Ground Control goes through the important factors in our lives and we should all get going to do something about it. Excellent.
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