realisedevelopment.net

Just another WordPress site

Leeds Arena – Winners and Losers?

by

So it seems certain that Leeds will get an Arena.

An important gap in our cultural birthright (the right to see middle-sized events that are not big enough for large stadiums but too big for 3000 seater venues, without having to travel 40 miles) will be plugged.

The city will have an ‘Arena sized’ ‘economic’ and ‘cultural’ engine like most other large northern cities.  We will no longer be different.  We will have ‘caught up’. Good for us!  The timing is interesting.  Leeds seems to be getting dangerously late into the ‘large events’ market.

Never again will the cry be heard ‘I have to leave Leeds for a city with an Arena’.  Another hole through which Leeds talent escapes will be forever filled.  Currently we lose too much talent to the south and west because of the ease with which one can take in a James Blunt gig in those places.

We want Leeds to develop an identity?  Let’s give it an iconic arena!   Perhaps one that changes colour? A place where we can go and view ‘talent’ when it briefly visits our city because of the economic upsides on offer.  Now THERE is a plan.

But perhaps I am pre-judging.  Perhaps the Arena will have coherent and resourced plans to provide Leeds with an affordable showcase for its own talent as well.  Perhaps it will have a meaningful programme of community engagement.  Perhaps it will become an asset for all of the city and not just those parts that can afford to pay?

I am not sure quite what the funding cocktail is for the latest plans for the arena.  Back in May it was just shy of £10m of Govt money in a £55m project.   I am not sure how much the council is putting in the pot. Or how much will come from private investors.  I can’t find much about it on the web.  But it seems now that the project has become an £80m investment. [Just been told that the Yorkshire Post is today running a story that says all £80m is coming from public sector purse.  £70m from Leeds City Council, £10m from Treasury].

That is a lot of investment.  And it will demand a return.  Clearly the investors believe they will see real financial gains from their investments.  They plan to be beneficiaries of the project.  And the public sector will rub its hands with glee at the increased GVA in the city.  And we can always rely on ‘trickle down‘ to ensure that we will all benefit from the redistribution of wealth that the new Arena will trigger.  Can’t we?  It is a part of an economic development strategy that says we can spend our way to a better future.

The developers, planners, architects and builders too will surely gain.  It is their raison d’etre to profit from this sort of project.

And for a couple of years we will create a few hundred jobs for builders, surveyors and other trades while the Arena is built.  And once it is in place there will no doubt be opportunities in Arena Management, retail and box-office.

And there will be a supply chain too who will benefit, Promoters, record labels and their artists, Marketing and Branding agencies, printers and franchise holders, maintenance workers and so on.

But it will not be a major employer in the city.  And most of the long terms jobs available to locals will be low skill and low wage, stewarding, ticketing, concierge and retail.

Of course it will be a major economic player. It has to be.  It will have to suck up hundreds of thousands of pounds every week in ticket sales.  It will have to be branded and hyped.  My vote would be for ‘The Marks and Spencer’ Arena to reflect Leeds noble retail heritage.  Hundreds of thousands of pounds that, yes, will pay wage bills, will pay for a supply chain and will provide a return to investors and managers.  It will be fascinating to see how much of the cash hoovered up by the Arena will actually be retained in the city.  My guess is that much of it will leave the Leeds economy.

The SMG group have the gig to manage the arena (they also manage the MEN Arena and many others all over Europe).  It will be fascinating to see the kind of programme they can put together and the interest that they show in engaging with local developing talent.

And what will the impact of the new Arena be on other venues?  Well clearly Sheffield and Harrogate believe they will feel the pinch.  Although Manchester seems quietly confident that their suite of arenas will remain untroubled by the new kid on the block.  But what about other Leeds venues?  Any way that The Academy, The Cockpit, The Refectory, The Brudenell etc will benefit?  I suspect that the Academy may lose market share to the Arena.  But most of the other venues serve very different audiences and I remain optimistic that they will be relatively untroubled by the Arena.  But will there be any upsides for other Leeds venues?

I think it is interesting that the Arena Showreel chooses to walk you through a boxing promotion.  And it is very strange to see a boxing ring with an audience on just three sides!   That is a brave design feature.  A three sided arena.  More intimate perhaps.  Certainly different.  But will the large shows designed for four sided arenas come to it?  I am thinking Monster Trucks, WWE and the like?

I guess we can anticipate boxing, comedy, pop, rock, classical, opera, fashion and many more event genres using the Arena.   And I would be interested to see how the Arena will actually benefit each of those circuits that are already embedded in the local economy.  Will having a large boxing venue drive a renaissance in Leeds Boxing?  Ditto opera, comedy, fashion and so on. Will the dream of playing a Leeds Arena provide additional drive and ambition in the city?  Or will the Arena take market share from these sectors leaving many of the incumbents struggling further.  Will ‘Arena Opera’ coming to the city be a boon for Opera North or a threat?

What will the impact of a development like the Arena be on ‘fairness’ in the city.  On social justice?  On the inequalities in wealth and health that exist in our city?  Will it make Leeds a more equitable city?  Or will it be an asset for those with disposable income that will only serve to widen the gap?

Will it provide a boom in the production of ‘culture’ in the city or in consumption of culture being sold to the city?

What will the impact be of pulling the centre of the city further north?  How will it impact on land values and uses?  Will local estates become more, or less desirable places to live in the shadow of the Arena?  What will the impact be on traffic flows?  What will those who arrive by train and walk up to the Arena make of their engagement with our city.  No doubt the city centre bars will find them to be yet another lucrative market to target.  I wonder just where the touts and the merchandise vendors will set up their pitches?

Of course the Arena will be a mixed blessing.  There will be winners and losers.

My best guess is that most of the winners will be in the business community and those with significant disposable income.  And the losers will be those for whom a £10m public investment may have been used to provide well considered and long term processes of community based economic development.  Providing community groups and local residents with the resources that they need to build their own economies, cultures and communities.

I am not against the Arena.  But neither am I for it.  What I am against is the continuing massive investment in the built infrastructure in the city that seems to imply if we can just get the right buildings in the right place we will get progress in our very wonderful city.  We won’t.

The most successful examples…[of economic and community development]…result not from top-down policies imposed by local governments but from organic, bottom-up, community based efforts.  While…government and business leaders pressed for big government solutions – new stadiums and convention centres – the city’s real turnaround was driven by community groups and citizen-led initiatives.  Community groups, local foundations and non-profits – not city hall or business led economic development groups – drove…transformation, playing a key role in stabilising and strengthening neighbourhoods…Many of…(the) best neighbourhoods…are ones that were somehow spared from the wrath of urban renewal…
Richard Florida – The Great Reset
When are going to ‘get’ this?

Does Big Society Foretell the Demise of Confrontational Government?

by

Kevin Harris has written a fascinating post about the possibility of the transition to Big Society foretelling the demise of confrontational we/you type government.
I too can see a way in which Big Society foretells the demise of command and control. However I can also see dozens of ways in which it doesn’t.  The recent Marsh Farm decision provides an example.
Government has a long track record of maintaining the status quo while providing the illusion of radical change.  Left/Right, Centralise/Decentralise, National/Local.  They all look like major change, but in fact politicians and civil servants collude to ensure that nothing REALLY happens.  It is  as if the pendulum of change is allowed to swing through an arc of only a very few degrees.
Kevin makes a good point about the nature of  you/me thinking.  A shift to ‘we’ would do no harm at all.  But I am not holding my breathe.  The very nature of democracy means that we elect a ‘you’.
In my mind the real shift needs to from a perspective where government seeks to engage us in the delivery of their agenda to one where it learns to engage itself in the development of our agendas.  A government focussed on enabling citizens in pursuit of their interests rather than recruiting them to do the work of the state.
But I will not hold my breathe for that swing of the pendulum either.
Perhaps it is time we learned to wean ourselves off the teat of the state and learn to make progress without them?

The Future is… Nomadic?

by

Is it time for a post-settlement society?

Are home ownership, long-term council house tenancies and commitment to a community doomed to become little more than quaint memories of how society used to work?  Do they restrict the mobility of skills, knowhow and muscle power that a modern economy demands?

There are many that argue this case.  Richard Florida suggests in his book The Great Reset that the creative classes should no longer tie themselves down geographically by committing to mortgages and buying properties.  Grant Shapps, Housing Minister wants social housing tenants to have Housing Freedom Pass and a National Home Swap Scheme to allow tenants to move in pursuit of work, or for ‘any other reason’.

The message seems to be ‘don’t commit yourself to a community – be prepared to follow the money – the future is nomadic’.

Can you imagine a society divided into the rooted and the rootless?  Those who can afford to commit to a community for the long term and those who can’t?

It used to be that we wanted people to come to our communities and stay in them.  To shape a society and an economy that would serve the community.  To care about community.  Now the big idea seems to be shaping community to serve the economy.

  • Is this progress?  Or a progress trap?
  • Should we engineer society to meet the increasingly dynamic demands of a growing and shifting economy?
  • Or should we engineer the economy to serve the kind of communities in which we wish to live?
  • Will increasing social mobility help to reduce inequalities and promote social justice?  Or will it create even more stark demarcations between rich and poor?
  • How will our city evolve if the churn in our working communities is significantly increased?
  • Or will the possibility of a digital Britain and an economy that is ‘lighter than air‘ mean that spatial mobility is much less of an issue than we may think?
  • Or is it just a lot of fuss about nowt?

Putting Power in the Hands of Individuals and Communities…

by

We agreed that…our government’s purpose is to make two major shifts in our political and national life:

The first is a radical redistribution of power from government to communities and people, to reverse decades of over-centralisation. Almost all our plans involve giving individuals, families and communities more control over their lives – whether that’s through opening new schools, giving locally elected councillors a say over local NHS services or holding local police to account.

Clegg and Cameron’s Letter to MPs of the Coalition Government

At first glance this is a gift for those of us who have advocated the potential of individuals and communities to shape their own destiny.  But I think it shows a lack of understanding about how such processes can work.

Communities and individuals are being offered power to do the work that some aspect of the state had previously done.  They are being pointed at opportunities identified by the powerful where they maybe allowed to play a part.   In the examples cited above to manage schools, health and policing.  Perhaps also to buy the local pub and turn it into a social enterprise or cooperative.  Or to take over an old school or library and turn it into a community asset.

All very laudable at first glance.

But there is no real shift  of power going on here.  Individuals and communities are being invited to play a larger part in delivering the strategies of the powerful.  There seems to be little or no sign of individuals and communities being allowed to set their own development agendas, to build their power to tackle the issues that really impact on their lives.   There is little evidence of real self-determination being encouraged, just more gentle manipulation to ‘good folk’ to do their bit in times of austerity.

And much of this will play well to middle Britain and its obsessions with schooling, policing and the delivery of healthcare.

But how will it play out in some of our poorest communities?  What will the impact of this ‘radical redistribution of power’ be on them?

My best guess is that for many the impact will be detrimental, unless we find a way to really engage them as individuals and communities in working on their agenda rather than on the agenda of the state.  Doing things that will make a real difference in their lives and the lives of their loved ones.

When we tell people how we wish them to participate in transforming their own worlds we can be sure that either:

  • we are not really sincere in our wishes for any such transformation, or
  • while we do wish for a radical transformation we do not understand the processes through which it might be achieved.

Perhaps it is time for Cameron and Clegg to read a little more Paulo Friere to go with their Philip Blond?

There is the world of difference between ‘putting power in the hands of individuals and communities’ and helping people to develop their power to shape their lives.