Feature Story

EASEL power

With pockets of dereliction and decay remaining in most UK cities, Leeds City Council's Maggie Gjessing outlines the impact of private finance on urban regeneration programmes in the area

Leeds City Council, together with partner ALMO, East North East Homes Leeds Ltd, began to develop the East and South East Leeds regeneration initiative, known by its shorthand 'EASEL' in 2003. Its aim was to develop a new vehicle to deliver an ambitious and long-term solution to reverse the decline of the inner east area of the city.

The EASEL area extends from Leeds City Centre to the east of the city and covers an area of 6.6 square miles. With a population of approximately 80,000 people it accounts for almost a tenth of the city's population within a number of distinct communities: Gipton, Seacroft, Halton Moor, Osmondthorpe, Harehills, Burmantofts, Richmond Hill and Cross Green. It has a mix of housing types and tenures with large numbers of Victorian back-to-back and terraced stock wrapping around the city centre, and concentrations of council-owned housing towards the outer ring road. With large stretches of municipal housing, one of the underlying objectives of the council's programmes is the creation of mixed income, mixed tenure areas.

Facts and figures
The evidence base – the Index of Multiple Deprivation – shows the need for transformational change; of the 53 Super Output Areas that make up the area, 41 fall within the worst 10% and 13 fall within the worst 3% nationally. The issues are high levels of worklessness, poor housing conditions (especially in the terraced stock), high crime, low levels of educational attainment and poor health outcomes. Over half of the most serious deprivation in the city is concentrated in the area and there is a 12 year difference in life expectancy between the most deprived east Leeds neighbourhoods and their more affluent near neighbours.

These conditions are the product of long-term economic changes over the last 30 years and the unforeseen impact of such a major concentration of social housing (next to an already impoverished area of pre-1919 terraced stock) in a period of rapid growth in home ownership. The area has deteriorated through a lack of sufficiently effective intervention to reverse the historic decline. The EASEL initiative is based on reversing this position and bringing about sustainable and growing improvement, which will only be achieved through a long-term comprehensive and integrated regeneration programme over a 15-20 year period.

Despite this backdrop, inner east Leeds has a number of opportunities including significant land availability (over 120ha), established employment areas (and large employers), large amounts of green space and communities that have a tradition of engagement and enterprise especially in the area close to the city centre.

Developing the regeneration agenda
For a considerable period of time, inner east Leeds has been an investment target area for the council and its partners, building in part on the Neighbourhood Renewal Area designations for Harehills and Gipton in 2003.
Supported by a range of public sector partners, the area is a priority for improvement in education and employment in particular, and has benefited from funding regimes such as Building Schools for the Future and Access to Employment.

A new approach to working with workless families is being piloted in part of the area, providing mentors to those facing multiple barriers to work, while a bid to Natural England is being developed for investment in the Wykebeck Valley – which will not only improve the physical conditions but will provide opportunities for the community to participate through volunteering and learning about the natural environment.

The level of resource the area still requires, however, affects the city's ability to meet its growth and prosperity objectives, which in turn impacts upon the role of Leeds within the City Region. As such, the potential for financial savings from the renewal of east Leeds to the public purse is significant, ranging from the benefits of renewed infrastructure (especially housing and schools) built to good design and energy-efficiency standards, to reductions in benefit dependency arising from social and economic interventions.

The programme
Like all regeneration programmes, the objective is to create a desirable place for people to live and work, in safe and tolerant neighbourhoods that are served by good schools and facilities in an attractive environment. Programme aims include:
• Increasing housing choice for existing residents and attracting new higher income residents to achieve a diverse and sustainable housing market;
• Investing in new and existing assets to transform the image and attractiveness of the area;
• Creating centres for new neighbourhoods with good schools, attractive retail areas, high-quality green space and better transport links;
• Solving the underlying social and economic problems of the area, focusing on improving attainment and skills, reducing crime and promoting employment and enterprise to improve the area's economic performance.

The model
One of the routes through which the council has sought to effect this level of change was to procure a private sector partner, Bellway plc, to form a joint venture arrangement flexible enough to help secure the delivery of long-term, lasting revitalisation of the area. The prospectus that we took to the market was to find an investment partner to develop our land portfolio coupled with a willingness to support comprehensive regeneration objectives, and in turn bring a private sector view on the development of new housing markets. We began with a number of cleared sites that had planning permission secured to make an early impact but at a manageable pace.

Regeneration and recession
The credit crunch has, of course, had a major impact on EASEL's progress. Severely reduced demand for new homes as a result of the squeeze on mortgages resulted in the first phase of development stalling. The partners risked loss of momentum and the confidence of the local community. The building of new homes and the continued employment, training and supply chain opportunities are the central driver to the wider regeneration strategy, and are a vital sign for the local community and the media of the viability of the project's vision to deliver a better future for the area.

In order to ensure that work continued, the council adopted a two stage plan in February last year. Firstly, council resources will be deployed to keep construction going, by directly purchasing new homes and taking them into council stock. At the same time, officers worked with the then-newly established Homes and Communities Agency to secure intervention funding to continue house building until market confidence and the availability of lending returns. Following the 2009 budget, the government announced the Housing Stimulus Programme, which provided the opportunity to bid to keep sites going and even open two new ones. Across the Kickstart, Local Authority New Build and National Affordable Housing Programme – with the help of our partner developers and that of the HCA in our region – the council has mixed tenure house building programme of around 600 units to take us through until next year.

What's next?
The recession gives rise to the risk that the project will lose impetus, while the lead-in times for development are long even when economic circumstances are favourable. It is therefore important that commitment is maintained and demonstrated to investors, partners and the community.

The next stage is twofold. Firstly we will begin the process of local spatial planning to take the scheme beyond the development of the first tranche of sites – a programme with an emphasis on 'placemaking' and working with colleagues in planning. We are looking at a land use approach to secure the availability of residential land, in addition to mixed use and good quality green space to raise land values and provide the potential for recreational and cultural facilities. More than anything, community support must be maintained, and people encouraged to 'buy-in' to long-term change. Additionally, new opportunities, such as the HCA's Public Land Initiative, will be explored to identify new delivery routes and investment sources.

The council and its partners have worked hard to develop a strong response to the downturn in market conditions so that Leeds has been well placed to get the benefit of new funding opportunities. East Leeds remains the city's main priority for regeneration and we will continue to work to bring investment and renewed confidence to the people who live there.


Maggie Gjessing
EASEL Senior Project Manager
Leeds City Council

www.leeds.gov.uk