It is with a heavy heart that we publish the final edition of Nimby Watch. Over 32 pieces, Jonn Elledge has exposed the most egregious cases of Nimbyism and shown us why major planning reform is so badly needed. For this last instalment, we’re taking a look at the country at large and the selfishness […]
For this week’s edition of ‘Nimby Watch’, we’re off to the South West coast, where the locals want to stop a boatload of foreign electricity from coming ashore… Where oh where oh where? North Devon. Lovely place for a holiday. So’s Morocco. Sorry, what? All will become clear. It’s not houses this week, it’s a […]
For this week’s edition of ‘Nimby Watch’, we’re off to a mystery site in London, where a veteran Lefty is opposing new social housing and student accommodation… Where are we off to this week? I’m not telling you. That seems to present a problem given the format of this column. No, we’re mixing things up […]
For this week’s edition of ‘Nimby Watch’, we’re taking a look at the work of Simon Jenkins, perhaps the most high-profile Nimby in Britain… Where are we going this week? The pages of The Guardian. That’s a newspaper. It is, yes. You can’t build stuff on the pages of a newspaper. No, you can’t, but […]
For this week’s edition of ‘Nimby Watch’, we’re off to a village that thinks one more home is one too many… Where this week? Blackheath. Oh, good bit of town that, nice walk up from Greenwich, some lovely pubs. Not that Blackheath. Oh. This is the one that’s in Surrey, rather than the one that […]
Where are we off to this week? Wimbledon, plush south west London suburb and the home of international tennis. And what are they trying to build there? More tennis courts, LOL? Er, yes, actually, that’s exactly what they’re trying to build. So, not houses then? Not houses on this occasion, no. Oh. This is not […]
Where this week? The ancient East Anglian village of Bacton. The Norfolk seaside village? Terminus of a gas pipeline connecting England to the Netherlands? Whose amenities include a village shop, a hotel, Chinese restaurant, kebab house and two cafes? No, not that one, no. This one’s 50 miles to the south west in Mid Suffolk, […]
Where? Redhill, Surrey: one of those places you’ve probably passed through on your way to Gatwick or Brighton, but to which you’ve rarely given a second thought. I’d always, if I’m honest, imagined it as a sort of suburb of Reigate, which only had any independent identity because it’s the bit with the mainline station […]
Where to? Maidenhead, a blue wall Berkshire commuter town about 25 miles west of London. Who wants to build what? Cala Homes would like to create ‘Elizabeth Quarter’, thus providing that town, where the average property price stands at a cool £550,000, with another 1,800 residential properties. I don’t imagine ‘reducing house prices’ is their […]
For this week’s edition of ‘Nimby Watch’, we’re off to north west London, where councillors are ganging up to keep the housing crisis going… So, where we going this week? To Edgware, in the north west London suburbs. Oh, where the trains go. What’s there now? The Broadwalk Centre, a rather grim low-rise shopping precinct […]
For this week’s edition of ‘Nimby Watch’, we’re looking at a newly released film which celebrates Nimbyism and demonises developers… Where are we off to today? The woods. Any woods in particular, or-? Well, they’re in Wigan. Oh, up North! Or possibly St Helens. Sorry, what? Or maybe Cheshire? I dunno, somewhere in the North […]
Alright, where to? Mallard Pass, on the Rutland/Lincolnshire border. This sounds familiar. And Gate Burton, which is also in Lincolnshire. Plus some fields near Newmarket, where Suffolk blends into Cambridgeshire. I’m getting a strange sense of deja vu, here. Yes, it’s a few years late, but Ed Miliband’s new golden age has finally arrived. It’s […]
For this week’s edition of ‘Nimby Watch’, we’re off to Greenwich, where a development was once objected to by Labour’s newly-appointed Housing Minister… Where are we off to this week? The Greenwich Peninsula, in south east London. South of the river? Will wonders never cease. What’s there now? Morden Wharf, a couple of crumbling industrial […]
For this week’s edition of ‘Nimby Watch’, Jonn Elledge takes us to west London, where local Nimbys appear to have taken entirely the wrong lesson from his work… Where are we this week? Brentford. Oooh, west London, fancy. So who wants to build what? The ’boutique property company’ Town Quay Developments and Mountbatten Homes is […]
For this week’s edition of ‘Nimby Watch’, Jonn Elledge takes us to rural Essex, where Nimbys who can’t define ‘countryside’ are preventing the construction of vital electricity infrastructure… Where are we off to this week? Essex. Look, don’t start. I’m saying nothing. But this is proper Essex, okay? Not London suburban Essex. Little Bromley, a […]
For this week’s edition of ‘Nimby Watch’, Jonn Elledge takes us to Greater London’s easternmost settlement, where Nimbys are up in arms over a planned data centre… Where are we off to this week? The far east of London. Oh, how novel. No, I mean the far east. Extremely east. As far east as you […]
Right, where are we going this week? To Buckinghamshire, a realm of rolling hills and picturesque villages, tragically cursed with being at the heart of one of Britain’s most successful export industries. Luckily for its people, though, an unlikely group of heroes have emerged in the form of an MP, a prospective MP, a county […]
For this week’s edition of ‘Nimby Watch’, Jonn Elledge takes us to London’s South Bank, where Nimbys are fighting to protect an abandoned brutalist tower block from the scourge of sophisticated new office space… Where are we off to this time? A little known city by the name of ‘London’. Specifically, the South Bank of […]
For this week’s edition of ‘Nimby Watch’, Jonn Elledge takes us to Brighton & Hove, where local activists and councillors care more about a disused gasworks than building new homes. You can read the rest of the series here. Where are we off to this week? Bloody Labour Party! That is not, in fact, a place. Well, […]
In a new series, CapX is celebrating the way our planning system tries its very best to save the country from affordable housing or decent infrastructure. This week, Nimbyism in Essex has resulted in one of the strangest results from the recent local elections… Where? Castle Point. Sorry, where? Southern Essex, a peri-urban landscape wedged […]
