Funding confirmed for pioneering study of how to design England's future suburbs

A team of researchers led by Professor Marcial Echenique of the University of Cambridge has been awarded £1.75m to design the suburbs of the future - places in which people of all incomes can live without using cars for every journey and in which the contribution of the new homes to climate change would be minimised.

The team's goal is to ensure that the hundreds of thousands of houses needed in the London Home Counties and other fast growing parts of the country are part of vibrant, 'sustainable suburbs'. Cambridge, Bristol, London, and Tyne and Wear will all be case studies.

The four-year grant is from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) and the project is called SOLUTIONS. It will draw up policy advice for central and local government and design guidelines for planners, house builders and environmentalists.

The SOLUTIONS team will study cities as a whole and neighbourhoods within them. In particular, they will compare today's practice of building houses in car dependent fringe estates with other forms of growth.

Alternatives to be considered include leaving development to the market, raising existing densities, designing fringe estates in new ways, building along public transport routes and creating new towns. Local options include inserting houses and flats into existing estates, or building them close to shopping centres or along transport routes.

Living in such places and in conventional cul-de-sacs that are remote from any shops will be compared. How would people travel under such different conditions? How much would they walk or cycle? How often would they go by bus or train? And what would happen if new roads were built or road user charges introduced?

The researchers will use computer models to test all these combinations of land use and travel. They will compare too how they would affect the cost of living for residents and damage to the environment.

The Department for Transport, Transport for London, the Cambridgeshire Infrastructure Partnership and other bodies have offered funds. Staff at other organisations which stand to benefit from the research have offered their time.

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