Volunteering opportunities 2016-7

Note change of venue on Wednesday below

As in past years, there are opportunities for students to volunteer for work with community organisations in London at various geographic scales. This is additional to, and separate from, the project work with community groups which form the basis of Masters Modules in the Bartlett School of Planning (BENVGPLD and BENVGPD3), a joint module between Planning and Urban Studies (URBNG007) and others in the DPU and Engineering.

The contribution of JustSpace members and groups to these collaborations is supported financially by the School of Planning; Michael Edwards is the staff member responsible for overall coordination.

If you think you might want to volunteer as an individual (i.e. not as part of one of the named modules) please try to come to one of the following briefing meetings, one an afternoon event and the other after the end of classes in the evening.

Tuesday 11 October 1815-2015h in Central House room G01.
Wednesday 12 October 1430-1600h in room LG04 at 26 Bedford Way – UCL Geography Department. This is a change of venue and time.

Anyone thinking of volunteering, or otherwise working with community groups in their university studies or research should first familiarise themselves with the Just Space Protocol which is full of good advice on how to avoid the pitfalls and ill-feeling which can arise if you get it wrong, and how to get the best from these collaborations by doing it right. Read online or download here.

New London Plan

As the new Mayor and his political and professional team work on a new London Plan, Just Space has sent them the document Towards a community-led Plan for London: policy directions and proposals. This 75 page document is the product of more than a year of work by local and city-wide community and activist groups which have met in working parties and 3 big conferences. The work of numerous UCL student groups and staff have supported and informed many aspects of the evidence in the document. It is available as a free download here.

Also on the JustSpace.org.uk web site are earlier documents and conference reports including a lot of video recording of workshops and debates.

April 28 2016 conference

Just Space has been working for 9 months towards producing a Community-led Plan for London, or at least key elements of it, to be ready in the early weeks of the new Mayor and Assembly.

Very good progress was made following discussions at community conferences in July 2015 and on 4 February this year. Now, there will be a further conference at UCL on Thursday 28 April to bring together community groups, students and academics with the following aims:

1. To share the results of the February conference workshops
2. To discuss further work that has been done on the Private Rented Sector, Opportunity Areas, Participation and Inclusion.

3. To focus on the following key economic issues:
   – Policies to support balanced economic development between London and other regions
   – Policies to support a green economy
   – The economic evidence base: an analysis of meetings between Just Space Economy and Planning group (JSEP) and GLA Economics

4. To mobilise further academic support for the final stages of the work which needs to be completed during May.

5. To reflect further on the potential of University students and staff to support community based policy development at a London wide level.

The conference will take place in London WC1 and be free of charge. It is, however, essential to reserve a place here on Eventbrite or if you can’t do that by email to Sue Ansarie who is helping with the organisation. mailto:ansarie34@googlemail.com

More details will be added on JustSpace.org.uk during April. Meanwhile, the tabloid publication produced for the previous conference plus write-ups of workshops and videos of sessions are all available here. This will be specially valuable for those who could not attend in February and want to get up to speed.

Volunteering opportunities autumn 2015

As in previous years, there are opportunities for UCL students to work with and for community and activist groups on London planning this year. The School of Planning is working with the Just Space network to set up and support the opportunities. Two meetings are about to take place at which these will be outlined and relationships set up. There is one evening and one afternoon meeting so that more students can fit one in to their timetables. Come to whichever is more convenient.

These are opportunities to work voluntarily, outside your formal course, so you should take care not to shoulder responsibilities which are unrealistically heavy. Students in two MSc programmes —Spatial Planning and Urban Design and City Planning— will ALL be doing work of this sort with community groups and neighbourhood forums starting in January so should probably not also take on these volunteer rôles.

To find out more about what has been done by past students in supporting community groups, browse the rest of this site. An updated pamphlet will be available any day.

The meetings well be: Monday 12th October 1700h-1900h and Wednesday 14th October 1400h-1600h, both in Roberts Building room 110. This is the new Engineering building opposite Waterstones bookshop on Torrington Place. No booking necessary. If you are unable to come to either meeting and want to find out more, contact m.edwards@ucl.ac.uk

UCL Bursaries – closing 30 October

Beacon Bursaries for public engagement
Deadline: 30 October 2015
Do you have an innovative idea that will help you connect your research or teaching with people outside UCL? If you do, and you need guidance, support and money, you could apply for a Beacon Bursary. Up to £2000 per project is available to UCL staff and research students and we particularly encourage applications for projects in East London as UCL is aiming to develop relationships with local people in advance of the building of UCL East.

To find out more, and to download the guidance and application forms, visit the Public Engagement Unit’s website:
http://www.ucl.ac.uk/public-engagement/funding/beaconbursaries

Student reports coming online

During 2014/15 groups of UCL students have been working on assignments devised to support community groups at various scales in London. Some of these reports are – with agreement of the authors – being made available here.

London-scale studies

Students in the course Citizen Participation in Metropolitan Planning urbng007 have this year been focussing on topic studies designed to support Just Space groups in thinking about the next London Plan – setting the agenda instead of reacting to the Mayor’s drafts. These reports will be posted here as they become available:

Alternative Forms of Housing Report examines UK and some international experience of diverse forms of housing supply, ownership and management and the roles each might play in London – Community Land Trusts, co-housing, co-ops, self-build and so on. There are many links to source material.

Environment report UCL June 2015 surveys the range of environmental issues which are, or should be, covered in the London Plan, emphasising the inter-dependence of the fields, often treated in isolation.

Neighbourhood level studies

An entire class of 90 masters students in the Bartlett School of Planning worked in 2015 in support of 6 neighbourhood groups working on Neighbourhood Planning or similar projects. Details of the module BENVGPLD From Strategic Visions to Urban Plans are here and some of the many reports produced are being made available here (with the authors’ consent) for download. More may be added.

Workshop on neighbourhood planning

Saturday 28 March: there will be a day-workshop on neighbourhood planning presented by Just Space neighbourhood groups which have been working with UCL students and staff from January to March 2015. The workshop will take place in Mile End. Details, programme and (free) booking here.

To new UCL students 2014

Effective engagement with community groups

In conjunction with the JustSpace.org.uk network of community groups in London we offer this year:

 1  A specialised optional module urbnG007 Citizen participation in metropolitan planning

• Wednesdays 1100-1400h Term 2
• Work in groups to support local organisation engaging on London planning problems at all scales
• 15 Credits (UCL standard module)
• Assignment designed to be of use to the group you work with. hand-in after easter break
• Students from BSP, Geography, DPU, Enginering and any other UCL Masters programmes
• For more, search urbng007 on Moodle or read the module outline

 urbnG007 recent topics & student reports –  scroll down

2  Opportunities for individual students to volunteer to work with community groups

• Neighbourhood Forums and other local community planning
• Borough-level plans
• Greater London: London Plan and transport / infrastructure / housing debates

Research / mapping / surveys / design workshops / explaining documents / finding international examples / transcription

Next: Come to one or other of these meetings: Thursday 2 October 1700h in Central House room G01 on the ground floor or  Wednesday 8 October 1400h in Chadwick 2.18 which is just beside the front lodge of UCL, at the entrance to the front Quad from Gower Street.  This is a change of venue for the 8 October meeting.

Reports from student collaborations in 2014

UCL students working with community and environmental groups in 2013-14 are now being completed and some are being posted here to make them widely available.

Two people have been working with the Regent’s Network and with local groups in the Old Oak Common Opportunity Area and have written reports designed to support the case for the use of the canal – which runs right through the Opportunity Area – to carry freight, particularly spoil and debris from demolition and excavation and construction materials, thus reducing the very heavy road traffic which the development threatens to impose. The work is in two parts:
Part A by Rebecca Payne Part A – Canal freight RP examines the waterborne freight issues in terms of the policies of various bodies and the scope for action.
Part B by Kate Beeching Part B – Barging In KB exploring the complex responsibilities for canal freight development in relation to the proposed HS2.

DCLG meet UCL on NP

James Dadge and Mick Duggan from the DCLG team which runs Neighbourhood Planning addressed a meeting of students and staff at UCL Bartlett Planning (and Urban Studies), with an update on NP progress.  Eleanor Lowenthal spoke about work being done to support Our Tottenham by various students, while Thomas Zhong described work over the last two years supporting a Neighbourhood Forum in Brent.  Presentations here to download:

DCLG: 140512_UCL DCLG Presentation_JD MD (has useful onward links)

Tottenham: Eleanor Lowenthal TottenhamPresentation

Brent: Thomas Zhong CHURCH ROAD, ROUNDWOOD Brent

also useful: new crowd-sourced bibliography on NP: http://bit.ly/1liqaIs

There was a strong discussion and it is clear that student groups can really contribute valuably to the work of Neighbourhood groups and Forums. UCL seems to be pioneering on this.