Commercial property and community: making the relationship work
Decades of property speculation and development in Shoreditch and an ever-intensifying consumer economy have conspired to accelerate gentrification, increase rents and forcing the displacement of low-income residents and independent businesses.
Some blame rent-seeking landlords, weak planning and complicit local government. Others blame decades of economic, environmental and spatial injustice.
We recently co-hosted an event with Property X-Change to discuss how, in this context, commercial property and community might work together to help neighbourhoods - or whether the distance between the two is so great, and the one so impactful upon the lives of the other, that it’s not worth bothering.
In attendance were several residents, commercial tenants, and representatives from local community groups. Some people with important local voices, and critical voices in the discussion, chose not to attend.
We asked: Is it possible for property to ‘do’ community? Can decades of distrust between landowners and community in the area be healed, or at the very least mitigated, by the kind of socially progressive activities onRedchurch undertakes? And the experience of a hospitality training school at No 6 Redchurch Street in May/June 2022 was shared.
Notes on the meeting are available to read here
