Assessment of the Regeneration Legacy that the 2012 London Olympic Games Is Likely to Bequeath East London - Coursework Example

Running Head: CITIES AND URBAN INEQUALITIES ASSESSMENT OF THE REGENERATION ‘LEGACY’ THAT THE LONDON OLYMPIC GAMES IS LIKELY TO BEQUEATH EAST LONDON By Student’s Name Code+ course name Professor’s name University name City, State Date Abstract The Regeneration “Legacy” imposed by the 2012 London Olympic Games renewed East London’s urban landscape through sports avenues, parks, social facilities, and urban developments. The word legacy buzzed across London after the Olympics. Knowing what the Olympics would shake off and being delicate to the needs of East London’s locals were values that aided in making London the winner of the seven-year-old bid. Two years after the games, LLDC (the London Legacy Development Corporation) pours critical attention on East London. Along with public and private parties, LLDC turned to the development of East London because the corporation intends on motivating a generation that reflects the UK’s belief system about the Olympics. Evidently, LLDC realized the 2012 London Olympics presented East London with an exclusive opportunity to deal with years of exclusion. After the implementation of the regeneration legacy, East London should be transformed to secure a helpful effect on the livelihoods of the residents of east London. The UK government and mayor’s plans intended on making sure the whole of London feels the lasting economic advantages of the aftermath of the Olympics. Table of Contents I. Introduction………………………………………………………………………………4 II. Literature Review………………………….…………………………………….………4 A. Investment Returns…………………………………………….……………4 B. Urban Regeneration………………………………………………..…..……7 C. Regeneration Legacy………………………………………………………10 D. Broader Developments of the Regeneration Legacy………………………………………………………………….……12 III. Conclusion……………………………………………………………………..………13 IV. References………………………………………………………………………………14 Assessment of the Regeneration “Legacy” That the 2012 London Olympic Games Is Likely To Bequeath East London Introduction The Olympics have always been a symbol of unity and collaboration. This is largely because the world gets together to partake in sports with similarly and equally imposed rules, which commemorates the same Olympian essence of quality and fair gaming (Pacione, 2005). Today, the Olympics are popular for another kind of friendship that exists between private and public industries (LeGates & Stout, 2007). The Olympics constitute of events and games of immense size and budgets. Inevitably, the government and private firms must consider all resources. The 2012 London Olympics are an ideal example of this consideration. Several sources sponsored the 2012 London Olympics. Among them was the London Organizing Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games Limited, which is a private firm with a core financial plan surpassing £2 billion. This firm was in control of planning, financing, arrangement, and staging of the entire 2012 London Olympic Games. Such vast funding and organizing roles are bound to affect London’s urban landscape significantly (Butler & Watt, 2007). The following paper will assess the Regeneration aspect of the impact of the 2012 London Olympics on East London. The Regeneration “Legacy” imposed by the 2012 London Olympic Games renewed East London’s urban landscape through sports avenues, parks, social facilities, and urban developments. Literature Review Investment Returns East London alone made over £9 billion after the 2012 London Olympics after a mere £2 billion from the private sector alone. A large share of this return went to the transport industry. As a result, Stratford is currently the second most linked part of London today after King’s Cross. In addition, two underground rails for a high-speed javelin transit emerged after the 2012 Olympics that connected King’s Cross and the Docklands Light Railway. This transit might be a passenger depot for the Eurostar headed towards Paris. Most of the key developments on London before the 2012 Olympics have been heading eastward. Two of the five legacy pledges established in Britain’s pitch for 2012 Olympics was that the event would modify and improve the center of east London (The Guardian – regeneration, 2014). As a result, authorities transformed the Olympic Park spot to the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, which serves as real evidence of change (Thorns, 2002). The regeneration legacy extended to the athletes’ township where national flags and shopping queues were a characteristic of the area (Jones and Evans, 2008). However, this township was converted into a real estate hub known as the East Village. Nearly half of the more than 2,800 new homes were affordable at first, which represents the beginning of the much-required boost of real estate in this part of East London (ESRC Neighborhood Centre for Research, 2014). East London authorities plan to renew the Olympic parkland and its environs to five new districts accommodating 8,000 households with nearly 40% in reasonably priced houses (Greater London Authority, 2014). On the other hand, economics researchers are skeptic about the outcome of the housing part of the Olympics regeneration legacy. This is because the new homes may be expensive to Newham’s poorest families. This issue will be challenging for East London’s urban setting particularly after reforms to the manner in which the government sponsorships for real estate (International Journal of Urban & Regional Research – Lecture Series, 2014). East London currently faces a dire shortage of learning institutions in Hackney and Newham that the regeneration legacy will most likely relieve by September 2014 (The Guardian – regeneration, 2014). During this month, a much-required school launches in the parklands. The school, Chobham Academy, will be an elementary, high school, grade school, and a grownup learning facility. An agreement for the previous eight lasting sporting constructions in the park was available by early 2014 (Joseph Rowntree Foundation, 2014). As a result, authorities dispelled numerous critical concerns about Olympic-sized white elephants. The government approved the last construction as the £300 million media center that today mostly accommodates data firm Infinity (Joseph Rowntree Foundation, 2014). The construction and transport developments near the park brought up questions regarding a more significant change occurring in the area. The effect of the 2012 London Olympics on infrastructure venture has been truly fantastic and visible in east London. However, joblessness did in fact rise during the Olympics. The 2012 London Olympics did not provide on the potential to develop joblessness levels (The Guardian – regeneration, 2014). This deliverance would have aided in the boosting of the numerous still-poor areas of East London. During the preparation of the Olympics games, extremely few employment opportunities were formed for locals. There are still soaring levels of joblessness in the area that it acted as a missed chance for training people and preparing them for new jobs. It will most likely be ten years before researchers record any certain proof of the positive effects of the Olympics (The Guardian – regeneration, 2014). However, investments made in transport and real estate is already delivering the starts of a true regeneration legacy (Jones and Evans, 2008). The Olympic Delivery Authority, ran by the government, was in control of building and mounting new substructures and sites. Several private firms supported the government financially, which went to building amenities hosting the Olympics games (Knox & Pinch, 2006). The Department for Culture, Media, and Sport embodied the UK government through the supervision of the core government sponsoring of the games and broader production expenses. The UK government did not just aim its financial ventures at hosting the Olympics effectively, but regenerate parts of East London. Clearly, events like Olympics have a lasting effect on host towns (Jones and Evans, 2008). Past the prestige affiliated with hosting the Olympics, developing the essential infrastructure to welcome the international community in the course of the two weeks of the Olympics provided East London a genuine pretext and facilitator for the transformation of sections of East London according to the city’s wider urban regeneration vision (International Journal of Urban & Regional Research – Lecture Series, 2014). To make sure that East London profits from the legacy of the 2012 London Olympics, East London Business Alliance set up the London Legacy 2020 (The Guardian – regeneration, 2014). Through a variety of projects concentrating on the young generation and sports, skill training and tradition, and the London Legacy 2020 initiative works to make sure the 2012 London Olympics has a positive impact on East London. This impact must be evident on London’s promise in the course of its entry, which is applying the event to assist in building areas neighboring the Olympics settings. Urban Regeneration At Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, five new districts are currently under construction within and close to the park. These houses will offer nearly 8,000 much-required houses to the vicinity (Greater London Authority, 2014). Most of the grounds being maintained as a park site will be available to the public for application as grounds for relaxation. Today, the Legacy Corporation has by now made substantial development towards setting up lasting, opportunities for sustainable financial ventures. The firm has achieved these feats through a wide array of devices like planning influences, to encourage regeneration across Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park and the neighboring estates. Initiatives by the Legacy Corporation work to make sure the park and settings are successful on top of using them as the core of a regenerated urban borough for east London locals and visitors (International Journal of Urban & Regional Research – Lecture Series, 2014). For the regeneration of Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, the Legacy Corporation operates under three key goals. First, providing amenities for high-output and community involvement is part of working a prosperous and available park with topnotch sporting venues (The Guardian – regeneration, 2014). This way, the organization can lure guest attractions and a busy initiative of sporting, traditional, and community occasions that will keep on attracting people to Stratford (Savage, 2003). Second, to make one of East London’s most active urban boroughs, appealing financial ventures from throughout London and other parts of the UK was necessary. Such investments could help in turning East London into a place of choice for existing residents and fresh arrivals, serving as a pivot for wealth accumulation and free enterprise, and connecting the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park parkland with neighboring areas. Lastly, the Legacy Corporation seeks to form domestic opportunities and transformational revolution, encourage regeneration and the union for East London, and make sure the taxpayers’ money meets its value (The Guardian – regeneration, 2014). East London authorities also plan to build an Aquatics Centre that will entail the exploitation of the current 50m pools for open, academic purposes, and elite sportspersons (The Guardian – regeneration, 2014). The Aquatics Centre will also be available for the same price as other pools in the host neighborhoods. The Lee Valley Velopark is a monstrous circuit for bicycle racing and training that caused numerous faceplants during the 2012 Olympics. East London intends on converting this circuit into a little less monstrous track. East London will mix the track with the velodrome, which is a track for mountain biking and finalize the Lee Valley Velopark. From September 2014, East London locals can begin shifting to the Olympic Village where properties of the elite athletes who partook in the games were kept (The Guardian – regeneration, 2014). The East Village included the renewal of the East Village into flats in the previous Olympic Village by knocking down walls and adding suitable kitchens to the flats. The previous Olympic airing workroom where nearly 20,000 workers of the media practiced during the Olympics will be changed into one of Europe’s biggest data storage amenities (Greater London Authority, 2014). Along with the data firm Infinity, Loughborough University and Hackney Community College are verified occupants of the Media Center. The main arena where the Olympic Games took place will turn into a multisport center for public use and international games. The arena has a volume of 7,500 seats that will also accommodate performances and events for private individuals and companies (The Guardian – regeneration, 2014). East London authorities shifted the neon pink hockey amenity to the Eton Manor tennis courts to form a mixed sports center adjacent to velodrome. Lastly, the Olympic Stadium originally appeared to be a solution to the Dome. However, West Ham is verified as the anchor occupant from 2016 and portable seating. This means the Olympic Stadium will be able to accommodate sports like Cricket, Rugby, and Athletics Competitions. The 2012 London Olympics started changing formerly abandoned parts of East London. In 1992, Barcelona underwent nearly similar projections and transformations in the urban landscape during and after the Olympics (Hall, 2006). Barcelona incorporated preparation for the games and the city’s broader regeneration plan that was much similar to London’s 2012 plan. Barcelona broadly thought that one of the most effective Olympics in terms of permanent legacy for the city. The 1992 Olympics gave Barcelona the much-required new transport substructure and the regeneration of a collapsing coastal area (Jones and Evans, 2008). The public-private alliances certainly fixed in the manner the 2012 London Olympics have been arranged is simply a single case of how the UK government and the private industry use the resources and expertise of others to deal with the multiple challenges cities and nations deal with today (The Guardian – regeneration, 2014). Planned cross-industry alliances are surfacing around solid events like the Olympics and tackling urgent issues like climate change, worldwide health, and economic growth. East London attached the Olympics games to concentrate on a number of serious problems (Hubbard, 2006). Regeneration Legacy Ambitions for benefiting from the Olympics were a chance for speeding up the lasting renewal plans for East London. East London dedicated towards changing one of the most disadvantaged regions of the London. These ambitions also worked towards forming a living new sector for the city. Additionally, the Olympics were supposed to drive employment, skills, and financial ventures across London (The Guardian – regeneration, 2014). The UK government further intended on bettering services, community substructure, improving lifestyles, and increasing the value of life in East London. Front-page accomplishments of the 2012 London Olympics will be evident in the coming several years (Hall, 2006). A sped up procedure of urban regeneration has occurred in East London in the course of the past ten years (Byrne, 2001). The future of the properly maintained Olympic Park has been safeguarded inside one year of the games. Between 2013 and 2014, East London launched Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park to the public. The government verified iCity as the occupant of the Press and Broadcast Centre with occupiers like BT Sport and Loughborough. Financial ventures of the transport industry worth £6.5 billion backed development throughout London. The government plans on building 11,000 homes and over 10,000 employment opportunities will be formed during the transformation of the park into an estate (ESRC Neighborhood Centre for Research, 2014). The substantial investment and substructure development within and close to the Olympic Park in the groundwork for the games have sped up a procedure of renewal in East London. This procedure started nearly three decades ago with the building of London’s Docklands (The Guardian – regeneration, 2014). As a result, East London turned into London’s new social and economic capital. East London is of rising strategic importance to the capital’s lasting effectiveness and development (Hall, 2006). According to Oxford Economics, East London will be one of the UK’s most significant development facilitators, a net contributor to public funds that will reach £5.4 billion annually by 2030 (Burdett & Sudjic, 2011). The government also expects the Olympics to enable East London to house 50% of the capital’s populace growth and almost a section of its growth in employment opportunities to 2031 (The Guardian – regeneration, 2014). The deficiency gap between the Boroughs and other parts of London ought to be shut with the intention of ensuring the residents of the Growth Boroughs take pleasure in similar life opportunities over the following two decades. The 2011 Convergence Action Plan created affluence and lowered poverty, supporting healthier ways of lives, and building successful areas (Department for Communities and Local Government, 2014). The plan helped in determining affluence over time in achieving this general drive. East London authorities and organizations intend on renewing venues of the Olympic Park separately. The government re-launched the Copper Box in mid-2013 for providing sports ranging from basketball to boxing an arena that could house more than 400,000 spectators for performance annually (Greater London Authority, 2014). The ArcelorMittal Orbit is a building that offers an iconic cornerstone for Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in addition to a thrilling tourist attraction. This is mostly because the ArcelorMittal Orbit is the tallest statue in the UK (The Guardian – regeneration, 2014). LVRPA will oversee the Eton Manor Sports Complex and convert it into centers for Tennis and Hockey. Both centers re-launched in spring 2014 to provide for four interior and six exterior courts for tennis. According to a 2013 appraisal by UK’s Department for Culture, Media and Sport, 80,000 inhabitants of Host Borough said they individually, directly, and indirectly benefited from jobs created in preparation for the Olympics games (National Statistics Online, 2014). The advancement of Westfield Stratford also offered over 10,000 new lasting employment opportunities in East London alone (Greater London Authority, 2014). Out of these employment opportunities, Stratford City Retail Academy corresponded with a quarter of the permanently unemployed. Additionally, the Legacy Corporation currently works with partners to make locals partake and assist them in acquiring jobs and business prospects by making use of the amenities provided (The Guardian – regeneration, 2014). This way, the firm can ensure east London residents take pleasure in the regeneration legacy after the Olympics. The legacy conversion of the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park previously formed 2,500 short-term construction employment opportunities and the park will host thousands more lasting jobs in the future (Department for Communities and Local Government, 2014). Broader Developments of the Regeneration Legacy The mayor is directing efforts to back the provision of real estate through financing substructure, economic housing, and incentivizing areas to construct (The Guardian – regeneration, 2014). The mayor is allowing private organizations and individuals to develop government land and meet the requirements of the London’s expanding population as well. The mayor composed a plan to extend work on the six Growth Boroughs via “Leaving a Transport Legacy” (Urban Geography Research Group, 2014). This work focuses on future urgencies for new transport substructure in the Upper Lee Valley. The mayor collaborates with public and private industries to provide over 7,000 employment opportunities and 13,500 new houses through the additional development of the Greenwich Peninsula (ESRC Neighborhood Centre for Research, 2014). This cape would be a substantial guest attraction and cause for an expanding community. The progressive prospect throughout the Lower Lee Valley and Stratford will accrue to 32,000 new houses and 50,000 employment opportunities (National Statistics Online, 2014). Recently development residential projects in east London have been high at all times. The prosperity of the 2012 London Olympic raised the interest to extraordinary levels (The Guardian – regeneration, 2014). The Mayor recently proclaimed two objectives that are established to change East London’s past harbors and assure the billions of pounds of financial ventures made into the UK economy by the government and private parties (Urban Geography Research Group, 2014). Conclusion The Regeneration “Legacy” imposed by the 2012 London Olympic Games renewed East London’s urban landscape through sports avenues, parks, social facilities, and urban developments. The permanent effect of these games on London societies and the international community will come up in the future several decades (Cochrane, 2007). The essence of collaboration Olympics encourage is established in the diverse cross-industry alliances brought into line with the games. Gradually, residents’ populations will depend on global sporting occasions to produce opportunity that improve their lifestyles (Paddison, 2002). The risks are high at each degree for Olympics and safeguarding an offer for the games is conventionally transformative for host towns (Butler & Watt, 2007). East London’s highlighting on lasting community is an advantage in its attitude towards the Olympics. This emphasis is also a great opportunity to raise the standards on how these marvelous events can propel social and economic advantages for future decades. References BUTLER, T. & WATT, P., 2007, Understanding Social Inequality. London: Sage. BURDETT, R. & SUDJIC, D., 2011, Living in the Endless City. London: Phaidon Press. BYRNE, D., 2001, Understanding the Urban. London: Routledge. COCHRANE, A., 2007, Understanding Urban Policy. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing. Department for Communities and Local Government, 2014. DCLG. [Online] Accessed from: https://www.gov.uk/government/organisations/department-for-communities-and-local-government [Accessed 29 August 2014]. ESRC Neighborhood Centre for Research, 2014, ESRC Neighborhood Centre for Research. [Online] Accessed from: http://www.esrc.ac.uk/my-esrc/grants/H141251026/read [Accessed 29 August 2014]. Greater London Authority, 2014, GLA. [Online] Accessed from: http://www.london.gov.uk/ [Accessed 29 August 2014]. HALL, T., 2006, Urban Geography, 3rd Ed. London: Routledge. HUBBARD, P., 2006, City. London: Routledge. International Journal of Urban & Regional Research – Lecture Series, 2014. Lecture Series. [Online] Available at: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1111/(ISSN)1468-2427/homepage/custom_copy.htm [Accessed 29 August 2014]. JONES, P. AND EVANS, J., 2008, Urban Regeneration in the UK. London: Sage. Joseph Rowntree Foundation, 2014, JRF. [Online] Accessed from: http://www.jrf.org.uk/ [Accessed 29 August 2014]. KNOX, P. & PINCH, S., 2006, Urban Social Geography, 5th Ed. London: Prentice Hall. LEGATES, R & STOUT, F., 2007, The City Reader, 4th Ed. London: Routledge. National Statistics Online, 2014. NSO. [Online] Accessed from: http://www.statistics.gov.uk/ [Accessed 29 August 2014]. PACIONE, M., 2005, Urban Geography: A Global Perspective, 2nd Ed. London: Routledge. PADDISON, R., 2002, Handbook of Urban Studies. London: Sage. SAVAGE, M et al., 2003, Urban Sociology, Capitalism and Modernity, 2nd Ed. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. THORNS, D., 2002, The Transformation of Cities. London: Routledge. The Guardian – regeneration, 2014. Regeneration. [Online] Accesses from: http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/regeneration?INTCMP=ILCNETTXT3487 [Accessed 29 August 2014]. Urban Geography Research Group, 2014. UGRG. [Online] Accessed from: http://urban-geography.org.uk/ [Accessed 29 August 2014]. Read More