Plymouth grew from a small bronze-age settlement at the estuary of the River Plym, into a trading and naval port with national significance by the time of its municipal independence from Plympton Priory in 1439. Since the 1800s, as with other cities, Plymouth’s development has been characterised by rapid increases in its population and geographical extent, aided by developments in transport (Paton Watson and Abercrombie 1943). The single County Borough of Plymouth was formed in 1914, incorporating the adjoining settlements of Stonehouse and Devonport, subsequently becoming the City of Plymouth in 1928. After destructive bombing in World War 2, the city was reconstructed
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according to the Plan for Plymouth, known as the Abercrombie Plan (Paton Watson and Abercrombie 1943), and is now the nineteenth most populous city in England and Wales with 256,400 people at the 2011 census. Figure 4.1 illustrates the city as planned, with distributed development, and its
current extent.
(a) Envisaged expansion of Plymouth by 1960
(Source: Paton Watson and Abercrombie 1943: xiv/xv)
(b) Extent of city development in 2013(Source: Digimap. © Crown Copyright/database right 2012. An Ordnance Survey/EDINA supplied service.
)
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As Figure 4.1 above illustrates, post-war expansion of the city has mostly
consisted of infilling rather than expansion of borders, partly due to unsuccessful discussions with adjoining administrations during the 1950s (Essex and Brayshay 2005). The different boundaries that variously define present day Plymouth include those of building development (Figure 4.1b above), as well its
administrative (political) and Travel-to-Work (economic) areas, the catchment (natural) zone of the Tamar Valley, and the 30 to 50 mile radius by which ‘local food’ is defined for farmers markets, as illustrated in Figure 4.2.
(a) Plymouth Travel to Work and Unitary Authority areas (Source: with permission from Baker et al
2005) Inset: The fifty mile radius around Plymouth which covers most of Devon and Cornwall (Source: Digimap)
(b) The Tamar Valley catchment(Source: with permission from Defra / Environment Agency 2009)
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Implications of different scalar boundaries (Figure 4.2) are widely debated in literature (e.g. Brenner 2000, Collinge 2005, Bai 2007, Veldkamp et al. 2011; see also Chapter 8), but the main focus for this research is the administrative
boundary of the local authority, Plymouth City Council (PCC), for which data on allotments are available. The demographic and economic characteristics relevant to praxes within allotments and AFNs on which comparisons can be made with other cities (see Section 3.3) are population levels and densities; employment and incomes; and education and health, shown in Table 4.1.
Table 4.1 Demographic comparisons of Plymouth with other conurbations
(Source: ONS 2012)
Conurbation Population Pop density km2
Male life expectancy at 65 years Female life expectancy at 65 yrs Unemployment rate (%) Bournemouth 183,491 3974 18.4 20.9 7.3
Bristol (incl. greater Bristol) 428,234 3907 17.4 20.6 7.6
Exeter 117,773 2504 18.8 21.5 6.5 Gloucester 121,688 3001 18.1 21.0 8.5 Plymouth 256,400 3214 17.6 20.6 8.7 Swindon 209,156 909 18.1 21.1 7.4 Birmingham 1,073,045 4007 17.4 20.4 13.6 Brighton 273,369 3307 18.0 21.6 7.7 Cardiff 346,090 2467 17.7 20.4 9.4 Coventry 316,960 3213 17.9 20.8 8.9 Leeds 751,485 1380 17.9 20.6 9.9 Leicester 329,839 4497 16.4 19.3 12.7 Liverpool 466,415 4170 15.8 18.4 11.2 Manchester 503,127 4351 16.1 18.7 12.8 Newcastle 280,177 2470 17.2 18.2 10.6 Newport 145,736 765 16.9 20.8 10.0 Nottingham 305,680 4097 16.3 19.7 13.1 Portsmouth 205,056 5081 18.1 21.0 7.4 Sheffield 552698 3949 17.6 20.3 10.4 Southampton 236,882 4752 18.4 21.5 7.9 Swansea 239,023 632 17.8 18.7 9.2
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As Table 4.1 shows, although smaller in size and population, Plymouth is similar to Coventry on several variables (and with Brighton on population densities, Bristol on life expectancies, and Gloucester on unemployment rates).
Allotments developed in response to poverty (Chapter 2) and, as elsewhere, the South West has experienced loss of employment since 2008. Although unemployment levels in the city are below those in the former ‘industrial heartland’, they are higher than other conurbations in the South West. Wage rates in the city are also lower than the national average, at £468.90 compared to £502.60 gross weekly pay (PCC 2012). In common with other peripheral regions, the fall in the economic benchmark of Gross Value Added (GVA) in the South West has been less than in many UK regions (-2.5% compared to an average of -3% between 2008 and 2010 (ONS 2012)), and it could be
hypothesised that these regions, with generally lower population densities and higher dependence on land-based activities, are potentially more recession- proof. However, this difference could also be due to higher funding streams (e.g. European) or other variables such as public sector employment (armed forces, health and education). Many additional variables could be brought into play to test potential causal factors through city comparisons, but are not pursued here for this exploratory case study research into allotments and AFNs, although differences with Coventry are discussed briefly in Chapter 8.
Within the city, as also in other cities, sharp differentials exist between areas of prosperity or deprivation. Out of its 160 Lower Super Output Areas (LSOAs,
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the UK census unit), Plymouth has 13 among the least deprived 20 per cent in England, and 41 among the most deprived 20 per cent. Of the latter, 17 also sit within the most deprived 10 per cent, and one is within the most deprived one percent in England. Reporting on these variables by the local authority is given according to the neighbourhoods and regions defined by the Local Strategic Partnership, ‘Plymouth 2020’ (Figure 4.3; see also Appendix 9).
(a) Plymouth City boundary, regional localities and neighbourhoods
(b) IMDs for highest and lowest Plymouth neighbourhoods
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The IMD data (Figure 4.3) still obscures differences within each neighbourhood, although some information exists at finer granularity through PCC’s Sustainable Neighbourhood Assessments20. These give detailed descriptions of
neighbourhood characteristics, e.g. demographic and greenspace, along with a short narrative on major issues. The latter, for Devonport and Peverell (top and bottom of the IMD list respectively) describe implications for allotments and AFNs:
“Devonport has a high proportion of young families, singles, childless couples and older people residing in high rise of upper floors of social housing, who are often engaged in uncertain employment opportunities….” (PCC 2009)
“Peverell consists of generally close-knit inner-city, mixed communities, comprised of urban residents living in well-built early 20th century housing … priorities for the neighbourhood include issues regarding anti-social behaviour in Central and Pounds Park and criminal damage to allotments” (PCC 2009)
These brief statements suggest variables that all have an effect on
allotments/AFNs. Housing type and price is used here as a proxy for household space, and so potential for household food production, as well as for income or asset levels. These are depicted in Figure 4.4 below, for the same two
neighbourhoods and in comparison with those at regional and national level.
20 http://www.plymouth.gov.uk/homepage/environmentandplanning/planning/planningpolicy/ldf/ldfbackgroundreports/
148 (a) Housing type in highest and lowest IMD neighbourhoods
(b) Housing price in highest and lowest IMD neighbourhoods
[Missing bar indicates no or insufficient data available ]
Figure 4.4 Housing type and price in highest and lowest IMD neighbourhoods (Source: PCC Neighbourhood Profiles 2009)
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90
Devonport Peverell Plymouth South West England & Wales Percent Detached Semi-detached Terraced Flats 0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350
Devonport Peverell Plymouth South West England & Wales House price £000k Detached Semi-detached Terraced Flats
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Figure 4.4 shows that Devonport has a high proportion of flats (75 per cent), valued at lower than average prices at all other scales, whereas Peverell has a high proportion (64 per cent) of terraced houses in Peverell with higher than average prices at all other scales. Besides some of the best schools in the city, Peverell also has significant area of greenspace (Central Park) as well as the highest number of allotments of any neighbourhood. Figure 4.4 further
illustrates the loss of detail from data at city-level, and indicates the variances that can be revealed through micro-level (individual allotment site) analyses.
Policy narratives for populations, economies and environment in Plymouth and the South West are frequently phrased in terms of sustainability, for example a statement of intent by the (now disbanded) SW Regional Development Agency: “to make the South West the leading region for sustainable development” (SWRDA 2010). In Plymouth, the Local Strategic Partnership’s document, ‘Securing the future for generations ahead’ (PCC 2007: 4) draws on the Bruntland Commission’s (1987) definition, stating that : “… we must manage our social, economic and environmental resources so that in meeting our short- term needs we don’t compromise the quality of life of future generations.” The actual validity of such claims are difficult if not impossible to verify. For example, Plymouth ranked eighth in a 2010 Sustainable Cities Index by Forum for the Future, but the methodology was hotly contended and the index has not been calculated since then.21 However, the City’s Environmental Strategy and Plan
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(ibid.) does cite the Worldwide Fund for Nature’s (WWF) Ecological Footprint of 60 British Cities (2007)22 in which Plymouth and Newport emerged as the
cities with the lowest ecological footprint (a ‘requirement’ for 2.78 planets to maintain standards of living compared with the UK average of 3.01 and 2.85 for Coventry). Although this low footprint could be attributed to the lower than average income levels, Marsden (2010) does suggest that Plymouth is a front-runner city for sustainability issues (Section 3.3.1). The food sector is contended to be a main contributing factor to any city’s ecological footprint (WWF ibid.), and its characteristics in Plymouth and the South West region are explored next.