Impacts of AirBnB regulation in New York
New York has long been a money spinner for AirBnB. In January 2023 there were 38,500 listings. As…
Planning a Refugee Camp
In 2010 the Commonwealth Association of Planners held its first Student Essay competition. The winners were Jeremiah Atho…
Kes Revisited – The welfare state and community in the late 1960s
Ken Loach’s film, Kes, was released in 1969. What does it tell us about life in a coalfield…
Place Identity, Participation and Planning
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Regional and Local Economic Development
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Cliff is a freelance consultant, researcher, author and trainer. He was the Chair of the Cockburn Association 2016 – 2023.
He is Professor Emeritus of Planning and Spatial Development at Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh.
He is a Past President of the Royal Town Planning Institute, and of the Commonwealth Association of Planners.
He is a past Chair of Built Environment Forum Scotland.
He was awarded the O.B.E. in the 2016 Birthday Honours.
Books
Some articles fromall categories:
Planning and politics
This first appeared in Planning on 29 November 2002 and is reproduced by kind permission of Haymarket Publications.
Lord of the (Pineapple) Rings
In a week when my term of office as President of the Royal Town Planning Institute came to a close, I also faced being made redundant. This largely inconsequential article that I wrote in 1997 is redeemed by the photo of me wearing my Eric Cantona T-shirt while meeting a pirate. It also provides some…
Territorial Dynamics in Europe: Gateway functions in Cities
Territorial Dynamics in Europe: Gateway functions in Cities, ESPON Territorial Observation No.9, (2013) https://www.espon.eu/topics-policy/publications/territorial-observations/territorial-dynamics-europe-gateway-functions Co-author.
Blow for Smart Cities as Toronto project is scrapped
The recent decision by Alphabet to scrap its ambitious waterfront regeneration project in Toronto is a landmark in the short history of smart cities. Sidewalk Labs’ Toronto Waterfront project was a flagship for the Smart Cities movement. Early in May 2020 it was abandoned. The germination, contestation and demise of the scheme will be mulled…
Do you want fries with that?
This first appeared in Planning on 31 May 2002 and is reproduced by kind permission of Planning Resource.
Force Majeure movie review: Explosions in a landscape
The film Force Majeure focuses on the tensions within a marriage, but it also depicts the tensions between people and the natural environment. The original Swedish title of Ruben Östlund’s internationally acclaimed film Force Majeure is Turist, which is “Tourist”. The pivotal drama in the film is the moment early on when an avalanche of snow threatens to bury the winter…
World Urban Forum 9 – A missed opportunity for UK
World Urban Forum 9, in Kuala Lumpur in 2018, was an opportunity to show UK engagement with urbanisation as a global issue. It was missed. Here is the blog I posted from that event. The UK remains myopic about the opportunities and challenges of the urbanisation of the planet. We may fret about the lack…
China’s New-Style Urban Policy
This blog was first posted in July 2019. Urban Transformation and “New Style” Urbanisation in China was the theme of a major conference hosted by the University of Glasgow. In 2014 China launched its New-Style Urbanisation Plan (NUP). The Plan gave a new emphasis to environment and to the quality of urban development, and better…
Community and film: Akenfield and Byker
Three contrasting films prompt important questions about the nature of communities, past and present, rural and urban. The word “community” is often invoked by planners and architects, but all too often with disregard for the realities. This week I have been to see three films that explore what communities are and how they function, while also…