Newcastle's west end represents one extreme of the UK's topsy-turvy housing problem. While in the south-east of England, homelessness and overcrowding get steadily worse, in the west of Newcastle the issue is the surplus of housing.
Since 1971 the population of the area has declined by 40%, leaving row upon row of boarded up homes. Low demand for housing in the area has been well documented in many studies including one for the Joseph Rowntree Foundation.
The council has been struggling to cope - at one stage the more homes it demolished the more empty property seemed to appear. Some new homes were even demolished after never being lived in.
Perversely the former Labour-led council's solution to the problem was to build even more homes in its controversial Going for Growth Strategy. The Audit Commission diplomatically urged the council to think again by warning that the strategy threatened to make matters worse.
Now the new Lib Dem-led council is trying a different tack with its Revised Approach. It is planning the UK's first housing expo for the area in 2008. The idea revives a tradition that started in Victorian Britain with the Great Exhibition in 1851, which showcased cutting-edge engineering and manufacturing of the time.
Although a specialist housing expo has never been hosted in Britain, the idea is now fairly common in Europe, particularly in Scandinavia. Newcastle was particularly impressed with Bo01 a housing expo in the Swedish city of Malmo in 2001. Scandinavia is seen as much more advanced than Britain in using modern methods of housing construction that the government is currently championing.
Newcastle is hoping that the construction of around 300 innovative show homes by the world's best architects will help transform the reputation of Newcastle's west end. The scheme will be funded as part of Bridging Newcastle Gateshead, a government backed scheme to reverse abandonment in the area by restructuring the housing market.
Matt Weaver
