What is an Urban Village?

“Urban Village. Hmmmm..What a great idea. It’s brilliant. We like it. We’re all in favour. What is it? "

The recent history of “urban villages” in the UK really began in 1992 with the publication by the Urban Villages Forum under the patronage of the Prince of Wales of a book called “Urban Villages – A concept for creating mixed-use urban developments on a sustainable scale”. The first chapter of the book discusses what it is that characterises these developments and what ideal qualities we should be looking for.

In one sense it is sometimes easier to imagine what the alternatives to an urban village style development might be. We are all familiar with the large housing estates that continue to be built up and down the country. There are a number of reasons why we don’t think this is an appropriate model for Bilston:

• It does not use land very efficiently
  
• It would tend to contribute little to the wider regeneration of Bilston and would act as a barrier to movement between Bilston Centre and the south.
  
• It would become a “monoculture” , that is it would all look and feel the same. This wouldn’t be Bilston, it could be anywhere.