Written by Stephanie Edwards, ARB RIBA, Founding Director at Urban Symbiotics What if? What if…
Matthew Morgan23 November 2022
Our goal in Reading
The intention was to collaborate with the communities of Reading and work with them to create a shared space where they could raise issues that matter to the local community and celebrate the diversity of groups in Reading.
Who we spoke to
The people that came to the urban room were from local community groups interest groups around environment, history, religious community groups, a range of charities that support local people in Reading, and academics and researchers who wanted to share their research with the community.
What’s happening now?
We shared a report in November 2022 with all the community groups who took part in the urban room project. The steering group for the urban room is considering the report and will look for funding possibilities to establish a more permanent community space in Reading.
What will we do with what we’ve learned?
As well as sharing the findings of the report with the local community groups that took part in the project, we will feed our findings into a national report around community consultation. This will include recommendations on how to develop more inclusive community consultation processes to inform the local planning application system. We will publish this in Spring 2023.
How can people get involved?
If you want to be involved in further stages of the project, or have any ideas or suggestions about how and where a more permanent urban room can be located, please contact Prof Lorraine Farrelly, the urban room lead for Reading at l.farrelly@reading.ac.uk
