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Urban Studies, Vol. 40, No. 12, 2557–2572, November 2003
Leeds Calling: The Influence of London on the
Gentrification of Regional Cities
Paul Dutton
[Paper first received, January 2003; in final form, June 2003]
Summary. This paper undertakes a review of gentrification and global city research to develop
an appreciation of the nature of gentrification taking place in central areas of Leeds in the UK.
The literature review establishes an uneven and dominant set of social, economic and cultural
relations between the city-region of London and the South East with other regions in the UK. It
is proposed that these sets of relations will impact upon socio-spatial developments in regional
cities in the UK and will provide the dynamics leading contemporary gentrification in regional
financial centres. Using Leeds as a case study, quantitative and qualitative data are presented to
develop an appreciation of the internal and external dynamics driving contemporary ‘developerled’ gentrification in Leeds.
Introduction
The focus of the theoretical and empirical
research activity of this paper is to develop
an understanding of the relationship between
London and the South East and the occurrence of gentrification in regional financial
service centres in the UK.
The paper commences by evaluating the
ability of historical explanations of gentrification to account for gentrification in cities lower down the urban hierarchy, and
weaknesses are identified in these explanations. Drawing upon contemporary literature
on gentrification, this paper identifies linkages between global city formations and the
social, economic and cultural dynamics of
gentrification. From this review, a set of
uneven social, cultural and economic relations between the global city of London and
the South East region with other city/regions
of the UK is identified. It is argued that this
set of relations informs the gentrification process in regional cities of the UK.
From these discussions, a conceptual
framework is established, from which a research agenda is designed to investigate the
dynamics leading contemporary gentrification in regional financial service centres. The second part of the paper presents a
case study of gentrification in Leeds. The
case study draws upon local economic data,
questionnaires from local residents together
with supporting evidence using ‘vignettes’
from selected semi-structured interviews
with estate agents and residents of ‘The
Calls’ area of Leeds. In the light of these
theoretical and empirical activities, the paper
Paul Dutton is in the Centre for Research in Applied Community Studies, Department of Applied Social Sciences and Humanities,
Bradford College, McMillan Building, Trinity Road, Bradford, West Yorkshire, BD1 0JD, UK. Fax: 01274 307 828. E-mail:
[email protected].
0042-0980 Print/1360-063X On-line/03/122557–16  2003 The Editors of Urban Studies
DOI: 10.1080/0042098032000136219
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concludes by distinguishing between internal
and external forces leading the gentrification
process in Leeds.
Gentrification and the Urban Hierarchy
Despite the considerable differences in the
literature seeking to explain its occurrence,
much of the empirical and theoretical research in the 1980s and early 1990s, either
explicitly or implicitly, considered gentrification in the context of cities occupying
strategic positions in the international urban
hierarchy. Furthermore, complementarity between competing explanations of gentrification can be identified over expectations
of particular categories of cities experiencing
gentrification.
Smith’s supply-side hypothesis (1986) argued that the closure of ‘rent gaps’ following
‘capital switches’ (Harvey, 1989) and subsequent reinvestment into devalorised urban
land markets will only manifest as gentrification in cities at the top of the international urban hierarchy. Smith develops
Cohen’s understanding of ‘global cities’,
based upon notions of uneven development
and new international divisions of labour
(Cohen, 1981), to identify particular ‘corporate cities’ (Williams and Smith, 1986,
p. 211) experiencing gentrification.
Demand-side explanations located the social and cultural conditions required before
gentrification could occur to a limited number of cities. These were high-order cities
dominated by ‘post-industrial’ service sectors (Munt, 1987; Mills; 1988; Ley, 1980).
Both perspectives were in agreement that
gentrification was a product of processes
found in a limited number of cities—strategically well-placed to take advantage of structural economic changes—caught on the
upside of economic and social restructuring.
In the UK, London dominated empirical
and theoretical research (Butler and Hamnett,
1994; Hamnett and Randolph, 1984; Hamnett and Williams, 1980; Munt, 1987;
Williams, 1976). The restructuring of London’s occupational sectors provided a backdrop to these case studies of gentrification.
However, evidence of the changing role of
second- and third-tier cities in the UK suggests weaknesses in Smith’s and Ley’s conceptualising. The late 1970s saw the rise of
provincial financial centres (Leyshon and
Thrift, 1989) which Tickell classified as regional and sub-regional financial centres
(Tickell, 1996, 1993). He identified regional
financial centres as those which had developed an infrastructure across the range of
financial services, with firms possessing the
capacity to generate some original information. Such centres possessed a small number of headquarters of national institutions
with some possible representation from foreign firms. Tickell classified Birmingham,
Bristol, Cardiff, Leeds, Manchester and
Newcastle as regional financial centres in
England (Tickell, 1996, 1993). The capacities and expertise of these urban centres
imply the requirement for skilled professional and administrative occupational
groups and present suitable conditions for the
production of potential gentrifiers in these
regional cities. Indeed, by the early 1980s,
gentrification in Britain had already been
observed in a number of cities outside London, including
Clifton in Bristol, Jericho in Oxford with
similar areas existing in Reading, Leeds,
Newcastle, Glasgow, Bath, Canterbury
and elsewhere (Williams, 1984, p. 221).
However, despite the limitations of Smith’s
and Ley’s ideas, their early conceptualising
of the types of cities experiencing gentrification, represented endeavours to link
processes associated with gentrification with
wider societal changes.
Empirical and theoretical research on gentrification, which mushroomed during the
1980s and the early 1990s, was part of, and
indeed influenced by, a resurgent interest in
urban-based aspects of dramatic social and
economic restructuring taking place from the
1970s onwards. King (1990) linked a major
paradigm shift in urban studies at this time to
developments in the world economy.
Notwithstanding differences over the precise interpretation of the term, it is widely
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agreed that globalisation has brought about
greater interdependency of economic relations between distant localities, involving the
movement of capital, goods and labour.
Globalisation also implies in varying degrees
an increasing interconnectedness of people,
knowledge, images and ideas (King, 1990).
‘Global cities’ such as London and New
York exemplify the reassertion of urban centrality in an era of increasing globalisation
(Sassen, 2000, 1991). Leading-edge economic sectors in global cities provide the dynamic for the urban transformation of their
inner cities. The pulse of high-status occupational growth has increasingly become
linked to the socio-spatial rhythms of the
expansion of gentrification across the global
cities of London (Lyons, 1998; Butler, 1997)
and New York (Lees, 2000). It is also these
cities—with a long history of the process—
that have witnessed extensive gentrification
of increasing intensity and scale.
The maturity of gentrification and magnitude of private high-status residential housing in inner urban areas of high-order cities
such as London, is in stark contrast to the
nascent up-market inner-city residential
housing markets developing in regional cities
of the UK. The uneven time–space geography of gentrification is particularly stark between London and second-tier cities with
industrial urban structures which have witnessed extensive counterurbanisation, population flight and historical state-directed
comprehensive redevelopment of their urban
cores: Glasgow (Atkinson and Hall, 2002),
Liverpool and Manchester (Crouch, 1999;
Wynne and O’Connor, 1998; Jones and
Watkins, 1996), Leeds (Dutton, 1998) and
Newcastle (Cameron, 1992, 2002) are particular examples.
The contingent conditions found in these
cities—of obsolete industrial buildings and
the removal of inner-city residential areas
following comprehensive redevelopment—
have led to contemporary gentrification of
the inner core being instigated predominantly
by institutional actors rather than ‘classic’
gentrification which involves the in-migration of ‘pioneer’ households renovating
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run-down property through ‘sweat equity’. In
Leeds—for example, following two decades
of limited private-sector activity, only in the
past three years has there been intense investment activity and growth of residential housing redevelopment and conversions of
industrial and commercial spaces close to the
inner core. A mere 448 units were completed
in the central core of Leeds between 1982
and 1992, with a further 313 added between
1993 and 2000. From the turn of the century
to March 2002, an additional 700 units have
been completed together with a further 708
under construction. An additional 2742 units
have been granted planning permission
(Leeds City Council Planning Department).
Are the economic, social and cultural processes which gave rise to the socio–spatial
transformation of inner cities of global cities,
paradigmatic for other cities lower down the
urban hierarchy? Although the process commenced in the dynamic environments of a
limited number of high-order global cities,
suitable conditions for gentrification can now
be found in many lower-tier provincial but
globalising cities. Gentrification is one localised effect of globalisation. Burgers is certain of the outcome of globalisation and the
top–down nature of the process
What is already manifest and obvious in
the global cities, is in the offing for cities
at lower levels of the global urban hierarchy. Hence, the best way to learn what is
happening in cities all over the western
world is to study global cities (Burgers,
1996, p. 99).
The production of theories and generalisations of the gentrification process and evaluations of its consequences are built upon
empirical research located in a limited number of high-order cities. It is important to
question the interurban homogeneity of gentrification. However, only a limited amount
of research activity in the UK has taken place
outside the global city of London. Theoretical and empirical research into gentrification
in regional cities in the UK is underdeveloped.
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Gentrification and Regional Cities
To date, gentrification literature offers little
consideration of the impact of the increasing
interdependency of economic relations and
interconnectedness of people and places—
engendered by globalisation—on the gentrification process in cities lower down the
urban hierarchy. London holds a dominant
cultural, political and economic position in
relation to other regions in the UK (Charles
et al., 1999). In addition, other global cities
impact upon developments beyond their national boundaries and should also be considered in understanding the development of
gentrification in second-tier regional cities
such as Leeds.
Contemporary work from Allen et al.
(1998) provides an understanding of the notion of uneven development in a period of
increasing globalisation within the national
context of the UK. They identify an important and dynamic relationship between the
‘dominant’ region of the South East and
other city-regions in the UK. Their conceptualising provides a point of departure in considering how the time–space dynamics of
gentrification in particular dominant places—
such as the global city of London—inform
contemporary developments in the city of
Leeds. They argue that regional differentiation should not be understood solely
in terms of spatial differences in the levels
of certain selected criteria (employment,
unemployment, per capita income), but
also in terms of interregional (including in
many cases international) social relations,
which produce these differences and, at
least temporarily lock them into place.
[Also] regions/sub-regions/places are characterised, not by differences from each
other, so much as by their place within this
overall constellation of forces which constitutes social space and, in particular, by
their differentiated and unequal relations
to each other (Allen et al., 1998, p. 50).
The research question for this paper is formulated to apply Allen et al.’s (1998) notion
of uneven development to the process of
gentrification found in regional cities in the
UK. What is the relationship between contemporary developments of gentrification in
cities such as the regional service centre of
Leeds with the historical and contemporary
development of gentrification in London?
The focus of the theoretical and empirical
research activity of this paper is to offer an
understanding of the relationship of London
and the South East to the process of contemporary gentrification occurring in the inner
city of Leeds.
Understanding the Influence of London on
the Production and Consumption of
Inner-city Living in Leeds
The preceding discussion suggests the importance of considering the sensitivity of
contemporary research to the uneven set of
social relations between the global city of
London (and other such cities) and the regional financial service centre of Leeds.
Hamnett’s integrated approach (1991)—
which identifies a set of necessary and
sufficient conditions that must be present in
any metropolitan context before gentrification can come about—provides a useful
schema to review contemporary work into
gentrification and to generate propositions
and questions.
The identification of Leeds as a regional
financial service centre suggests the development of a ‘post-industrial’ service economy
and the existence of an important precondition. Leyshon and Thrift (1989) identify decentralising processes emanating from
central London as important factors in the
growth of regional centres.
Sharon Zukin’s (1982) ideas, which consider the interplay between cultural and
economic spheres, provide fertile ground to
develop an appreciation of important dynamics leading to the growth of gentrification as
a new investment opportunity for institutional investors and property developers. As
gentrification evolved in particular metropolitan contexts, it has become socially, symbolically and economically coherent amongst
producers and consumers alike (Podmore,
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LEEDS CALLING
1998; Jackson, 1995; and Mills, 1993). Podmore (1998) identifies the role of the mass
media in representing and reproducing the
meaning and values of gentrification. Dominant places such as London have become
reference-points for marketing strategies for
property developers and place engineers in
other places. Furthermore, the role of local
public agencies is often ignored when considering the dynamics of gentrification
(Warde, 1991).
The preceding discussion leads to the final
and sufficient condition identified by Hamnett (1991)—namely, the presence of effective demand for inner-city living amongst a
particular occupational cohort working in the
inner city. Bridge (2001) identifies this demand as a class stratagem and traces the
time–space manifestation of gentrification
with innovative social practices of an emerging middle class.
As the process has matured the lifestyle
cache of the gentrified neighbourhood has
caught on and attracted members of the
professional middle class in private sector
occupations and possessing more economic than cultural capital (Bridge, 2001,
p. 206).
Similarly, Butler and Hamnett (1994) identify a particular fraction of the middle classes
as an important cohort with a predilection for
inner-city living. They draw upon Fielding’s
(1989) classification of the South East as an
escalator region and recognise the role of
London and the South East region as a dynamic both in job creation and in occupational restructuring. Butler and Hamnett
(1994) track cohorts of ‘migrant’ universityeducated entrants into professional occupations in London, who have specific urban
lifestyle requirements and reside in gentrified
areas of inner London. Their research provides further specificity to the production of
class identities, cultural formations and
predilections for inner-city living in London.
Butler (1997; Robson and Butler, 2001) continues to develop the relationship between
place and class distinction in the context of
London. However, little regional analysis is
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offered beyond consideration of the global
city of London.
In the context of Leeds, witnessing contemporary growth in the financial and business service sectors, one possible scenario
could be the discovery of large cohorts of
consumers of urban living being highly mobile workers having received both promotion
and socialising in London working in the
expanding professional and managerial occupational sectors of Leeds. An alternative
reading of Fielding’s (1989) escalator region
is to consider Leeds as a regional magnet for
professional, managerial and technical workers, not only from London but other regions,
particularly from the North of England.
Initial Conclusion and Research Questions
The outcome of the review of selected contemporary research on gentrification together
with conceptualising the global city of London as a ‘dominant’ city-region within the
UK offers insight into contemporary gentrification in a second-tier regional city. Gentrification certainly may have commenced in
particular high-order cities; however, as gentrification has progressed both historically
and geographically in these localities, the
process develops into an increasingly commodified form.
Gentrification as an urban form and way of
life—developed in particular economic and
culturally dominant cities—is exported to
particular regional financial centres such as
Leeds, which is experiencing contemporary
growth in its housing and labour markets.
The development of gentrification in a regional city is less reliant on the outcome of a
set of historical-geographical conditions,
based upon a set of interrelationships between property developers, financiers and a
particular fraction of the middle class.
Rather, place-specific cultural producers and
other place engineers, become important intermediaries in marketing and selling this
culturally symbolic residential form.
Furthermore, expanding regional financial
service centres such as Leeds-which is witnessing contemporary growth in professional
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and managerial white-collar service occupations—import workers from beyond their
metropolitan and regional boundaries. As a
social grouping, migrant workers seek out
known and understood ‘cultural symbols’
and ways of living, related to particular
urban cultural and consumption activities.
The preceding scenario suggests a set of
research questions. First, it is important to
establish the nature and extent of economic
restructuring in the regional financial service
centre of Leeds. The influence of London
and the nature of ‘post-industrial’ economic
growth taking place in Leeds and the concomitant importance of professional and
managerial occupational growth in local
labour markets need to be explored. Secondly, it is important to consider the role and
representations of London and other dominant cities in shaping and influencing urban
policy interventions and place-marketing
strategies by public and private agencies in
Leeds. Furthermore, the structural characteristics of the consumers of inner-city living
require identification. Whether urban living
in Leeds can be described as an activity of a
particular class cohort and the spatial mobility of residents also require consideration.
The Regional Financial Service Centre of
Leeds
Leeds has developed its regional importance
as a centre for specialist financial and business services through growth in regional demand and expansion of local firms. With the
HQs of 5 of the top 10 national building
societies based within the West Yorkshire
region, many firms in Leeds benefited from
the deregulation of financial services in the
1980s.
However, important processes taking place
in London have had implications for servicesector growth in Leeds. Office relocation out
of London has been one such process. Leeds
has been the beneficiary of ‘back office’
processing functions following First Direct
and Barclays Intermortgage relocation of
their activities out of London. In addition, a
number of London firms have expanded into
the provinces and established regional HQs
in opportunistic searches for new business
and increasing market share. In Leeds, such a
process has been evident, particularly
amongst accountancy firms (Tickell, 1996,
1993). Also, many London firms have focused their activities upon highly valued international corporations, with smaller
domestic business being of secondary importance (Leyshon and Thrift, 1989). In
Leeds, it has allowed firms—particularly
amongst the legal services—to attract large
contracts from London, offering lower prices
and more likelihood of the account being
handled by a more senior experienced professional (Begg and Guy, 1992). Consequently this has provided opportunities for
firms to build up their expertise in particular
services (Tickell, 1996, 1993).
The location and growth of these firms
have strengthened economic activities of
financial and business service sectors in
Leeds, offering services to regional and national firms across a range of financial and
business activities. Such growth has been
significant in expanding the spatial reach of
Leeds, providing services across Yorkshire
and Humberside, expanding into the North
East of England as well as offering certain
specialist services to London (Tickell, 1993,
1996; Leeds Economy Handbook, 2002).
The government choosing to relocate some
of Whitehall’s major departments—the
Departments of Health and Social Security—
to the centre of Leeds in the late 1980s is a
further example of London decentralising.
Employing approximately 2200 civil servants in a new purpose-built HQs in the
centre of Leeds, approximately 1000 of these
workers migrated from London (Haughton
and Williams, 1996).
These processes had made a dramatic impact on the nature of economic restructuring
and labour market growth in the metropolitan
labour markets of Leeds. The Leeds Metropolitan District (LMD) includes the City of
Leeds and outlying towns such as Otley,
Wetherby, Morley and Garforth. During the
period 1981–91, service-sector employment
in LMD increased by over 20 per cent and by
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LEEDS CALLING
Figure 1. Percentage of employees in the financial
and business service sectors in Leeds MD, 1981–
2000. Source: Leeds Development Agency (2002).
1991 employed some 73 per cent (225 000)
of total employment. Net growth was focused upon the sectors of banking, financial,
insurance and business services (18 300).
The financial and business service sectors of
Leeds have been a consistent dynamic of job
growth (Figure 1). Highly skilled professional and managerial occupations have
been a dominant characteristic of such
growth since the early 1980s. Between 1981
and 1991, expansion in legal and accounting
employment represented a 108 per cent
(2000 to 3800) and 91 per cent (1700 to
3600) increase respectively. According to
one firm in Leeds, the city was seen by
graduate entrants as second only to London
as a desirable location to start a career (Begg
and Guy, 1992). The following 10-year period, between 1992 and 2002, employment
growth continued to be dominated by these
occupations. Professional and managerial occupations totalled 107 900 employees working in LMD in 2002 and represented an
increase of 31 per cent since 1992, with
projections for growth to be higher over the
next decade (Leeds Economy Handbook,
2002). Professional and managerial occupations now dominate the occupational sectors
of Leeds.
Such growth rates in financial and business service sectors and professional and
managerial occupations are against a backdrop of expanding labour markets in Leeds
2563
Metropolitan District. The employee-base in
LMD has grown from 301 700 in 1981 to
353 900 in 1998—an increase of 52 200 jobs
or 17 per cent growth. This was a far better
performance than that of either Great Britain
(10 per cent) or Yorkshire and the Humber (7
per cent), and better than any other major UK
city except for Aberdeen. The period between 1996 and 2000 witnessed expansion of
37 000 jobs created in LMD with 26 per cent
coming from the financial and producer service sector. Service-sector employment now
totals in excess of 80 per cent of the labour
force working in the District.
Leeds city centre is the location of 30 per
cent of all employee jobs in the Leeds Metropolitan District and almost 60 per cent of all
financial and business service sector jobs.
The spatial and sectoral concentration of regional and metropolitan economic activity
and employment growth in Leeds city centre
has stimulated expansion of high-quality
office space and growth in retail and leisure
developments in the city core over the past
decade. The purpose-built ‘Quarry House’
headquarters for the two government departments, opened in 1993, became the largest
building ever constructed in the city
(Haughton and Williams, 1996). The Leeds
Development Agency has calculated that almost 60 per cent of the total £3 billion of
property development schemes undertaken,
under construction or proposed in LMD over
the past decade have been within the central
area of Leeds.
Research Design
The Calls in Leeds is an area running
alongside the River Aire Canal, a short walking distance south of the spatially concentrated central business district and retailing
centres of Leeds and the City railway station.
In the early 1980s, the main features of the
area were its poor environmental quality and
physical dislocation from the city centre. It
was an area of derelict land, predominantly
disused or with low-grade uses. Scrap-yards,
derelict warehousing and traditional mill
properties ran eastwards along the River
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PAUL DUTTON
Canal away from the city core. The inner
core of Leeds was also an area with few
remaining residential spaces.
The first phase of waterside developments
for private residential use in The Calls took
place during the period 1984–91 and marked
the beginning of a nascent private housing
market in the inner core of Leeds. Recently,
further developments and residential spaces
have been created in the central and western
edge of the city’s core.
This paper draws upon a body of research,
which sought to understand the nature of,
and explanation for, gentrification in the regional city of Leeds. A case-study approach
to research design was used and took advantage of both qualitative and quantitative
methods of data collection. First, exploratory
research was undertaken using fieldwork,
telephone conversations with estate agents
and local officials together with analysis of
1971, 1981 and 1991 Census data collated
from the enumeration-district level. These
case studies identified three neighbourhoods
undergoing a process of gentrification. Social
upgrading was identified: all three areas witnessed rapid increases in the proportions of
SEG Class I and II relative to both ward and
city levels. Figure 2 demonstrates the increases amongst Class I and II between 1981
and 1991 in The Calls.
The Calls, identified as a ‘developer-led’
form of gentrification, witnessed rapid increases in the levels of private housebuilding
Figure 2. Percentage change in social classes 1–6
in Leeds and The Calls, 1981–91. Source: ONS
(Census 1981 and 1991).
and conversion activity together with increases in planning applications for residential developments.
Following this exploratory research, further qualitative and quantitative data were
collected. Additional data were collated during spring 2001 by questionnaire (262 households in the 3 gentrified areas plus an
additional 55 households from a suburban
neighbourhood on the edge of the metropolitan area of Leeds). In-depth interviews were
conducted during spring and summer 2001 in
the gentrified areas (30 householders, 10 estate agents/chartered surveyors, 3 property
developers, 5 local domestic/corporate
financiers together with local officials). Additional analysis of local and national print
media was carried out.
Local economic data-sets including data
gleaned from Leeds City Council’s yearly
Economic Handbook, together with supplementary council reports and local history
literature, were collated to identify structural
economic changes taking place in the local
economy of Leeds over the past four
decades. Additional local history and academic literature identified patterns and processes of urban development of Leeds and
urban policy interventions and initiatives.
The questionnaire asked respondents for
information on a total of 52 items concerning
household structure, income and occupation
including parents’ occupation, housing histories, educational histories of householder
and dependants, household incomes, motivations for house moves and locational choice,
political affiliations, cultural interests and
leisure activities. A total of 82 returned questionnaires for The Calls were recorded, representing a response rate of 25 per cent.
Qualitative data collection entailed indepth, semi-structured interviews with residents and key actors in the property
development process. Interviews with residents were used to support responses to questionnaires and provided opportunities to
explore residents’ biographies. Interviews
with both residents and key informants were
able to build a detailed picture of resident
and key-actor involvement and perceptions
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of city living and the process of gentrification.
Urban Policy Context: Urban Governance
in Leeds
The state has played an important role—both
directly and indirectly—in the regeneration
and gentrification of The Calls in the centre
of Leeds. The emphasis of urban policy
throughout the 1980s was on property-led
regeneration (Hill, 2000). Various initiatives
in Leeds during the 1980s were aimed at
unlocking the potential of hitherto underutilised land, especially in central areas of
Leeds, providing coherent land development
policies and using state investment and policy tools to induce private-sector capital
flows back into the area (Roberts and Whitney, 1993). The policy initiatives undertaken
in The Calls reflect the changing nature of
urban governance, encapsulated by the shift
from urban mangerialism to urban entrepreneurialism (Harvey, 1989).
Urban entrepreneurialism can be distinguished from urban managerialism by an
ideological shift away from universalistic
and egalitarian impulses to a greater acceptance of social and spatial inequalities. It is
also identified by the emergence of new organisational forms and institutions—notably
public–private partnerships (Griffiths, 1998).
These themes are revealed as urban policy
initiatives unfolded in the support of new
housing developments and the renovation
and conversion of relic industrial buildings
into residential spaces in The Calls. The following section outlines key periods in the
creation of an inner-city housing market.
Furthermore, as will be shown, this new form
of urban governance is based upon state
speculation and risk-taking. The urban pioneers, innovators and risk-takers in the creation of residential spaces close to the inner
core of Leeds were various public–private
partnerships underpinned by state funding
which shielded the risk to private capital
investment.
During the period between 1985 and 1991,
a number of new-build developments to-
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gether with conversion of derelict warehousing took place, involving a mixture of,
public–private-funded projects in association
with private developers and also a building
society in conjunction with a housing society.
In June 1988, Leeds Development Corporation (LDC) was established as one of a third
generation of mini UDCs (Urban Development Corporations). These development corporations by-passed local democratic
institutions and were parachuted into various
inner-city locations in a number of regional
cities following the ‘success’ of the Conservative government’s urban policy
‘flagship’ initiative, the London Docklands
Development Corporation (Hill, 2000). The
Calls was within LDC planning jurisdiction.
In 1991, LDC became a partner in ‘Leeds
Waterfront’, with Leeds City Council, British
Waterways and the English Tourist Board.
Leeds Waterfront was established to develop
leisure and tourist attractions along the Leeds
waterfront and to develop further housing
and office space from both old and new
properties. The initiative was successful in
attracting a major £42.5 million landmark
development—the Royal Armouries—out of
London and onto the south bank of the River
Aire.
From 1991 until 1996, a period of inactivity followed and coincided with the economic recession in the UK. This period was
also marked by low demand for properties in
The Calls, either for investment purposes or
by private sale.
From 1997, increasing market activity
amongst a small group of local and regional
developers began. National housebuilders–
independent of state support—have become
active in the city centre since 2000. Recent
developments have spread westwards and
eastwards of the core of Leeds, including
renovation and conversion of lower-grade
office buildings for residential use.
Such findings suggests that, in the context
of the city of Leeds, national property developers—and accordingly national financial investors—remained risk-averse to developing
a new inner-city housing market, despite the
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PAUL DUTTON
success of ‘the brand’ in other cities with
mature inner-city housing markets. The creation of an inner-city housing market in
Leeds relied upon the support of public funds
and public or quasi-public agencies to minimise the risk for private-sector investment.
Equitable Issues: The Gentrification of
Urban Policy
The consequences of successful economic
and environmental regeneration of The
Calls—in a policy environment of public–
private partnerships leading urban renewal in
a deregulated housing market—have been
rises in property values and rent in the area
and the subsequent abandonment of social
policy goals to provide ‘affordable’ housing
in The Calls.
An early development in The Calls was
the renovation and conversion of Victoria
Quays, previously warehousing units, with
infill new buildings available for purchase
(totalling 121 units) and intended for the
first-time-buyers’ market. Three years after
the completion of this development, an
officer of the Urban Development Unit of
Leeds City Council declared
It’s been an excellent success story. It
would have been good to see the flats
occupied by people on low incomes but
the development has achieved its aim to
revitalise that area of Leeds (Leeds Other
Paper, 28 April 1989).
Furthermore, The Chandlers, another early
‘bridgehead’ development in The Calls undertaken by a housing society to provide
‘assured rents’ to lower-income residents,
has since been sold on to a private landlord
and has witnessed rises in average rents. The
future housing needs of lower-income residents of Leeds will be met elsewhere in the
city, away from the regenerated and transformed inner-city landscape of Leeds.
As private investment capital flows into
the area, so further social costs become manifest. A regional housebuilder has applied for
planning permission to demolish The Chandlers and build 124 luxury apartments along
with offices, a restaurant and car parking.
The spectre of direct displacement of any
remaining lower-income residents in the inner city of Leeds becomes a distinct reality
and suggests universal and inevitable deleterious consequence of gentrification regardless of urban context.
The Corporate City: Marketing Leeds
Place-marketing strategies—in relation to local economic development—have become
another important characteristic of entrepreneurial governance (Griffiths, 1998).
Both Leeds City Council and the nowdefunct Leeds Development Corporation
have been active in the promotion and marketing of the City of Leeds, to both internal
and external audiences. The creation of the
Leeds Initiative—a growth coalition of local
public and private institutions—and the idea
of Leeds as a ‘Corporate City’ (Haughton,
1996) have been used to portray the city as a
partnership between various public- and private-sector agencies to “promote the mutually beneficial improvement of the city as a
whole” (Burt and Grady, 1994, p. 249).
As a major player in the Leeds Initiative,
Leeds City Council has been influential in
orchestrating the notion of the 24-hour-city
concept and the repackaging and theming of
the city centre. Various quarters have been
created, including the Riverside Area, the
Victorian Shopping Quarter and Entertainment area, and the Civic Quarter.
The opening in Leeds of the first Harvey
Nichols retail store outside Knightsbridge
(London) mirrored processes of financial service firm decentralisation from London. Harvey Nichols, the Royal Armouries and
‘Quarry House’—all examples of London
decentralising—have been important centrepieces of place-marketing and (re)presenting
the city as a centre for prestigious office,
retail and leisure activities. As a result of
such local economic development strategies,
the city of Leeds, like other cities has seen a
“profound revaluation of the potentialities of
urban living over the past fifteen years”
(Griffiths, 1998, p. 52).
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LEEDS CALLING
Celebrating the City
Such institutional marketing strategies have
played into a diverse range of marketing and
advertising strategies of numerous private
agencies—including the property development industry in Leeds. One estate agent
interviewed identifies the importance of
place-marketing to sell individual apartments.
That scheme … was about marketing the
city centre. We ended up trying to sell the
whole concept rather than the individual
scheme. That has been the theme of the
whole business ever since
A burgeoning array of metropolitan
‘lifestyle’ magazines focusing upon leisure
and cultural consumption in the city have
provided a medium by which the property
development industry, furniture designers,
restaurateurs and large breweries celebrate
urban living and sell their products. Numerous articles in magazines such as Leeds Life
and The Leeds Guide extol the virtues of
urban consumption and urban living. Such
copy blends into deliberately crafted advertising images presented in the real and imagined settings of a rebranded and themed
consumption landscape of Leeds city centre.
For instance, a supplement published with
The Leeds Guide in the spring of 2001, produced by ‘Urban id’ a Leeds design consultancy, provided a focus on city living in
Leeds and celebrated urban consumerism.1
Features included ‘The 24 hour city’, and
‘Northern class’ which identified Leeds as
the northern showcase of contemporary fashion. Another commentary featured an interview with a prominent estate agent who was
“pioneering the re-branding of the Leeds’
West End”. Placed alongside such magazine
features are advertisements selling ‘loft living’, designer furniture and artefacts associated with chic urban living. Other lifestyle
magazines such as Absolute Leeds carry features on the development of the city-centre
living phenomenon in Leeds and offer comparisons with cities such as London and New
York. Additional advertising of new inner-
2567
city developments include the association of
a new housing development in the ‘West
End’ of Leeds with prestigious areas in London, encapsulated in the advertising copy
‘Whitehall. Whitehall Leeds’.
Recently, Leeds has attracted a number of
major national network television productions and these have been identified by placemarketers as an influencing factor in creating
positive representations of Leeds. One estate
agent identifies how such productions enhance the reputation of Leeds as a desirable
liveable city and create demand for inner-city
living.
It just lifts the whole thing it just adds
celebrity and I think it adds value at the
ground level. And moreover it encourages
other people to come in from the outside
to buy into that whole culture, and of
course, they rent flats and they also rent
flats for location. I wouldn’t over emphasise the importance of that but it certainly
is a factor.
Socio-demographic Characteristics
Residents of The Calls
of
In this inner-city area of Leeds, the ageprofile of respondents indicates that urban
living is not the sole preserve of the young.
The largest group—26 per cent of respondents—was within the age range of 31–39
years, while 20 per cent were within the
40–49-year-old category. Owner-occupation
is highest amongst the 31–39 age-group. The
age range of renters is comparably younger
than owner-occupiers in The Calls, but is
evenly spread between 20 to 39 years of age.
The survey suggests that inner-city living
in Leeds, although not a practice of a specific
age-group is certainly the preserve of childless households. With the exception of one
household—a single-parent family—all respondents were childless. In addition, 75 per
cent of respondents described themselves as
single, while 57 per cent stated they were
living alone and a further 33 per cent were
living with a partner.
Based upon returned questionnaires, 75
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2568
PAUL DUTTON
per cent of the population live in private
rented accommodation—this included 8 per
cent of respondents residing in company
lets—the remainder being owner-occupiers.
In addition, 78 per cent of respondents had
resided at their present address for less than
3 years, while 60 per cent of respondents had
resided at their previous address for less than
3 years. The evidence of high proportions of
rental units recorded amongst the survey
sample in The Calls was supported by a
number of estate agents interviewed. The
survey of residents was carried out in developments built during the 1980s and the short
residential periods recorded by respondents
living in The Calls contrast sharply with the
comparator suburban neighbourhood. The
evidence provided suggests a highly transient
population residing in The Calls and indicates a high degree of ‘churning’ in the
inner-city housing market of Leeds.
The following accounts from two residents
provide qualitative support for the survey
data, indicating a transient population, spatial
mobility and divergent working patterns of
respondents located in The Calls.
Daniel is 30, single and a computer programmer. He has worked for an IT company
based in Altringham near Manchester since
he left university. Daniel’s connections with
Leeds are predominantly work-related
We work with clients for, however, long
the projects last for. Usually three to six
months … So for a few weeks you stay in
a hotel and a few weeks later you can get
a flat because it’s cheaper and that’s how it
works.
Daniel’s work has taken him across the country, including to London, Bristol and
Manchester.
I am on the extreme of things. It’s a bit sad
in a way, because your life is dictated by
where your company sends you. Leeds is a
cool place to be. But I am at the point—if
they send me to Ipswich or say Skegness—that will do me over, I will do the
normal thing. I’ll say that’s it.
Chris, a senior civil servant, has been spa-
tially mobile for career enhancement. Chris
and his partner chose to rent a flat in The
Calls following their experience of city living in other places.
Chris: We were city-centre ‘livers’ when I
lived in Cambridge, in Chester we lived in
the suburbs which was kind of OK, we
then became city-centre livers in Scotland
where we lived briefly in the centre of
Edinburgh and then again in the centre of
Stirling. Got used to city-centre living after 6–8 years and really loved it.
In contrast to Daniel’s transitory relationship
with Leeds, Chris and his partner wish to
make a commitment to the city and purchase
a property in the city centre. Chris’s housing
and locational aspirations support the view of
one estate agent interviewed whose own data
suggested increasing proportions of units being sold to owner-occupiers. The estate agent
believed that this trend was indicative of the
maturing of the inner-city housing market in
Leeds.
A Middle-class Strategy?
The data collated suggest that inner-city living in Leeds is the preserve of particular
cohorts of the middle class. The survey
identified the socioeconomic status of residents—using the Registrar General’s
classification of occupations—as being predominantly professional (30 per cent) and
managerial (31 per cent) occupations, with a
further 17 per cent associate professional or
technical occupations. Within these groups
of respondents, 84 per cent stated that their
fathers were from one of these three occupational classes. Of all respondents, 82 per
cent were graduates with 41 per cent receiving their degrees from either redbrick or
Oxbridge Universities.
Responses from questionnaires indicate
that high numbers of consumers of inner-city
living in Leeds are geographically mobile,
with 57 per cent of respondents indicating
that at least one of their two previous addresses was outside the Yorkshire and Humberside region. A total of 22 per cent of
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LEEDS CALLING
Figure 3. The Calls, Leeds: employment profile.
residents had a previous address in the South
East.
The data suggest that the inner-city housing sub-market is closely associated with the
expanding local economy (Figure 3), providing residences—often for short periods—for
highly mobile professionals and managers
servicing the growth of a major regional
financial service centre.
The Outsiders
The picture of high numbers of survey respondents moving to Leeds from outside the
Yorkshire area is supported by accounts from
estate agents, who recognise ‘outsider’ demand for inner-city living in Leeds. A partner in a city-centre estate agency identifies
his experiences of the people looking to buy
or rent in the inner city
You get a mixture, you get young professionals, people who are working in the city
not from Leeds, who want a base up here
and they live up here during the week and
live somewhere else.
One estate agent interviewed became involved with the nascent inner-city housing
market of Leeds in the early 1990s, during a
deep housing recession in the UK. His experiences of ‘outsider’ interest in inner-city
living in Leeds—particularly from migrants
from the South East—were an important
constituent of early demand for residential
units.
2569
We started to get involved in re-selling
flats that had been bought off plan from
people … but nobody really wanted them.
But there was this hard core of people who
really wanted to be here. People, who were
a bit more forward thinking, people who
had perhaps lived in other cities. People
who had come from the South East who
thought that was the best thing to do. If
you work in the city you might as well live
there. And they kicked the whole thing off,
and they were helped out and supported by
a whole bunch of investors who were just
in for a bit of speculative chance for about
thirty grand [£30 000].
Alongside local public agencies, consumers
from London and the South East were an
aspect of early risk-taking in the establishment of The Calls. The experiences of the
same estate agent working with a developer
from London implied a learning process for
the agent, developing an understanding of the
potential of the inner-city housing market
By October 97, we were helping City
Lofts with … selling them—set of plans,
set of prices—setting the market at which
nobody had any gut feeling for where it
was going to be. The director of City Lofts
based in London said, “Look, I know
what’s going on in the London market I
have looked at the price indexes I want to
go for these prices”. At the time we were
going for seventy grand [£70 000] for one
bed, just under one hundred [£100 000] for
two. At the time this was unheard of. The
scheme took off; all were sold.
The importance of what one estate agent
calls ‘outside forces’ identifies distinct cultural practices and attitudes towards innercity living between locals and outsiders.
So you’re inevitably relying on outside
forces people who are the more cosmopolitan people who are more mature, experienced … and so you do rely on people
who say “I’m coming to Leeds to work I
wonder if there is anything on the riverside
like there is down in Greenwich or
Kew”. … Trying to win over the local
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2570
PAUL DUTTON
population particularly the older generation, you know we’ve had launches, the
Mayor has come along, and she said to me
“Why would anybody want to live here”.
Literally in The Calls!
Conclusions
The redevelopment and renovation of The
Calls can be claimed an economic success
story. The concentration of contemporary
economic growth in Leeds shatters many
doom-laden predictions, so prevalent in the
early 1980s, of the peripheral role cities
play—particularly industrial cities in the
north of England—in an increasingly postindustrial economy.
The gentrification of the inner city has
become an important facet of the urban renaissance of Leeds. In light of the entrepreneurial and risk-taking activities of the
state, high levels of public investment have
gone into the creation of a private residential
housing market and a consumption landscape
in the heart of Leeds.
The concern over the future of British
cities and, in particular, the social and economic decline of inner-city residential areas
and the vision of an urban renaissance of
towns and cities in the UK provide continuity
to urban policy and remain important objectives of the British Labour government in the
21st century. However, research undertaken
in Leeds suggests that a universal consequence of the gentrification process—regardless of place and time—are the socio-spatial
inequalities and social inequities it produces.
The contemporary policy issue for many industrial towns and cities in the north of England seeking to emulate the successful
regeneration of Leeds is whether the economic and social benefits accruing—increased
land values, the creation of private investment opportunities and the repopulation of
the inner core—will inevitably entail social
inequities and costs for the lower-income
urban populace.
The development of inner-city living in
Leeds is closely linked to its expansion as a
regional financial service centre. This inter-
relationship is mirrored in the occupational
characteristics of residents of The Calls: IT
consultants, accountants, solicitors, and actuaries. What is striking about the characteristics of many residents is their ‘loose’
historical connections with the City of Leeds,
being a highly transient group of professional
and managerial workers who service the expansion of the financial and business service
sectors of Leeds. Many of these residents
parallel Daniel’s experiences—their connections with Leeds are temporary—and their
inner-city location is partly engendered by
the nature of their work. The nascent innercity housing market with high levels of rental
units reflects these labour market dynamics.
The transitory nature of residents and the
high levels of churning in The Calls raise
further policy concerns over the sustainability of this niche housing sub-market in
Leeds.
In exploring the influence of the dominant
city-region of London and the South East in
the gentrification process in Leeds, a number
of external factors driving the gentrification
of the inner city of Leeds can be suggested.
The uneven economic and political power
relations between London and the South East
with other cities and regions of England establish particular connections between the
decentralisation of London firms and government departments and the growth of Leeds as
a regional financial service centre. The desire
for urban living is part of an uneven sociocultural relationship between Leeds and London. Dominant and positive representations
of London inform place-marketing strategies,
encouraging urban consumerism and city living in Leeds, and the creation and development of positive images and representations
of Leeds as a liveable city. The growing
reputation of Leeds as a place to live and
work is reflected back to dominant places
such as London and provides opportunities
for further relocation and expansion of London businesses, which in turn further enhances the urban competitiveness of Leeds.
Quantitative and qualitative data suggest
that the development of the inner-city housing market in Leeds is heavily reliant upon
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LEEDS CALLING
the consumption practices of outsiders—
many of whom are from London and the
South East—who are an important constituent of demand for inner-city living. Migrant
workers seek out city-centre living, partly for
cultural reasons, but job-related factors are
also important.
The benefits of gentrification and urban
renaissance in Leeds have fallen unevenly
upon the local populace. The residents of
The Calls, in certain ways, represent the
‘denizens’ of the city of Leeds, indulged for
their economic value as consumers and residents.
Developing a greater understanding of the
processes and consequences of gentrification
in towns and cities lower down the urban
hierarchy is an important but underdeveloped
research area, and highlights the salience and
pertinence of continuing empirical and theoretical research into the process of gentrification well into the 21st century.
Note
1.
The supplement, renamed—PaD: Property
and Design is now a separate publication
sponsored by Crosby group plc.
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