Previous work has indicated that there were limited positive effects of the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games on the most disadvantaged residents of the Olympic boroughs. An important part of the legacy of the London Games was the conversion of the Athletes’ Village into East Village, which was designed on active living principles and aimed to provide social, intermediate (affordable) and market-rent housing. The ENABLE London study investigated the effect of moving to this new environment on levels of physical activity among individuals from all housing sectors. The present analysis is based on focus group discussion with the social housing residents of East Village. Participants were asked about personal the social and environmental influences on their levels of physical activity and their use of local recreational space and facilities. Participants were positive about their new homes and the safer neighbourhood; however, they also complained about the high cost of living, restrictions on children’s play areas and limited facilities for older children/teenagers. The high costs, in particular, had a strong impact on participants’ plans to continue living in the development. These concerns need to be addressed to ensure a sustainable community.
Introduction
Defining and understanding the legacy of large events such as the Olympics is complex and can encompass elements of economics, built environment and sustainability.222 ‘Soft’ or non-infrastructural elements of a legacy include individual-level changes to mental and physical health and skills development, as well as community-level changes such as increased social cohesion.223 The bid for the London 2012 Olympics emphasised legacy.224 The Olympic Games were positioned as an opportunity to tackle the problems of London’s East End, which included deprivation, unemployment, poor health outcomes and a shortage of housing, by driving regeneration and through increased investment.225
High-quality evidence supporting the role of major sporting events in delivering a tangible (infrastructural) or non-infrastructural legacy is limited.223,226 Evaluations of the London 2012 Olympics also suggest that there was little positive impact on the most disadvantaged residents of these boroughs. Previous research has noted that the housing legacy of the London Olympic Games has fallen short of its ambitions; this appears particularly true in the case of social housing provision.227 Indeed, development and gentrification has led to the decanting of existing communities to make way for Olympic facilities,228 the growth of developments that are perceived by the local population as ‘not for them’229 and the displacement of residents as a result of the increases in rent and house prices.227 In terms of a health legacy, studies have failed to find sustained health improvements in the area.217,230,231
Although several studies have examined the effect of the Games on residents of the Olympics boroughs, there has been relatively little research examining the views of residents of the new East Village. The Speaking Out of Place project232 interviewed tenants from the social, intermediate and market-rent groups in East Village, in addition to individuals with a community role in East Village and residents from neighbouring areas. Their analysis found a growing sense of community among residents, although there were tensions around the high levels of securitisation and control. Both social housing and intermediate housing tenants reported concerns about the high costs of living in the neighbourhood and insecure tenancies.232 In contrast, Wilson’s233 work found relatively little interaction between residents, which was largely confined to individuals living in the same block. The work also suggested that certain features of the built environment in East Village may serve to limit interactions between different housing tenures.233
This chapter presents an analysis on the experiences of social housing tenants who moved into East Village.
Methods
The focus group was conducted in 2015 among social housing tenants approximately 1 year after they had moved to East Village, and aimed to identify factors relevant to the built environment and health that had not been covered or were inadequately covered by the baseline questionnaire used in the study. It was expected that findings from this focus group would provide additional context to the findings, as well as inform the spatial narratives work that would be carried out (see Chapter 8). Although the initial proposal included carrying out focus groups with members of the social and the intermediate housing sectors, time constraints meant that only social housing sector participants were contacted as they were the first group to move into East Village.
The focus groups were conducted using established procedures,234 audio-recorded and transcribed. The focus group started with a free discussion by participants regarding their experiences of living in East Village. As the discussion progressed, additional topics such as community cohesion, transport, traffic, noise, parking, safety, shopping, and the levels of exercise and use of local parks, gyms and swimming pools (including use of the Olympic Park) were introduced by the facilitator. All transcripts were anonymised. Following this, a thematic analysis235 was used to identify the main themes from the content of the focus group transcripts. This involved reading and rereading the transcripts and grouping data extracts together according to their main themes. A coding framework was developed, based on emergent themes, which identified the major topics and issues.
Eighty ENABLE London study participants who took part in the follow-up assessments between January 2015 and June 2015 were asked if they would be interested in taking part in the focus group. A total of 75 individuals from 65 households expressed an interest and were sent a formal invitation letter in July 2015. Thirteen households agreed to take part and were sent a further invitation letter with three suggested dates. The most popular date of participant availability was determined. Eleven individuals from separate households agreed to attend the focus group. On the day, seven attended; two confirmed that they were not able to attend and there were two no-shows. The participants were three black females (aged 32 years, 45 years and 39 years), two Asian females (aged 43 years and 45 years), one mixed ethnic origin female (47 years) and one white male (45 years). Five participants lived in Newham prior to moving into East Village; of the remaining two participants, one lived in Hackney and the other lived in Tower Hamlets. The focus group was conducted at a local school (Chobham Academy, E20) in August 2015 and lasted 100 minutes. East Village residents had been living in their new homes for 12–18 months. Five participants were in employment, one was a student and one was unemployed because of ill health. Shopping voucher incentives were given to those who participated.
Results
Five themes emerged from the analysis of the focus group transcript: (1) ‘cost of living’, (2) perception of new home, (3) perceptions of the neighbourhood, (4) sense of community and (5) healthy living. Quotations are identified using unique initials for each participant and their gender.
Cost of living
Participants commented on issues around the expense of living in an area of London that is undergoing rapid redevelopment and gentrification. They were concerned about the higher costs associated with living in the new development, including higher costs of basic utilities and council tax, which meant they were unable to save:
My first thing is the expense. I can’t save. Whereas in my other house, I could save. I can’t save at all. Obviously, it’s a band D area, I wasn’t in a band D, so council tax has gone up, the rent has gone up. I’m paying for water. I’m paying to heat my water. I’m paying the electricity. I’m paying to clean my communal area. It’s too much. I can’t save. I have to pick and choose the brands I buy in the supermarket to try and keep my costs down. I’m more financially strained now.
And to compare with what we were paying before and here . . . my water bill has gone by, I’d say about 70%, so that’s a lot . . . We were told it was going to be a decrease. One of the reasons I chose the house is that it would be 25% less living cost compared to where we were living. So I thought, ‘Oh! 25%. That’s quite a bit.’ But actually it’s about 50% increase.
The high costs were cited by residents as a major reason why they would not consider living in East Village long term:
I don’t see myself living here. With my children. It’s a lot of expensive. You can’t save money.
. . . more and more expensive, I just think, oh right, because they say it’s the East Village, I don’t know if you’re paying because of all the re-development they’ve done, we’re now paying for it, umm, but it wouldn’t be feasible to live here long term, if it carries on.
Amenities such as shopping facilities were limited for the social housing sector who were the first to move to East Village. The residents did not really use the Westfield Shopping Centre, which forms a gateway to the Olympic Park, citing expense as the main barrier. Many reported going to shops near their former residence:
And it’s funny to say, I don’t shop at Westfield, I do go around, just to browse around. I’ll probably go to some of my familiar shops to do you know like clothes shopping and stuff, but I don’t buy my groceries . . .
Waitrose did until umm Sainsbury’s opened. It did get used but I used to find– I’ve got grown-up adults children, who are eating for the world, I would go in there and get like two bags and it would be like £20/£30 and that was nearly enough every day . . . Oh my God, I thought, I can’t live here.
Perceptions of new home
East Village residents were generally happy and reported a sense of pride in their new homes. Many noted that there was a greater sense of calm in their new homes associated with better family space and family members having more of their own space. Better ventilation, no damp and brighter homes were all noted as positives:
The positive is because my children are older they’ve got their own rooms now. We’ve got a bigger kitchen . . . and now the whole family can sit down around the table. We have a family meal every day, whereas before it was once every so often. So it’s brought us closer . . . This place is cleaner. The area is cleaner compared to where I lived before. . . . there are a lot of positives. Everyone’s calmer. It makes the family a little bit more calmer. Also, they’re very proud: it’s a nice place to live. They feel happy.
I’m quite happy here. It’s bigger and the children are a lot more happier here . . . I feel secure in here because the security is 24 hours . . . We have a bigger kitchen now and we have family meals every day now, we eat together. They’ve all got their own rooms. So we [are] calm.
Anyway, I live in a townhouse and I found the place very good. As you said the ventilation is excellent in the house. The rooms are big and everything. About the house I’ve got no issues with the house, it’s just excellent.
Despite this, the families also had some complaints about the new homes. Individuals in the flats complained that there were limited storage options and strict rules regarding where they were allowed to store items. A further complaint centred around rules for the social housing tenants, which stated that they were not allowed to personalise their flats, including adding curtains to the windows, which had an impact on privacy:
Most of the proportions are– once you put a wardrobe and a chest of drawers in it’s really tight.
I must say that what we’ve said about storage, the storage was better in my old house because I did– I’m not necessarily a hoarder, but I have things that I know that, for example, we will use in the summer, whereas now I had to buy storage, I had to buy a big storage to put on my balcony. I’ve had to buy storage containers to put in my hallway. I’ve had to buy another big shoe storage to put– I’ve had to spend loads of money, hundreds of pounds, just to– because I’m a believer that umm everything should have a home and I don’t like clutter, so if it’s out of order, I throw it in the bin, and obviously– so as I said storage is a big problem. Can’t store my buggies anywhere whereas in my old house we had like a downstairs sort of like cupboard where we could store stuff.
Perceptions of the neighbourhood
Overall, participants were very positive about their new neighbourhood, in particular commenting on the cleanliness, order and greater security compared with where they lived before:
That’s really nice actually. I think the greenery is lovely. The greenery is lovely. The way that like we’re close to transport, close to Westfield, all of that’s nice as well. The streets are clean. I like the way that they have tried to upkeep the cleanliness of the area as well, you don’t hardly see any garbage on the streets. Even down to– well I haven’t experienced it, like unruly kids on the street, like– you know you get normally like people hanging around, because that was my fear here, was coming here and having like little kids hanging around, gangs hanging around, or whatever, because of the way that the community is laid out, but I haven’t experienced any of that, I haven’t seen any of that yet.
However, participants also reported certain frustrations with the development. In particular, many of the social housing tenants had young children and they were concerned about the number of restrictions on children’s play areas. Despite having access to the playing areas in the Olympic Park, many parents felt that those areas were too far away for their young children to go to alone or to play in unsupervised:
I feel that there is a lot of restriction, so children cannot, for example, play ball games, ride bikes in the terrace. If they have to they have to go to different parts, even though the parks are not so far, but it requires leaving everything.
The issue of limited facilities to keep teenagers engaged was also noted by the residents. Participants were concerned that as children grow up, there would be little for them to do, which could lead to antisocial behaviour. This was a major source of worry for these parents, and would be very likely to have an impact on their decision to stay on in the development:
I think also like for my daughter, who is a teenager, what we were saying before, there’s not much in the area for them to do, apart from going to Drapers Fields and I think there should be like a little community thing where they can do things like table tennis and– under supervision, you know, like after school, because my daughter does get bored. She just– in my area, in my block, in the community, there’s a lot of young children, not much children her age, and I’ve noticed that children who come to the school that do live in the area umm I don’t know, it’s like they are forced to argue. Because they don’t really have much to do, a lot of the time my daughter’s on her tablet, with people in the area, umm, abusing each other, and I think if they– yes, no, but seriously, there’s no sense of cohesion with the teenagers in the community. There’s a sense of cohesion with the small ones, but me personally– and a lot of the time I see them sitting on the steps and stuff like that, as I was saying about finding the condom in the sand pit area, they are doing things like that, whereas if there was something positive that they can go to . . .
People hanging around on the staircases, it’s going to get worse and worse and especially if they don’t build a communal area for the teenagers, it’s going to get worse and worse. They’ve only built it up for young children. So that’s one thing that I’m dreading in the future and that’s one reason, another reason, why I’d want to leave as well is . . .
Sense of community
Participants’ relationships with their neighbours were generally positive. The management was also active in organising a range of activities for residents to meet each other and managers. However, it appeared that only a few were aware of or had made use of facilities organised by the management:
Well my neighbours are really really nice. My neighbours on my floor are really really nice because we send each other Christmas cards, even when I had my daughter, they sent me gifts, etc. That’s really good. I must say that I don’t– I know there’s a lot of community things going on and they display it on the boards in the flats, but I don’t make use of them personally, so I can’t really.
Encouraging healthy living
East Village was designed to encourage healthy living and has access to gym and sports facilities in the Village and nearby Olympic Park, as well as the swimming facilities in the Aquatics Centre. Parents with young children felt that facilities for children to play should be made available closer to the houses. A few concerns were also raised regarding security in the available play areas:
And we’ve got so much open space, I think for children, they should do something– like a proper park, with swings, a slide, things like that, because they don’t want you to use the communal gardens, so they should provide a little local park for them.
In comparison to my old house we had like, as we said, a little park, where my child could go to. Here you’ve got little bits of parks, here and there, which is a bit of a bummer and I don’t think some of the parks are controlled very well around here, whereas in my old house, they were very very controlled . . .
Overall, experiences with increasing physical activity were mixed. Participants were often unaware of the facilities available to them and many reported not using them. In certain cases the lack of local shops made it necessary for people to travel further away to buy things, which meant they were more likely to drive or use public transport rather than walk, therefore reducing their physical activity:
Umm I would say mine is the opposite. Umm– because where I used to live before, umm, you could walk to like the local shops, etc. I know I’ve got Sainsbury’s now but sometimes if you want something elsewhere, I used to like umm– because of my culture we buy certain foods that we can’t buy in Sainsbury’s, but I used to have shops close to me that I could just walk to, but now I have to drive to work to get those things, so I won’t walk, I will just take the car, so it’s restricting me, umm, I don’t walk as much in that sense now . . . The only difference I would say is walking from my house to the car park, that’s probably the only thing that’s changed, because in my other house, I could just walk outside my house and my car would be there, so in terms of physical activity, no.
I think I’ve gained some weight since I have moved from my old address to this new address and that’s partly because, what you just said, I drive around as well, I don’t– because I find things a bit far, I mean, where I was in my old home before, I could go to my work, because I work in the school as well, that’s part time. I used to take a walk to the children’s centre but now I can’t take a walk, it’s quite far, so if I have to get to my children’s centre, I have to drive.
Umm I’m less active. Because where I lived before I used to walk to work, walk home, now I have to get a bus.
Others reported using the facilities to a greater extent and encouraging their children to do the same:
I do make use of the– because I go to the gyms as well there and the swimming. I get the kids involved. I’ve got a 12-year-old who has put on a bit of weight since we moved in here. He actually put on weight when we moved here, so I said, right, swimming, basketball, table tennis, these are all free for him, so I said right, I’m registering you in to everything and then what we do we go there, weather’s good, soon as I’m finished from here that’s what I’m getting ready to go, we will sit and spend the whole day there.
Well for me, my activity is because I have to walk more. Before I was not. Because the parking (. . .) to leave your car at work because when you move your car, when you come back, there won’t be parking, so why don’t you leave it here, walk, just across the other side of Stratford and go to work, so health-wise I’ve seen a lot concerning my life and the children and then, umm, the rest I don’t know the rest but for me it works for me.
As East Village was designed to encourage active living, there are restrictions on parking and limited availability of parking spaces. Although residents were made aware of this, some participants, particularly those with large families or with health problems, found this restriction limiting:
The only problem is the parking because I can leave my car and go to work, but when it comes to shopping, as a family of five children, there’s no way you can do shopping by bus or train, so you need that car, but sometimes I have to wait to go shopping, you can’t have a place to park, even though you have a free parking along there, outside, or– so you have to pay the inside one, which is £60 a month, which is very, very expensive for a mother of five, so that’s the only problem, apart from that I’m really enjoying the place.
I needed my car, but coming here, because I never had two children under the age of 10, I wasn’t allocated free parking, which was horrible, I mean I’ve had parking tickets, I mean the parking guidelines are not clear here, as well . . . I wasn’t allocated underground parking, which was obviously a thing, and now I’ve got another daughter as well, so it’s a big problem, so I have to pay £65 Stratford International to park my car every month.
I gave my car up just as we moved in, umm, because I wasn’t allowed– I applied for the parking, I didn’t get it, and you know, the one that you get with the underground, and at that time, I actually didn’t know about the council parking, because I did ask about that, and all they told me about was the parking that you know the Triathlon– the East Village parking so I wasn’t aware of [whether] we was going to get a council parking, afterwards, because the first car is free, so I got rid of my car, so I do find shopping is a little bit hard, because I’ve got umm early-onset arthritis and to carry shopping from anywhere it’s a bit difficult, but I mean, I suppose we do online shopping and get them in somehow.
Discussion
Residents of the new East Village had largely positive views about their new homes and enjoyed the security and cleanliness of the neighbourhood. Although participants in the focus group were largely unaware of, or did not choose to participate in, many community events, they reported good relationships with their neighbours. Most participants were, however, quite concerned about the high costs of living in East Village. Quantitative analyses of the ENABLE London study data suggest that there were no significant improvements in physical activity levels (see Chapter 3) or well-being (see Chapter 6) of participants associated with moving to East Village.66 Furthermore, the quantitative analysis showed that the residents perceived the new neighbourhood to be of a better quality and as having less crime than the areas where they previously lived.66 These findings are broadly supported by the focus group data. Findings from the focus group analysis also support the results of the Speaking Out of Place project, which noted that organised community activities as well as tenants’ groups were contributing to the building of social networks and a growing sense of community solidarity.232
The social housing sector was the first to move into the new development; however, many facilities such as nearby shops were not yet open. These amenities are now available in East Village (see Chapter 9). Analysis of the focus group data indicates that many of the participants found costs associated with living in the new housing development to be prohibitive and in some cases individuals felt that they were getting less for their money than with their previous accommodation. Many facilities that were available were also unaffordable. This had clear implications for the participants’ shopping in the local area, which discourages a sense of community. Many commercial developments in East Village appear to target wealthier residents.233 Exclusions because of affordability were also noted in the Speaking Out of Place project.232 The findings highlight existing uncertainties around mixed-tenure developments, in which many facilities or nearby developments may not be affordable to residents on lower incomes.236
Another difficulty cited by participants related to the provision of facilities for children. Many felt that parks were too far away for young children to access and the areas near their homes had strict play times and restrictions imposed on children’s play areas. The social housing residents were also concerned about the availability of activities for older children, particularly teenagers, and were worried that as their children grew up the lack of facilities would mean boredom and possible antisocial behaviour. Previous work has noted the ‘sterile’ quality of the East Village neighbourhood brought about by the strict policies regarding cleanliness, playing areas and noise enforced by the management, which do appear to find some support from the private renters who complained about noisy children.232,237
The lack of nearby play areas for children and limited local shops led to a decrease in physical activity for some participants. Many were also unaware of discounts at the Olympic Park facilities that were available to them. Findings from the quantitative analysis in the ENABLE London study suggest that participants in social housing were closer to a park in East Village than they were in their previous houses, with walkability and access to public transport also higher in East Village.66 However, when the social housing tenants first moved into the development many amenities such as the parks were still being developed, and access to certain areas might have been limited. Later work examining the use of shared spaces in East Village found that the presence of high-end stores around one of the largest parks led some social housing tenants to believe that the park was solely for the use of the market-rent tenants,233 suggesting that certain design features may inadvertently stop individuals from using these amenities. Although the limited parking led to increases in walking for some members, others found this to be very inconvenient and an added cost. Planned developments, including building on existing green space, may lead to a further decrease in activity levels.218
Our analyses are limited by the fact that we carried out only a single focus group with social housing tenants from East Village; additional focus groups would have been able to provide us with a fuller picture of life in East Village for this housing sector. Additionally, carrying out focus groups with participants from the intermediate and market-rent sectors would have allowed us to better understand how the different housing sectors experience their environment.
Conclusions
The Olympics represented an opportunity to have an impact on the social and structural determinants of health in a deprived part of London;224 however, the housing legacy of the London Olympic Games has fallen short of its ambitions.227 We and others have identified many positives associated with the social housing in East Village; however, concerns regarding affordability and facilities for children need to be addressed to ensure a sustainable community with health benefits for all.