When you look at the promotional materials advertising luxury high-rise developments in London, it is obvious that the fantasy of living in the sky is fused by a desire for sunlight and "unobstructed" views of the city. Phrases such as "the brightest addition to London's skyline" or apartments being "flooded with natural light" and offering "expansive sky views" are common.
Author
- Casper Laing Ebbensgaard
Lecturer in Human Geography, University of East Anglia
It is a dream with a dark side, however, which plays out below in the shadows of London's mushrooming cityscape. In a recent paper , I show how daylight and shadow are unevenly distributed across the urban population. Vulnerable and marginalised residents are disproportionately affected by overshadowing, a lack of privacy and the overbearing nature of new high-rise developments.
Dubbing such socially skewed access to daylight "light violence", as I do, may sound dramatic. But it captures something insidious.
When you build tall buildings, it is no surprise that they cast shadows in the surrounding environment. In northern climates, where sunlight is scarce, especially during long, overcast winter days, the compounding effect of living in shadows can be potentially harmful. Scientific studies show that depriving people of daylight can lead to increased stress , sleep disruption and early onset of myopia or short-sightedness. Sudden changes in daylight are also linked to an increased risk of cardiovascular diseases .
To protect the health and wellbeing of residents, the UK's Building Research Establishment (BRE) issue national planning guidance that sets out minimum daylight levels. Yet, in practice, the guidance is advisory. And in cases where a proposed development breaches the BRE guidelines, they are easily dismissed and breaches often deemed legally acceptable.
Take the example of Buckle Street Studio , a 13-storey apartment hotel that caused daylight to drop to levels in breach of BRE guidance for 201 windows across 166 rooms in 58 individual flats in neighbouring buildings. As I show in my paper, for each of these 58 homes, the drop in daylight levels amount to material harm. It is a deterioration of the living environment that will compromise the health and wellbeing of its residents.
Standing a mere nine meters from the newly built tower, Goldpence Apartments, a seven-storey housing block comprised of social and affordable homes, was the worst affected block. Of the 58 households in Goldpence apartments, 35 would be directly affected by the development. In fact, 33 residents submitted written objections that expressed both a concern for their individual homes and the lack of light for communal spaces in the neighbourhood.
The proposal was called in for a public inquiry, with a planning inspector assessing the reasons for the council's refusal. In the final report, he sided with the developer and said that the existing levels of amenity and low levels of daylight in neighbouring buildings constituted a local norm , which the residents in Goldpence Apartments should expect
The research draws attention to the legal process through which the harm resulting from a drop in daylight is both neutralised in the planning inquiry and normalised through the planning process. Levels breaching the BRE regulations would be expected, because neighbouring flats already had poor living conditions.
I argue that this kind of race to the bottom amounts to a form of soft or light violence. It is a legally accepted and politically encouraged erosion of living conditions that disproportionately affects vulnerable and marginalised residents.
A dark future?
When Buckle Street Studios completed, the residents in Goldpence Apartments were not only exhausted from the lengthy planning process but had lost faith in the planning system's ability to protect them. As I show in a related paper , they had to come to terms with no longer being able to see the sky from inside their homes.
Many left their curtains drawn all day or rearranged furniture in their children's bedrooms to prevent neighbours overlooking them. Instead of letting their defeat define them, the residents developed coping strategies that have allowed them to process and deal with the imposing presence of Buckle Street Studios.
This demonstrates how people deal with light violence in everyday life by developing innovative solutions to the challenges they face. And, if they can, so too can city builders.
The architects who design the towers of tomorrow should be able to uphold standards and produce healthy living environments rather than detract from them. More sensitive daylight design would include considering the orientation of buildings, the size and placement of windows and in some cases using reflective materials or diffusers.
Yet, to ensure healthy living environments for all the residents in the city - both those living on upper floors flooded in natural light, and those living below - city-builders must acknowledge the deeper challenge of addressing the socioeconomic divisions that are created as part of new developments . And, they should take the role of design more seriously in challenging residential segregation rather than smoothing over it.
Casper Laing Ebbensgaard does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
