Will some neighbourhoods always be dogged by a bad reputation?

Focusing on three areas with different socio-economic profiles in Scotland, the report – Neighbourhood identity: effects of time, location and social class – found that the identity of a neighbourhood is established at a very early stage in its life and is underpinned by social class and status making it extremely resistant to change. Given this resilience, the initial ambitions – both explicitly stated and implicitly understood – set out when planning a new neighbourhood are crucial.

Douglas Robertson, the report’s lead author, said: “Class is a greater divider than generally acknowledged. One estate in our study was labelled as ‘rough’ and the area, prior to the estate being built, had carried this label for over 500 years. As a result, Right-to-Buy was less popular there than in the other areas examined, and it consistently maintained its poorer ‘working class’ status.”

The study explored why regeneration policies often fail in their objectives and why the reputations of housing estates – good and bad – display a remarkable longevity and resilience to change.

Each area examined was constructed in the 1920s and 1930s as a ‘planned community’, and a neighbourhood’s status was often associated with historic male employment patterns. For example, miners lived in the working class area and professionals lived in the middle class area.

The report found that it is still social class that fixes the dominant identity of a neighbourhood, and although historic employment patterns have altered, these still influence perceptions of the neighbourhood.

Douglas Robertson concluded: “How communities are planned, then established, sets a physical and social template that has a long and sustained impact on neighbourhood identities. Crucially, this study has shown how place identity can act against the stated ambitions of renewal projects and cause social segregation.”