'Re-assessing' London's squares: the development of preservation policy 1880-1931

摘要

London's squares were reassessed by two incompatible interests in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The first viewed the squares as financial assets and development land; the second considered them as social benefits and urban open spaces, leading to substantial public interventions: the London Squares and Enclosures (Preservation) Act 1 906 and the London Squares Preservation Act 1931. This article explores the developing policy process by examining the roles of and interactions between private interests, social reformers, governmental agencies and the wider public. It concludes that social reformers took an intermediate position, working to transform the squares' cultural and social values to the wider public, to government and to Parliament.