Much has been made of the housing shortage in London and the need to build new housing in the Thames Gateway. We are adamantly committed to the idea that London's growth should take place within London and that there is enough room to do so. What then of the plans for the urban settlements in the existing towns and cities, and the future ones within the Gateway itself? Historically, this is an area that though once the seat of fine rural and country towns has, during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, suffered severe decline. In this respect, it is one of the few examples in the South-East to mirror the experience of England's industrial north. Both the urban and rural landscape are degraded by unemployment, pollution and lack of economic growth.The time has come to begin large-scale regeneration of the estuary towns.
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