Cool, but feels underwhelming in comparison to the growth of other cities over the past few decades. Shanghai, Dubai, etc..
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London Then and Now: Aerial Shots Show City Grow over Past Two Decades
141–150 of 220 posts
Re: London Then and Now: Aerial Shots Show City Grow over Past Two Decades
#142Earlier quoted context omitted.
It was great in 2012 and comfortable for SWEs (am one). Now it is honestly too expensive, £8 a pint in pub near work, it makes going out less fun.
That's the one kind of inflation which didn't bother me too much. I still go out just as much I just drink less. That's healthier. The property situation makes me far more angry. The UK construction and property industry completely lacks market discipline and quality regulations have been reduced (see: Grenfell where that literally killed people, but also the shocking build quality of most properties). Then there was…
The terrible thing is how they destroy old house from the inside and build multiple flats with terrible quality at huge prices because renters are pretty much in a dire situation and, stuff like RTO and centralization, makes it even worse for them (commute cost+rent cost+living cost in those areas)
All the while charging extremely high tax rates that get distributed to who knows what, the war on Ukraine, maybe.
Re: London Then and Now: Aerial Shots Show City Grow over Past Two Decades
#143Earlier quoted context omitted.
It was great in 2012 and comfortable for SWEs (am one). Now it is honestly too expensive, £8 a pint in pub near work, it makes going out less fun.
Yeah, who could ever afford a £8 ping on a SWE salary. /s
Tax rates matter. It's easy to talk as a yank in a US salary with the tax rates in most states.
UK is insane.
Re: London Then and Now: Aerial Shots Show City Grow over Past Two Decades
#144Earlier quoted context omitted.
What was your reason for loathing living in London? Edit: reason I ask is because I assume it's costs, I can't imagine your apartment was cheap. I don't see much evidence that even SWE's can comfortably live there.
London is actually surprisingly cheaper than many cities in US. You just have to find your place based on the budget. I lived in Ealing area (sure it’s far from many actions but lots of great ethnic food in far cheaper price than anywhere else) in a quite a spacious apartment and it was half as much as what I spent in both two cities I have lived in US. And the tube is excellent (compared to our public transport stan…
Can you mention year and price? I'm curious. It can be vague if you think that would be identifiable info.
I know Ealing and things are pretty pricey nowadays.
Re: London Then and Now: Aerial Shots Show City Grow over Past Two Decades
#145Earlier quoted context omitted.
The human population cannot grow indefinitely without moving to other planets, which is very much infeasible now and probably infeasible into the foreseeable future. Society just has to adapt. The problem I see is our current leaders are only interested in pushing the problem down the road. Declining population (which won't actually decline till 2080-ish IIRC) is not in itself a problem.
We still have plenty of room on this planet, and upcoming medical technology may change the equation on the number of people dying. I hope to start a family before people start imposing measure to limit population growth.
it is extrodinarily unlikely anyone will do such as thing.
As I noted earlier. the birth rate is below replacement rate in almost all developed countries. If not for immigrants population would be shrinking. If anything they would demand more children...
Re: London Then and Now: Aerial Shots Show City Grow over Past Two Decades
#146Earlier quoted context omitted.
1) Housing affordability relates to building relative to growth rate. For a variety of reasons, inlcluding both London's glboal appeal and a fact that it is so dominant culturally, economically, etc. within the UK it's likely this rate of increasse was still not enough. 2) A lot of the building has not necessarily been what you'd call affordable. While you will get some benefit moving wealthier people, expats, and sh…
4) smaller households. You can add 50% more housing, but if more people are spending more of their years single, and desiring to live in their own abode, then increase in demand could easily outpace increase in supply.
The number of people per dwelling went up though, so that hasn't happened, at least not on average.
But I think the average could be misleading if the household size had gone up significantly in council homes, hiding a slightly falling household size in the private sector. But that's pure speculation.
Re: London Then and Now: Aerial Shots Show City Grow over Past Two Decades
#147Earlier quoted context omitted.
1) Housing affordability relates to building relative to growth rate. For a variety of reasons, inlcluding both London's glboal appeal and a fact that it is so dominant culturally, economically, etc. within the UK it's likely this rate of increasse was still not enough. 2) A lot of the building has not necessarily been what you'd call affordable. While you will get some benefit moving wealthier people, expats, and sh…
The elephant in the room is population growth.
Cities like London could absorb pretty significant population growth with high quality, high density home building of the right type, in the right areas as long as they also invest in infrastructure and services too.
Obviously making up the infrastructure and investment gap in other medium and large UK cities might make more sense. Most of the UK’s next 10-20 cities by size (at least) could probably take on a doubling or more in population while also becoming wealthier, easier to get around, and better overall for everyone who lives in them.
Just needs competent government and proper investment in the right places, which have sadly been far from forthcoming for a while now.
Re: London Then and Now: Aerial Shots Show City Grow over Past Two Decades
#148Earlier quoted context omitted.
Riyadh and Dubai are bad examples as they are in the middle of a desert.
What? Why? Riyadh changed like crazy in just 10 years.
Yes, because as a populated city it’s very young: it virtually didn’t exist in the 19th century while London was the most populated city of the whole world at the time. Even in the 1930s London had 300x the population of Riyadh. You have to wait until the 1980s to see Riyadh have more than 1M inhabitants.
Re: London Then and Now: Aerial Shots Show City Grow over Past Two Decades
#149Earlier quoted context omitted.
We still have plenty of room on this planet, and upcoming medical technology may change the equation on the number of people dying. I hope to start a family before people start imposing measure to limit population growth.
it is extrodinarily unlikely anyone will do such as thing. As I noted earlier. the birth rate is below replacement rate in almost all developed countries. If not for immigrants population would be shrinking. If anything they would demand more children...
It is because the elderly are dying, same as they always been dying through out the ages. The older you get the more likely you are to die.
The current demographic trend is based on this assumption. It goes out the window the moment we start meaningfully reducing the probability of death.
Re: London Then and Now: Aerial Shots Show City Grow over Past Two Decades
#150The planning in London is very poor. All they build are really the buildings that are meant to store value for foreign investors, typical open plan offices or warehouses. There is nothing build that would be for workshops or light manufacturing. Friend of mine have been trying to find a workshop space in London or vicinity for over a year and there is very little available. It's either very expensive and too large or…
> All they build are really the buildings that are meant to store value for foreign investors, typical open plan offices or warehouses.
Offices and warehouses is not what I expected to follow the first part of that sentence… office and warehouses are pretty productive! And likely a better use of space in a dense urban environment than a manufacturing facility.