New Developments Are Not Letchworthy

Jonathan Glancey writes: "Letchworth is no longer a pioneering or idealistic development, but nor is it some thoughtless stretch of suburbia. The way it was planned and the ideas behind it have ensured that it has a character all its own, a century on from its founding. Here is a real 'sustainable community'." He argues that planners and architects can learn far more from Letchworth Garden City, with its diversity of uses, spaces and incomes, than Seaside, Fl, Dorset village, Poundbury and other places British planning officials have turned to for recent inspiration.