CENTRE FOR CITY AND REGIONAL STUDIES

Centre for City and Regional Studies
Department of Geography
University of Hull
Hull HU6 7RX

Tel: +44 (0)1482 465330
Fax: + 44 (0)1482 465006

The Centre for City and Regional Studies is an inter-disciplinary research centre located in the Department of Geography at the University of Hull. The Department of Geography is itself a centre of research excellence which received a 5 grading in the 2001 RAE.

The focus of much of the Centre's work is on national, regional and local policy for economic development and environmental protection and in particular on the interface between these two areas of public policy. Critical perspectives on policy approaches towards sustainable development are central to much of this work.

CCRS staff have considerable experience with work funded both by research councils and undertaken for clients at different scales of governance. For example, they have undertaken work for national government on sustainability appraisal and economic development, for regional bodies and for local government in Yorkshire and the Humber. Examples of current and recent research include

• Making space for the new economy (British Academy)
• Angling in the rural environment (ESRC/NERC/BBSRC)
• Assessing the social and economic impacts of social enterprises (DTI)
• The New Economy, Regional Development and Sustainability (with Worcester Polythechnic Institute, USA)
• City-region competitiveness in the Hull and Humber Region (HEIF3)
• Policy interactions and outcomes in deprived areas(DTI)
• Integrated spatial planning, multi-level governance and state rescaling(ESRC).
• Consultation as scientific communication? The case for local air quality management.
• Regional and sector demand for graduates (DTI/BERR)
• Connexions: local evaluation guidance and support project (DFES)
• Relative costs associated with delivering the Connexions service in rural and urban areas (DFES)
• Economic regeneration of North Lincolnshire
• Employment support in the Humber sub-region
• Changes in Regional Planning: a New Opportunity for Sustainable Development? (Economic and Social Research Council)
• Eco-Industrial development: the potential contribution to local and regional economies (ESRC)
• Sustainability Appraisal of Regional Planning Guidance (Office of the Deputy Prime Minister)
• Tools and Support Mechanisms for implementation and Application of Sustainable Development Strategies (English Regions Network) (with CAG consultants)
• Links and consistencies between regional strategies (Yorkshire Futures) (With Leeds Metropolitan University)

The Hull & Humber City Region Observatory is now up and running. The Observatory, which has been funded through HEIF3 monies, was established in Spring 2007 to foster work between the University and local stakeholders in ways that bring economic, environmental and social benefits to the Humber sub-region. A comparative research study exploring the impact of EU legislation on the competitiveness of port-estuary economies in the Humber and Rotterdam is currently underway. WEB LINK.

Professors Andy Jonas and Dave Gibbs, together with Dr Aidan Wilde from Sheffield University are working on a new research project: New Economic Spaces and the Politics of Collective Provision which has received funding from the British Academy. Focusing upon high tech city-regions, the aim of the project is to identify social structures, spatial tensions and local political responses to issues of housing affordability, infrastructure renewal and other forms of collective provision in and around new and maturing economic spaces.

David Gibbs has given invited talks at two major conferences in recent months. First, at the Royal Geographical Society-Institute of British Geographers conference in August-September 2007 where he gave a presentation in a plenary session on sustainable cities entitled 'Neo-liberalism, Ecological Modernisation and the Sustainable City'. Second, to the Sustainable Development Research Network's Annual Sustainable Development Research Conference in September 2007, held at the Royal Society of the Arts in London on 'Implementing industrial ecology? Eco-industrial park development in the USA and Europe'. A podcast of the latter talk is available for download.

David Gibbs will begin work on a new AUS$190,000 research project together with two Australian colleagues Chris Cocklin (James Cook University) and Jacqui Dibden (Monash University). The project will run for three years from January 2008 and will explore the contested area of genetically modified organisms in the agricultural sector in both countries.