Harlow’s population boom boosts plans for more investment
News / Thu 30th Jun 2022 at 09:16am
TUESDAY’S census revealed that the population of Harlow had grown from 81,944 in 2011 to 93,300 in 2021. A growth of 13.9%.
Harlow’s population alongside its neighbour Uttlesford has seen the highest annual growth in the county and the country.
We asked the Harlow councillor in charge of strategic growth for his reflections
Councillor Michael Hardware, Cabinet Portfolio Holder for Strategic Growth, said: “Harlow’s significant population growth over the last decade will be due to several factors including the new housing developments that we now have in the town.
The growth demonstrates that Harlow is a welcoming, friendly place in which to live and work, with many new residents moving to the town in recent years. Our planners are currently analysing the new census information, and there will be further releases of data later in the year. The census will not only provide updated population figures, but also important data about our town, our people, and their needs.
The new data will support our plans to get the right investment and support from government and will help inform the decisions that we and other public services will make in future.
Next week we will submit our bid to the Levelling Up Fund to bring more investment into the town and we will continue to look for other opportunities.
From 2023 we will be starting our review of the Harlow Local Development Plan and this will set out future growth projections alongside the infrastructure that is required to sustain that.
“Part of our plan is that we have a long-term framework in place for the growth and the regeneration of the town and to ensure that this is sustainable, planned and integrated with the existing town and continue to be underpinned by Gibberd’s New Town principles.”
Mike
2022-06-30 15:33:57
How about supporting the residents you have already instead of squeezing in more into a already overcrowded area, gp surgeries can't cope, hospital overrun not to mention the terrible state of the town centre, building social housing is non exisent, housing register will just grow and grow while the richer part of society will buy the new houses/flats, harlow is turning into a place you can't be proud of.
Kim Oconnor
2022-06-30 19:54:18
Spot on Mike.
Kim Oconnor
2022-06-30 19:55:53
Spot on Mike. 5OOO people waiting on housing, in our town alone.
Strawbs
2022-06-30 23:18:47
Just out of interest Mike, where do you suggest Harlow Council build more social housing? Many people on here moan about the green spaces going from Harlow (rightly so), so where would the new social housing be built? Do you propose the social housing be built on green belt land, or use up the remaining green spaces Harlow has left?
Matt
2022-07-01 08:34:41
Strawbs - 1000% what you just said. I've challenged moaners about where they would build the required homes and I'm always met with vauge, non-committal, non-answers; "I bet there's more space than you think" I believe was one prominent YourHarlow commentator's response. Truth of the matter is, Harlow is running out of space to build the required number of houses on, so either we build outside the borders, on green-belt inside the borders or residential tower blocks everywhere. To the moaners; pick a solution!
Iain
2022-07-01 09:45:32
Where new social housing will be built is simple; it will be the town centre after it is demolished following the sale of the Harvey Centre, and the retail parks along Edingburgh Way as bricks and mortar stores disappear with the advent of online shopping. And many architects now are extolling the virtues of high-rise living so it will be tower blocks of rabbit hutches.
novoman
2022-07-01 10:46:46
The town was designed in a thoughtful way and anyone who has read Sir Frederick's book on Harlow and town design will know that it is a bespoke build to fit within the geography and environment. It's simply no use to say that expansion or development will go on along Gibberd's principles, that's like building a 747 aircraft and saying that adding an extra seats and an extra passenger cabin to cope with double the number of passengers will be ok because the new cabin will follow the same design principles. Capacity within the design and location is limited, in filling and tacking new developments like hggt Gilston Estate and the Epping housing developments onto the town will simply overload the engines, destroying the environment and quality of life. High rise 20 storey living was not in the Gibberd plan. Putting the M11 on the East of the town wasn't green areas and wedges, low rise houses with gardens and shopping hatches were. These features that were revolutionary and provided incredible improvements in the lives of many as they were displaced from London after the war are now being discovered in towns and cities everywhere and being hailed as the future, yet here these ideas are being overridden. The solution is to build new ultra green towns updating the Gibberd principles in the light of new knowledge and green technology about Climate change and the ecological environment. "New town, new house, new job, new baby". Sorted. Harlow is full.
Theman
2022-07-01 12:31:26
More people= more problems
Nicholas Taylor
2022-07-02 23:18:06
Ian, none of the homes in the Town Centre apart from perhaps where Occasia House now sits will be Council owned. Matt, there is a list of areas which the Council have put together using mostly brown field sites. These include the redevelopment of a number of the towns shopping hatches and places like the former Lister House site. The plan to build thousands of homes around Harlow solves nothing, none will be Council homes, they will be unaffordable to those most in need of a home and indeed the number of new jobs created locally will not be enough so most new residents will be commuters.
Matt
2022-07-04 16:29:57
Nicholas, council waiting list is around 5,500 people. Let's say conservatively we need to build 5000 new homes (because of people dropping off the list, some being accomodated elsewhere...etc.) just to satisfy the current council list. Where would you build all these new homes within Harlow, not on green belt, and not high-rise buildings?
Alison
2022-07-09 21:15:13
Can some one tell me where migrants are going to go. Surely they won't be staying in hotels indefinitely and our town doesn't have enough housing for our local population.
11 Comments for Harlow’s population boom boosts plans for more investment: