Choosing a place

All places are imagined. They are a story told by the people who live or lived there; by people who work or worked there; by people who study or studied there; by governments that govern there; by businesses that set up shop there.

The imagination of place is framed. By many things. But three strong influences stand out.

First is physical or natural infrastructure, for example of roads, railways and rivers that can connect in large places and keep people apart in small places.

Second is history and culture, including how a place has been named over time, what languages, dialects and accents are spoken there, the architecture, including famous landmarks, and activities and events that are baked into shared stories about the place.

Third is the nature and strength of social connection between groups of people. The social networks of individuals are limited -typically between 50 and 150- and cannot shape a place, but the association between social networks can. These macro connections can be imagined, for example regularly convening sports fans; administrative, say people who live in the same village, town, or city; or cultural, as in religious gatherings.

The Winch

The Winch has operated from a disused pub in Winchester Road since 1973. It is part of not one community but many communities. It sits on one side of a major artery, the Finchley Road, but serves people on both sides. The Winch could claim to work across Camden, a London Borough with 200,000 residents. It is regularly serving people who live in at least four of the 20 wards in Camden -Belsize, South Hampstead, West Hampstead and Kilburn -an area with roughly 40,000 residents. A lot of people know of The Winch, even if they don’t know what it does.

The Winch provides services -drop-ins for parents and children, parenting classes, youth groups.

The Winch also works to change places. But which place will be the focus of the Good Neighbourhood Project?