What shapes prosperity for people in the Olympic Park?

The stories here describe what people living in East Village in the Olympic Park and the neighbouring area of Chandos in Newham say about what prosperity and a prosperous community means to them. The research was carried out by citizen social scientists in 2015 and 2017. 

East Village is a new neighbourhood on the border of the Olympic Park. During the 2012 Games it was the Athletes’ Village. Following the 2012 Games, the Athletes’ Village was refurbished creating 2,800 new homes to rent - 1,300 affordable rent and shared ownership homes and 1,400 for private rent.

In the 2017 research, households in the streets around Chandos Road Gardens in Newham were included in the Prosperity Index survey and interviewed by citizen scientists. This neighbourhood is on the eastern boundary of the Olympic Park, closest to the first areas of new Olympic Legacy housing development at East Village and Chobham Manor.

Read more about these areas and see the Prosperity Index data for the Olympic Park to hear how established and new communities are experiencing regeneration differently.

When talking about prosperity and opportunities to live well, people living in East Village focused on the following themes: employment and the cost of living, inclusion, insecurity about the future and ‘buying’ quality of life, feeling prosperous and a sense of community.

employment & cost of living

East Village in the Olympic Park has the highest proportion of survey respondents in any type of employment 64% (IGP Prosperity Index, 2017), however when talking about employment opportunities for local people, interviewees often felt pessimistic - saying that long-term residents were not finding good jobs but people with high-income jobs, such as city workers, were moving into the area. 

One interviewee felt that even retail jobs at Westfield Stratford City, the shopping centre, weren’t being filled by local people as they couldn’t afford to live in Stratford on such low wages. 

People spoke of feeling lucky to live in East Village because of the high quality housing, green space and local amenities. But a number of people said the high-cost of living in East Village meant they were spending more than they wanted to on housing, or sacrificing something like space to afford to live there:

“I’m aware that my husband and I are very privileged residents of this area. You know, we rent privately and a lot of our friends could not afford to live this way. But you know we are a married couple, but we are having to share with another guy, three bed flat, in order to afford it. It’d have been nice to have one or two bed flat that we rent ourselves, but you know that would mean paying an extra like 5 or 600 a month just for that privilege.”

East Village resident. Interview 2017.

inclusion

People who had lived in East London for a long-time before moving to East Village felt that local amenities like cafés, bars and restaurants are aimed at wealthier residents and are not affordable for many households:

This concern prompted people to ask who regeneration was intended to benefit from regeneration in the Olympic Park. A number of people talked about feeling that the East Village exists in a ‘bubble’ that is disconnected from established neighbourhoods like Leyton and Stratford.

Interviewer: Are there any places or services in the neighbourhood that you really value or appreciate?

Maria: I can’t lie to you the only places I go to is the Sainsbury’s and the doctors. There’s just restaurants that I feel only appeals to a certain type of people.

Interviewer: Who is that person?

Maria: White, more middle-class people because a lot are bars that you would find in Shoreditch or places like that. They only cater to those types of people, because if you were to walk past them in the evening you would just see people in business clothes, back from work having a beer you wouldn’t really see a family- it’s rare too.”

InsecuritY ABOUT THE FUTURE & ‘BUYING’ QUALITY OF LIFE

Many interviewees talked about feelings of uncertainty and insecurity about the future linked to the high costs of living in East Village. Some shared concerns that they would be priced out of the area.

East Village residents recognise the neighbourhood’s high-quality environment contributes to their sense of prosperity. However, they also acknowledge the ‘trade-off’ between choosing to pay high living costs and experiencing a good quality of life that in the long-term may not be financially sustainable.

CLEAN, GREEN & feeling prosperous

All the East Village residents involved in the research discussed the benefits of living in a neighbourhood with green space, good quality housing, clean streets and good connections to other part of London:

“I used to live next to West Ham park, that area, and then moving to the Olympic Park was completely different [..], because it was so much nicer and so well looked after, it made you feel, I don’t know, it was just such a better environment. It had a whole different type of atmosphere. It was definitely cleaner. It was a really positive change.”

East Village resident. Interview 2017.

People also valued the area for feeling safe and having little crime - although residents noted that they pay a premium in service charges for private security on top of paying taxes for the police.

People also recognised that being part of a new neighbourhood contributes in other less obvious ways to their feelings of prosperity. Roshni, who lives with her family in a privately rented apartment, talked about how the high-quality living conditions in East Village make a difference to how she feels about everyday life and about her family’s prospects. Her sense of prosperity and living a good life is enhanced by feeling part of “somewhere and something new”, which she argues, gives community spirit a greater significance. 

sense of community

In the interviews, residents in the new neighbourhoods referred to a strong initial sense of community created by the shared experience of moving into a brand-new area together and the residual excitement of the Olympics. However, they noted that much of this initial community had been lost as people moved out of the neighbourhood because of the high costs of living.

As Mark explains (right)