Centre for London is an independent think tank producing research and policy guidance for the economic and social development of London. In 2018, they motivated for repurposing of long-term vacant commercial properties for alternative use. Whythawk was contracted to develop research data and analysis drawing on our openLocal.uk commercial location data project.
Our solution
We worked with Centre for London lead researchers to develop a set of queries to support their research questions. These were the geospatial distribution of vacancy both in number of units, and in total floor area in terms of the duration of vacancy.
We identified:
- 24,400 commercial properties in London are currently empty, and 22,500 had been empty for at least six months.
- 2,700 hectares of land – the equivalent of the London Borough of Lambeth – hasd planning permission to develop, but construction had yet to start.
These data and recommended visualisations formed a core part of the research analysis for their report and workshops.
Outcomes
Centre for London released their report in October 2018 and followed up with a series of workshops and presentations with business and local government leaders.
