How Barking Riverside clicked with the community

Technology’s practical application to real estate is the key to adoption. Sometimes it will be the most simple of solutions that can make a huge impact. And when the 433-acre Barking Riverside development in east London is eventually handed over to a community interest company, it will have been the implementation of a technology platform that has allowed residents to have had an impactful say in shaping the structure of that vehicle. A combination of in-depth, in-person engagement with those residents willing and able to commit the time has been complemented by a far wider-reaching, less in-depth, digital engagement with the many more residents who are not. Master developer Barking Riverside Ltd worked in detail with a group of 17 residents over a two-year period to design the shape and governance structures of the CIC. Then they went out to the wider community using the digital engagement platform developed by proptech company Built-ID to check whether this group’s recommendations were reflective. The result was a good match in all areas but one: when residents were asked to prioritise who they wanted to see represented on the board of governors, they put greater weight on community organisations (such as local charities and residents’ associations) than the 17 had. “Residents felt that these organisations had a lot of insight and wanted to see them incorporated more into the governance structure,” says Sarah McCready, head of placemaking and communications for Barking Riverside. “So we have made an important edit: we have added something to our articles of association to allow the CIC to co-opt members from community organisations onto the board when needed. It was something we hadn’t considered in enough depth because the model long term is a democratically elected one, but it will hopefully make the organisation operate in a more collaborative way.” The new board will be incorporated and start playing a larger role in the provision of estate services as early as this summer. Talking to people at scale This is just one example of how tech is being used by BRL, a joint venture between the mayor of London and housing association L&Q. It has so far delivered nearly 1,700 of the planned 10,800 new homes at the former industrial site, with 50% of the completed development set to be affordable. For now, the electoral ward encompasses around 4,000 homes, and McCready is implementing a strategy to engage with as many residents as possible and to support and foster community in this underprivileged area. “The mood music across lots of industries is that you need to be talking to people,” she says. “Tech is one way to do that, particularly to talk to people at scale.” BRL has used the Built-ID platform since late 2019, under its own Thames Talk branding, to share news, information on “influenced decisions” (where BRL has taken action in response to residents’ comments) and of course those all-important polls. The polls tend to go out between two and four times a year, but are typically packed with 10 questions around each of several topics. Social media – organic and paid for – is the main conduit for advertising and sharing links to this work, and McCready enlists the support of community champions to cascade it through their networks. In its first year of using the Built-ID platform, BRL saw more than 2,500 people take part in this engagement. This was a huge contrast with the 100-150 residents who typically engage with interactive events held in a physical space. But both are valued. “It’s that balance between breadth and depth that we try to achieve,” says McCready. “It also means that when people see a poll, they don’t feel in the dark because it’s part of a whole programme of engagement.” Empowerment Built-ID founder Savannah de Savary believes BRL’s early adoption of digital engagement (with 16 surveys already under its belt) goes some way towards explaining why its resident sentiment is particularly positive around themes such as community activation and outdoor space. She recently pulled together data from 43 surveys carried out for clients active in the affordable housing sector across 11 different locations. They had attracted a staggering 64,261 responses and highlighted key issues for residents, such as antisocial behaviour and how this affects their attitudes to outdoor space. “It demonstrates how tech can be used to empower people who have often been seen as apathetic in the past,” de Savary says. BRL’s responses stood out. “The majority of respondents use the green spaces where they live, for example. They feel ownership of the spaces, they feel that they can influence events programmes,” de Savary says. “They feel they have been listened to through this technology. They feel they have ownership of their community and that is really powerful.” McCready adds: “If you give people opportunities to play an active role, which we’ve done, then they know that that’s a realistic expectation. People know that they really can shape and lead.” Flagship digital engagement James Payne, regeneration director at East of England affordable housing provider Flagship, has been using digital engagement for three years and says he has noticed a rush to adopt this sort of tech in the sector since the pandemic. The main driver was to reach more young people, residents with mobility issues and those working long hours. For many people, responding to a poll on Facebook is a much better proposition than attending a community meeting from 6-8pm. In Newmarket, Flagship used a mapping tool via the Built-ID platform to enable residents to identify areas where they did not feel safe and say why. “We would be daft not to listen to them, because they know the area best,” Payne says. One of the things this highlighted was that the way the garages were constructed made people feel unsafe: there was no surveillance, and the lighting was poor. In response, Flagship demolished some of the garages and is now developing ideas for lighting the area, which it will go back to the community on before implementing. In Thetford, Flagship recently completed the consultation stage of a major project and used the platform to create, test and revise ideas with the community. One strand that came to the fore was the need for structured things for young people to do. “There is a desperate need,” says Payne. He believes Flagship has only scratched the surface in terms of the potential this type of tech has to offer. “So much of our work in the past was based around assumptions. Now, we are informed by all demographics of the community,” Payne says. “Our goal is to create meaningful change. We want to create high-quality homes, where people want to live. This is a way to make sure homes remain fit for purpose. The housing crisis is as much about quality as it is about quantity.” To send feedback, e-mail julia.cahill@eg.co.uk or tweet @EGJuliaC or @EGPropertyNews