Tessa Lynn

As the Just Neighbourhoods? project moves into its final phase, we’re preparing to bring together practitioners, policymakers, and academics a dedicated conversation about what our research has revealed.

Across the past two years, we have been working with neighbourhoods in the UK and Northern Ireland to understand why community-led planning remains unevenly taken up, what supports or hinders involvement, and how communities experience justice, voice and value as they engage with planning systems.

What is becoming increasingly clear is that community-led planning (in its broadest sense) does far more than shape local environments, it exposes the deep relationships between place, power, opportunity, and (in)justice. It shows us what communities strive for, what they struggle against, and what conditions help people feel able to influence the future of their neighbourhoods.

To support reflection on these questions, we’re hosting a small, invite-only policy symposium. This gathering will allow us to:

• share our findings and tentative conclusions,

• explore their implications for planning practice and policy,

• consider what more equitable participation could look like, and

• connect with others committed to creating fairer, more inclusive neighbourhoods.

Although the event itself has limited capacity, we are keen to ensure that the learning reaches as widely as possible.

Over the coming months, we will be sharing insights, resources, and reflections from the project here on our website.

If you are interested in the themes of the symposium or would like to hear more about our work, please feel free to get in touch:
tessa.lynn@henley.reading.ac.uk

 

As the Just Neighbourhoods? project moves into its final stages, our focus is shifting towards sharing emerging findings and building conversations with a range of audiences. Over the coming months the team will generate workshops, insight sessions, and ultimately a policy symposium that brings together insights from across the UK and Northern Ireland and  feature our findings.

Throughout these activities, we will be aiming to test ideas, spark debate, and support learning across neighbourhoods, practitioners, policymakers, and academics. Here’s an overview of what’s happening:

 

JN Collaborative Workshops (Autumn 2025)

This autumn, we’ll be holding four online workshops with neighbourhoods in England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland. These events will bring together participants from our case study communities to reflect on the realities of community-led planning (CLP) and to feed-back some initial thoughts and  findings.

These workshops will:

• Share emerging findings from our fieldwork.
• Explore the possibilities and limitations of CLP in addressing local injustices.
• Create opportunities for cross-country learning between communities.
• Invite participants to shape how project findings are disseminated back into neighbourhoods.

We hope that these discussions will provide invaluable feedback and help ensure that the project speaks directly to the lived realities of under-represented communities.

 

JN Practitioner Insight Seminar (January 2026)

Alongside the collaborative workshops, we are planning an insight seminar with the  UK and NI Planning Aid organisations. This will be an online event, which will record for wider access, aimed at professional planners and community development workers and  volunteers.

The seminar will:

• Present comparative findings from across the four nations.
• Highlight common challenges and opportunities for supporting underrepresented areas.
• Explore actionable policy recommendations.
• Open the door to possible cross-UK networks for knowledge exchange.

 

End-of-Project Symposium (February 2026)

In early 2026, we will host a policy symposium to share the final findings of the project. This one-day event will gather invited participants across our audiences, including policymakers, practitioners, academics, and support organisations.

The symposium will:

• Launch the project’s final report and associated outputs.
• Convene roundtable discussions on planning and social justice.
• Explore policy responses to the needs of underrepresented neighbourhoods.
• Provide space for dialogue across research, practice, and policy communities.

This event will mark an important moment for consolidating the learning from Just Neighbourhoods? and identifying where it might go next.

 

Stay tuned to our website and social media channels for updates, blog posts, and resources as these activities unfold and  our findings emerge.