A Radical Fix for Britain’s Housing Crisis: A New Offshore City

The answer to Britain’s housing problems might be to build an entirely new city offshore in the Thames Estuary. So suggests Ian Mulcahey, Global Leader of Cities & Urban Design practice at global architecture practice Gensler.

With the UK’s housing shortfall so acute that it would need to construct another London-sized city to meet it, Mulcahey believes that the new government’s building plans — which involve new towns, peripheral urban expansion and infill — risk neither solving nor necessarily easing the problem. The river waters and banks just to London’s east could provide enough space to genuinely tackle the issue, while also being located in the part of the country whose economic vibrancy means such a plan could be implemented without heavy government subsidies. Mulcahey says the cost is that of building a new city, but he’s still working on an estimate.