Building London’s Town of the Future

Welcome to the latest installation of “Public Access,” where CityLab shares its favorite videos—old and new, serious and nutty—that tell a story about place.

It’s hard to resist the ringing sense of optimism in this 1970 film charting the construction of London’s largest ever single housing project, Thamesmead. A 1,000-acre site on a part-derelict, part-marshy brownfield plot on the banks of the River Thames, Thamesmead was the kind of opportunity planners dream of. Moving on from the grimy row housing, rumbling traffic, and often treeless bleakness of London’s existing inner city, Thamesmead would provide decent, well-proportioned state housing for a working class population—one initially hoped to reach 100,000—enjoying the benefits of Britain’s post-war upward mobility.