REPORT: Future Cities Forum's first half 2026 event highlights
- Jul 24
- 25 min read
Image: Life and Mind Building, University of Oxford, courtesy NBBJ
Future Cities Forum is releasing report highlights from the first half of this year, showcasing some of the discussions it has held and the contributors involved.
Its event discussions have been on science hub development, university real estate investment, new towns and the Oxcam Arc, tall buildings, devolution and growth in Oxfordshire, the City of Culture 2029 and Cambridgeshire's emergence under the Greater Cambridgeshire Develpment Corporation, our summer awards 2026 and Burnham's vision for housing, infrastructure and place.
January 2026
The year began with our Winter Awards 2026 and an all-female judging panel - drawn from leading professionals across local authorities, development and construction, universities, infrastructure operators, arts organisations and architecture and urban design practices - assessed a shortlist of eighteen projects spread across six categories. The judges included Laura Dyer, Chief Executive Places, Engagements & Libraries (Executive Board Member) Arts Council England, Donna Nolan, Chief Executive, Watford Borough Council and Diane Metcalfe, Head of Architecture at HS2.
In the museums category, the winner was PoMo Museum, Trondheim, Norway, and Laura Dyer said:
'The Trondheim has both aspects of the renovation as a heritage asset in itself and siting the museum in the heart of the community. The gender equality of 60% of the acquisitions budget devoted to female artists is a very good thing as it is very much a live issue. The use of warm colour referencing Norwegian folk art is very strong so this pipped the Harlem New York project, which also has a strong sense of rootedness in the community.
In the heritage and retrofit category, Barts North Wing was the winner and Donna Nolan commented:
'Barts North Wing has very sensitively brought together the historic assets with modern healthcare access and it's very relevant today. as we go through the New Hospital Programme.'
In the science buildings category, The Life and Mind Building, Oxford University, won, Professor Rokia Raslan, UCL, said:
'I like that Oxford North looks at not just science but the impact on the local economy while sustainability and community engagement have been thought about in detail. The Life and Mind is a great project by Arup, which has a team well equipped to understand nuances of sustainability..'
For details on all our judges and project winners/runners up, click through on the link here:
Image: Future Cities Forum at Jesus College, Oxford - in the Cheng Kar Shun Digital Hub designed by MICA Architects
Also in January 2026, Future Cities Forum gathered leadership from the Oxfordshire region and the West Midlands to discuss the recently published interim Oxfordshire Growth Commission Report, investment required for infrastructure connectivity, and continuing concerns around building housing on the Green Belt.
Those taking part in the opening panel discussion included Cavendish ('Cav') Elithorn, Director – H M Treasury, Cllr Liz Leffman, Leader of Oxford County Council, Cllr Ian Courts, Deputy Leader Solihull Metropolitan Borough Council / Board Director West Midlands Combined Authority, Clive Tritton, Interim Director of Regeneration, Oxford City Council, Victoria Collett, Director, Thomas White Oxford for Oxford North and Matthew Humphreys, Director, Scott Brownrigg.
Cavendish ('Cav') Elithorn, Director with oversight of the Oxford Cambridge Growth Corridor at H M Treasury commented on the outlook for investment in infrastructure across the Corridor:
'We think about the Growth Corridor on three levels and one of these is industrial strategy. How do we get companies growing and how do we support them in the right way with infrastructure? This approach is predicated on creating fantastic places and connectivity and the agglomeration benefits of these for communities and businesses. We know some of this growth is held back by the infrastructure challenges of having sufficient power, water and sewage services in place and so on.
'When you look at how these things are funded, much of this is via regulatory settlements with private sector developers so for government intent on creating a good environment for investment it's about unblocking the system, and attacking some of the planning challenges.
'However when you look at creating the connectivity between places this is often funded by government. There is a lot of government capital going into transport as often the commercial returns are not there for private sector. In France they subsidise transport infrastructure up to a level of 60 per cent because they see the agglomeration benefits in doing so, and the private car alone will not deliver that.'
For more details on the discussion, click through here:
February 2026
Future Cities Forum's 'Student Cities 2026' discussion event in February focussed on the impact of UK universities on their host cities, from economic, research, innovation, social and built environment perspectives - and the role of design in helping student and staff well-being.
Contributors to the forum were: Dr Aileen Jones, Pro-Vice Chancellor of Partnerships at Liverpool John Moores University, Linda Goodacre, Estates and Facilities Director, University of Sheffield, Adrian Johnston MBE, Innovation Commissioner for the City of Belfast (commenting on the role of Belfast's universities and FE colleges in the recent City Deal), Professor Tim Thornton, Deputy Vice-Chancellor, University of Huddersfield, Michael Mitchell, Associate Partner - Architecture at Ridge & Partners LLP, Jessie Turnbull, Associate Director at MICA Architects and Ian Pratt, Director and Head of Education and Healthcare at Scott Brownrigg.
In August 2023 (according to the House of Lords Library) the economics consultancy firm London Economics published analysis of the impact of the higher education sector on the UK economy. The analysis was commissioned by Universities UK (UUK), which represents 142 universities across the UK, and was based on the 2021/22 academic year.
Its analysis estimated that the ‘economic footprint’ of higher education (HE) providers across the UK resulted in
768,000 full-time jobs
£71bn in terms of gross value added (GVA)
£116bn in terms of general economic output
It explained that these figures were calculated on the basis of direct impacts from HE providers, for example capital and operational expenditure, but also their ‘indirect and induced’ impact, such as spending flowing from suppliers and employees of the industry. For example, the analysis broke the economic output down as £46bn of direct impact and £70bn of indirect and induced impact.
In addition, it noted that these figures did not account for estimates of spending by international students who started studies in 2021/22. With this included it estimated that the economic output of HE providers was approximately £130.5bn.
It also set out analysis of these impacts by nation/region and type of industry. It found that each region of the UK benefited by more than £2bn in terms of economic output, with London and the South East benefitting the most and Northern Ireland and the North East benefitting the least.
Innovation Commissioner for the City of Belfast, Dr Adrian Johnston, MBE, started Future Cities Forum's conversation by talking about the billion pound investment from the UK government for the Belfast Region City Deal and the role of university research and innovation:
'We're delighted with the Belfast Region City Deal investment in its totality. It's a billion pounds of investment coming into the region. And in fact, my role Innovation Commissioner is one to bring strategic alignment across the innovation landscape of all the anchor institutions associated with innovation, but also the digital pillar of the Belfast Region City Deal. So £120 million of funds that underpins the activity, the digital infrastructure and challenge programmes which supports the work that Momentum One Zero will be doing. And we're really excited by that because if you look at the economy for Belfast and Northern Ireland over the past 10 to 15 years, it's really been built off digital and AI capability more than anything else.
'So when you look at the roll off from that into cybersecurity, into AI and big data, Momentum One Zero is effectively a 'one health' initiative. So everything from environmental, citizen, animal health, and the longitudinal studies of those data (sets) to then inform other activity - for example, in iReach, which is clinical data trials, or better therapeutics for citizens. We're really excited on how all of that starts to amalgamate into developing the city into a living lab where all citizens, whether they be students or the more mature residents within the city, ensures through our city investments, that it's not just an economic benefit, but actually a societal benefit from that as well. So it's kind of consolidating, which we haven't done for many years, but over the last two to three years with the help of the city and growth deals, and it has consolidated a lot of our strengths. These are around frontier type activity, but not just frontier activity that disconnects from the foundation economy, but also drives better benefits for people, really with that inclusive growth agenda.'
March 2026
Image: contributors to Future Cities Forum's ' New towns and the OxCam Growth Corridor' (from left to right) Anna Wai Partner, Price & Myers, Peter Seaborn, Partner at Mills & Reeve LLP, Paul Thomas, Director of Planning and Place at Milton Keynes Council, Leader of the Council, Cllr Pete Marland, Will Gallagher, Strategy Director, Eat West Rail, Naomi Green, CEO, England's Economic Heartland, Julia Foster, Managing Partner, David Lock Associates, Heather Fearfield, Co-founder Future Cities Forum, David Bell, Director, LDA Design, Dr Julia Cooke, Associate Dean External Affairs, The Open University, Nigel Hugill, CEO Urban&Civic, Michael Mitchell, Ridge & Partners, Millie Hitchens, Asset Manager and Tom Elviss, Fund Manager at Columbia Threadneedle investments
Future Cities Forum returned a year on In March 2026, from its last discussion event to catch up with Milton Keynes Council on new town development, public versus private investment in the city, science and innovation expansion and funding for high streets and culture.
Milton Keynes has recently been officially longlisted to become the UK City of Culture 2029, securing £60,000 from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport to develop its full application. Being longlisted is a significant moment for Milton Keynes and begins the next phase of the competition, with the city now having around four months to shape a detailed plan for a City of Culture year. The Council is leading the bid in partnership with organisations across the city including The Open University, Stadium MK and Milton Keynes Islamic Arts and Culture.
Milton Keynes City Council has also been praised for operating as “a well‑run authority” with “strong foundations for continued innovation” in an independent assessment from the Local Government Association.
At Future Cities Forum's discussion, among the contributors, developer Urban&Civic spoke about the disruptive approaches model for new house building and England's Economic Heartland discussed how East West Rail could leave an important legacy for the Corridor and the UK.
Leader of the Council, Cllr Peter Marland, began the conversation talking about his years in office, what has been achieved and his vision for the future:
'Well, I think the first thing to say is when I took over the council, there had been five leaders from three different political parties in the preceding three years. At one point, the council wasn't able to form a political administration. So the officers were taking emergency executive decisions on things like procurement. And it wasn't great. And I think that has sort of come through very, very slowly with very slow-burn development. But since, I think, planners David Lock have been involved it has been better. I think when we were first talking about Plan MK, quite a long time ago now, one of the challenges I was given for a place like Milton Keynes is, this is a local plan. And it talks about the next 10 years.
What's the overall vision for the city? I think what we did, and it was really important to me, in a changing place like Milton Keynes, that it wasn't a single person's or single party's political vision for a city. It needed to be the city's vision for the future of the city. And that's why we work with organisations like the Centre for Cities and brought in our own commissioners. We were the first council to do such a piece of work. And that basically came up with this idea that Milton Keynes needs to be successful, needs to continue to be successful, needs to continue to adapt, needs to continue to evolve.
'In the places where I grew up, in Liverpool, in Burnley, in the North West, you know, post-industrial times, it's not that long ago. It's literally just 70 years since the Second World War ended. Those places were globally significant and globally rich. Burnley was one of the highest income per capita in the world. Liverpool was the dock city of the world. And yet, within a generation, that had all gone. The city centres were collapsing. You know, places like Milton Keynes were needed. Not just because there was a housing shortage, because actually people didn't want to live in city centres.
But if you sort of cast that forward, there's no intrinsic reason why Milton Keynes should continue to be successful just because it is here. Everybody talks about our great links on the M1, on the West Coast Main Line, on the A5. But Crewe has all those things. Crewe is right next to the M6. Crewe is right next to the West Coast Main Line. But Crewe hasn't been able to change and evolve. And its reason for existing just ceased.
'So what we try to do in that commission is just plan ahead. Look to 2050. What are the six or seven big projects? What are the six or seven things that everybody could sign up to? It isn't just about housing growth. It is about jobs. It's about making sure that young people who were born and brought up in Milton Keynes have the same life chances as the people that moved to Milton Keynes and come to Milton Keynes.
'Just like this country, we cannot keep importing talent. We need to create our own talent. It's about making sure that we have the right skills to fulfil some world leading industries like Red Bull that we have here. But also within a 45 minute drive, some of the biggest and most successful F1 teams, Luton Airport, all of these things. So what can we do as a local authority but as a place to continue to grow, to continue to be successful.
Pete was asked about building a unique image for Milton Keynes, so that the city could continue to stand out alongside its successful neighbours such as Oxford and Cambridge?
He said:
'Sometimes I do wish the Chancellor, when announcing billions of pounds of investment in tech, could recognise that Milton Keynes has more tech jobs than Oxford and Cambridge combined. And people are astonished by that. But people are also astonished by the fact that we are now the 7th biggest city economy. So Milton Keynes, if you just take the place of Milton Keynes, Milton Keynes' economy is bigger than Liverpool's economy. You know, if you combine the combined authority area, Liverpool's city region is bigger. But Milton Keynes is bigger than Nottingham. Bigger than Sheffield. Bigger than Liverpool. Bigger than Liverpool in terms of size of our economy. And yet, obviously, and we understand this, the global brands of Oxford and Cambridge, and the fact, let's not pretend that there aren't people, generally who sit in the Treasury, who got on the grad fast track programme in the civil service, generally all went to an Oxford University, and ministers know those places and can pick up the phone, and no doubt vice-chancellors and people from those brilliant universities, world leading universities, can pick up the phone to somebody in Treasury and say, we just need this.'
Tall Buildings and Sustaible Cities - March 2026
Image: Marcus Richards, Partner at EY speaking at our Tall Buildings forum
Future Cities Forum's 'Sustainability and tall buildings' discussion event (hosted by EY in March 2026, at its London offices situated by the southern bank of the river Thames with views towards the City of London) where planners are considered the impact of sky-scrapers on heritage.
The discussion had a focus on balancing the economic necessity of density with the urgent requirements for sustainability, heritage preservation, branding of city districts and social equity. Contributors debated whether "sustainable tall buildings" are a technical reality or a commercial myth.
Mace Construct detailed a "world-first" approach at Euston Tower. Instead of traditional demolition, the 1960s concrete tower is being "sliced" into slabs for testing and potential reuse. This industrialization of deconstruction aims to de-risk the carbon and safety profiles of major retrofits.
Other contributors to our discussion were Fred Pilbrow and Andrea Marini of Pilbrow and Partners, Austin Wickner of Ridge and Partners, Balazs Bicsak of Price & Myers, Stuart McDonald and Shaun Tate of Mace Construct, Tim Downes of British Land, Dr Paul Toyne of Grimshaw, Alex Kerr of developer EDGE, Matthew Wooding of LDA Design, Marcus Richards and Siane Marshall of EY Parthenon, and Arash Rajai of RPC LLP.
Marcus Richards, Partner at EY Parthenon, began the discussion, talking about how tall buildings are inherently complex by nature:
'In particular, they are capital-intensive and of long-duration but actually that is true of all broader place regeneration. Undoubtedly, and I dare say regrettably these buildings will in further years ahead have to be delivered in an environment of fiscal constraints and economic and political volatility.
'A fundamental mechanism that we've worked on as a team within EY to ensure that we can improve the financial viability and close inherent funding gaps in these schemes. I think the UK, but also across Europe, we've seen some really fantastic and innovative examples of value-capture mechanisms that can help close certain demand on the public purse, but ultimately make these schemes more viable and more financially sustainable. From the perspective of tall buildings, I think they play a really critical role in that equation. We know that tall buildings, when delivered effectively and appropriately, can act as magnets for economic activity. They can increase density, concentrate demand, and I think they can undoubtedly accelerate place renewal.'
The conversation moved on to discuss a landmark building, the Euston Tower, which is being part rebuilt, part retrofitted by British Land.
British Land is exploring the future of Euston Tower, which was built in 1970 and has been vacant since 2021 – to create a world leading science, technology and innovation building and public realm for Camden and the Knowledge Quarter that inspires, connects and creates opportunities for local people and businesses.
Director, Tim Downes said:
'Euston Tower is a 1960s concrete office tower, circa 36 storeys tall, formerly known as the Rockwell Tower, home of Capital Radio. It was designed at a particular point in time when people were obsessed with cellular offices. The open plan, collaborative floor plate was not a thing that was in people's minds and it has got a floor plate which is somewhat constrained. So should the first point of call, if you were going to redevelop a building like that, because it's now 50, 60 years old, be expanding the floor plate?
'However, it has been put together in such a way that it has so many technical constraints, not just in floor to ceiling height, but also in how the concrete was physically poured, that by the time you go down the route of a deep retrofit to chop and change and cut and carve this building, you end up with basically a piece of Swiss cheese in concrete, which proves not to be financially viable for us. It takes far too long and almost generates as much carbon as building a completely new building. We had to have a completely different approach to this.
'So the new building, which I've described as a retrofit of the existing, but 70% of it is new, so there's quite a lot of demolition going into this building - we looked at whether we could actually reuse the concrete by cutting up the cast-in-situ slabs to create precast slabs that could either go back into the building or be reused somewhere else. This was not the form of demolition that John F Hunt, who's our demolition contractor, were familiar with or who hadn't been asked to do this previously, but they devised a way of effectively chopping up the building into slices that will enable a poured-in-situ, very complex 1960s building to be reused.'
April 2026
Image: Oxford Science Park, Oxford
Future Cities Forum's first report from its 'Global Science Cities' discussion event at The Oxford Science Park looked at how the vision for the Cowley Branch line can create new housing and jobs. as well as aid the development of science lab expansion. It also compares the innovation districts of Stockholm and Copenhagen, to find out how these cities tackle the similar challenges of infrastructure development and affordable housing to support their science economy as cities do in the UK.
In the first part of our 'Global Science Cities' report, there are insights from Oxford City Council, Stockholm Science City, Innovation District Copenhagen, British Land, Exeter College, Oxford and Thomas White Oxford for Oxford North.
Future Cities Forum has run its series of 'Science Cities' discussions to look at the benefits of urban as well as suburban and rural science parks with commentary on best practice in joined-up infrastructure planning and housing provision. Oxford City Council states that by working with Oxfordshire County Council, local landowners, Network Rail and Department for Transport, it will re-open passenger services on the Cowley Branch Line in Oxford:
'The line will be upgraded and two new stations built: “Oxford Littlemore” (for Littlemore and The Oxford Science Park) and “Oxford Cowley” (for Blackbird Leys and ARC Oxford). The planning assumption is for two trains per hour via Oxford Station through to London Marylebone Station.
'The new rail stations will connect significant employment sites and residential areas to the city centre in less than 10 minutes, with the possibility of direct connections to Oxford Parkway, Bicester and beyond. This would help to improve the public transport options for journeys into and around the City, increasing overall capacity locally, reducing congestion on our roads and contributing to a better rail network in Oxfordshire and the wider region. Network Rail estimates up to 1,000,000 journeys per year will be made using the new stations after only three years of operation.
In addition to transforming journeys, reopening the Cowley Branch Line to passengers will support the sustainable development of new homes and commercial employment spaces already proposed near the stations.'
Carolyn Ploszynski, Director of Regeneration, Economy and Sustainability, at Oxford City Council, told Future Cities Forum at our discussion event:
'It will be transformative. It's not a heavy piece of infrastructure to deliver but there just needed to be the investment and confidence in it. The city is only 46 kilometres squared and over half of it is open space in terms of floor zone and green belt and the average vehicle moves at eight kilometres miles an hour at peak times. It can take 15 minutes to go less than 10 kilometres. That is the main problem. So we can keep pumping buses into the network but places but it is extremely difficult to connect to the wider city by public transport. The communities that sit around this science park and in the Oxford Cowley location, which is by the business park, suffer the same problem, and these are some of our most deprived communities in the city and they are among the top ten in the country. In Blackbird Leys, 40% of people don't have access to a car, and so they are completely reliant on public transport. So in terms of social equity, the Cowley Branch Line will be transformative to business, but also those communities.
'There are two elements to the Cowley Branch Line, one is just local connectivity. At the Oxford Cowley location there needs to be a bridge over that railway to connect the Blackbird Leys community physically to the branch line and this is unfunded at the moment. But my team has been working with developers too on community employment plans and working with Enterprise Oxford on the skills agenda. The supply chain around science sites is massive and getting the community involved in working in that side of the science industry is really important. Facilities management and supply chains associated with science parks provide a range of jobs.
'We have a vision for more homes. We have already got about six to ten thousand homes essentially stored across the branch line area and we think the line will help give the confidence for some of sites to unlock. But we have also done a capacity study to identify another ten thousand homes.'
On a question about preserving heritage in the city, Carolyn said:
'I guess it is always the balance that Oxford has to strike, but this part - the southern part of the city - has the biggest growth potential of the whole place and so that is why the Cowley branch line is so important, to unlock it. Every site in the city is difficult. Part of the problem is that the city has not been able to grow for such a long time. Government re-organisation will help unlock opportunity and significant growth in the city. Outside the city there is a massive anti-growth lobby about the city expanding its bounds. That has been going on for a long time but I think recent research showing that Oxford has been left behind significantly on the global stage is evidence that the policy is not working. Unless the city is able to start delivering infrastructure and release more of its green belt, the city is just going to continue to flounder and will not stay competitive. It is why we believe that the three unitary councils is the way forward for Oxford and that we should release a further green belt to deliver 40,000 additional homes for Oxford in addition for further science and employment space for the city. There is always a fine line between regeneration and gentrification and that's the line we have to walk with the Cowley Branch Line. We have the benefit at the city council of being the main housing developer and housing stock owner in the city, so we can control that to a degree. I absolutely think we can win out against anti-growth. We need to start to deliver to show that growth isn't necessarily bad.'
Image: a view of Anglesey - credit Great British Energy (Nuclear)
Infrastructure 2026
Following the King's Speech on 13th May, Future Cities Forum released its 'Infrastructure 2026' report part one, with contributions from the National Infrastructure & Service Transformation Authority's Director of Infrastructure, Enterprise & Growth, Jon Loveday for H M Treasury, Grimshaw Principal Chris Patience, The Northern Powerhouse Partnership's CEO Henri Murison, LDA Design's Director and Head of Energy & Infrastructure Alister Kratt and SUEZ UK's Chief Technical Development & Innovation Officer, Stuart Hayward-Higham. Transport for London's Head of Investment Planning for Healthy Streets, Helen Cansick, Ridge & Partners' Head of Infrastructure Steve Williams and Grimshaw's Paris Studio Managing Partner, Kirsten Lees also took part in the discussion.
The insights are drawn from a discussion held by Future Cities Forum and hosted by architects, Grimshaw, at their London studios, where the issues of public-private financing of infrastructure, place-making, nuclear energy related projects and transport were debated.
Grimshaw is well known for its acclaimed infrastructure projects both in the UK and around the world, having worked on the recently completed HS2 Colne Valley Viaduct, London's Elizabeth Line (as part of the line-wide consortium of Atkins, Grimshaw, GIA Equation and Maynard, interfacing with different design teams across the 10 central stations, playing a unique role: developing a line-wide strategy that conceptually and functionally binds together the distinct stations along the network). and the EcoPark North London Heat and Power Project. Partner Kirsten Lees spoke about the practice's appointment - with LDA Design, engineering consultants WSP, and planning consultants Arup - to design the redevelopment of Cringle Dock Waste Transfer Station which sits in the Nine Elms Regeneration Area, adjacent to the newly developed Battersea Power Station. Grimshaw's Chris Patience described the issues around sustainability and place-making for urban data centre projects.
A key announcement in the King's Speech was the introduction of a Highways (Financing) Bill, with a new model of finance for major road infrastructure, enabling greater private sector investment with the aim of avoiding long-standing funding gaps and reducing risk for investors. NISTA's Jon Loveday commented at our forum:
'Quite often investors say that they want to do more. I think that genuinely the positive thing that I've seen over the last few years is a change in how we look at the long term. So the first thing that NISTA was asked to publish altogether in a very short space of time was a 10 year infrastructure strategy and the purpose of that was the first step in giving certainty across a number of different sectors to the market, from a supply chain, from employment and from an investor point of view.'
The UK government has also proposed an 'Energy Independence Bill' to support the transitioning away from fossil fuels to alternative forms of energy including nuclear. LDA Design joined Future Cities Forum's debate to talk about its work with Arup, TÜV SÜD Nuclear Technologies, Mace and Gleeds in support of Great British Energy – Nuclear’s first small modular reactor (SMR), a pathfinder project destined for Wylfa on Anglesey.
The Northern Powerhouse Rail (NPR) Bill (formally titled the 'the High Speed Rail (Crewe - Manchester) Bill') was also part of the King's speech last week. It has a budget of up to £1.1bn over the spending review period..
The Northern Powerhouse Partnership's CEO Henri Murison told Future Cities Forum at its discussion event:
'NISTA has worked with us and the NIC before on our investment projects in our city regions and on Northern Powerhouse Rail and on some of the significant road investments. And I think that clearly the North of England has a prioritised list of projects both at the city region level and across the north of England. Based on NISTA's advice, government has taken a three-stage approach to delivering NPR alongside working with Department for Transport.
'That's the main thing the NISTA has done since it was created in its new form in the last year. And I would say that broadly everyone in the north of England supports the approach that's been taken. Of course, we would want to deliver some of the links across the Pennines, perhaps, and be a bit more ambitious. But the framework and the scope for doing that is still there, but within a kind of a framework that enables for that discussion to happen. So I'm broadly very positive about the role of the infrastructure policy and how it's playing out here.'
Image: western approaches to the Tower of London (in 2023)
May 2026
Future Cities Forum was delighted to be hosted by Andrew Jackson, CBE, Historic Palaces' Tower Director, for its 'Cultural Cities' discussion event. Part one of this report records Andrew's contribution to the themes of the conference and the his ambitions for this ancient fortress visitor site.
The Tower of London is facing the need to build itself as a tourist attraction that can welcome new and broader audiences, while funding digital learning and sustainability measures to ensure the future of its historic fabric.
The event looked at questions on how the character of the tourism economy is changing and the role of heritage within this, how are towns and cities evolving to accommodate new cultural attractions and how can the UK City of Culture 2029 help to support this?
In Andrew's opening remarks, he spoke of looking forward to the 2066 millennium celebrations of the Tower of London, its history as a fortress and subsequent roles among others as a medieval palace, infamous prison and royal mint and the need to remain relevant to future generations.
He said there are three pillars that support its future: the first 'Reaching Further', which gives a spotlight to the need to enlarge the attractions audiences with more visitors and from a wider segment of society, 'Mean More', which denotes that whoever comes to visit, should find something that resonates with them, and 'Acting for the Future', the last pillar that reflects the need to embrace sustainability, education and community.
Andrew reflected that one hundred and fifty years ago the Tower of London was the capital's tallest building before the creation of St Paul's Cathedral and he highlighted the concerns for how the City of London would evolve around heritage. He asked the question of how the Tower of London could respond to that, how collaboration could take place in the debate around economic drivers of growth and the protection of heritage and how public realm could be managed well in its work with the local borough Tower Hamlets.
He also mentioned the possibility of reviving the historical procession that English kings as late as Charles II used to make after spending the night at the Tower of London to Westminster.
Andrew commented how useful it was to hold Future Cities Forum's event at the Tower of London for collaboration and to help evolve thinking and partnership.
During the following first panel discussion, Andrew was asked in growing new audiences, was he envious of the V&A's new museum and storehouse in Stratford, starting from scratch with modern buildings and therefore able to get to grips with new digital infrastructure for modern audiences:
'Trying to retrofit anything into the fortress here is a real challenges. We ask ourselves what audiences want and try to find a baseline around this. We must avoid the lowest common denominator. We can do digital and have done it, but with around three million visitors, we cannot do immersive digital. We concentrate on how you look to the future by using new tech in old buildings. We are building up our educational facilities while being aware of the need for sustainable measures such a heat pumps and new radiators to fulfil our targets, but it is a challenge. Of course on the latter, we work with Historic England and I would like to put solar panels on the roof here but told I cannot do that.'
June 2026
Future Cities Forum was delighted to be hosted by the Wellcome Genome Campus last week for its 'New Model Innovation Districts' discussion event with CEO Robert Evans making the opening speech. Robert was joined on the first panel by Jane Hutchings, Director, Cambridge Science Park, Roz Bird, CEO, Anglia Innovation Partnership for Norwich Research Park, Vicky Stanbury, Executive Director Business Innovation & Operations, Imperial War Museums for IWM Duxford, and Fred Pilbrow, Founding Partner, Pilbrow & Partners
The event looked on how science parks and innovation districts are developing in the UK and future impact of the newly created Greater Cambridge Development Corporation on the planning and infrastructure of the region.
Forum Co-founder and facilitator, Heather Fearfield, introduced Robert who began by describing the Campus as ' a powerhouse for a particular type of science to do with genomics and 'omics', biodata and - increasingly - AI, with a really concentrated hub of talent in that area. With a very strong academic bias, a growing business element to it and an important community aspect to the place as well.'
'We are growing pretty quickly. That's the plan, certainly. Campus today is pretty leafy and pretty low density and very countryside-y, as you would have seen if you haven't been here before. But as you arrive, you'll have spotted that. But there are a mixture of buildings. There's the conference centre that you're in. There's a listed building, Hinxton Hall. There are slightly more modern-looking buildings behind that. There are obviously wet labs, dry labs, all the usual things that you would expect to see. And the main occupier is listed on the top. There's the powerhouse of genomics. There's the Wellcome Sanger Institute and EMBL, the European Molecular Biology Laboratory.. This is really the bedrock, globally, of open-access bio-data.
'Coming soon, the third of those, which we're very excited about, is HDRS, which stands for Health Data Research Service. HDRS is a government and Wellcome-joint initiative to create a new way of unlocking patient and health data. And then using that with other data, which we're very strong on here, and using that for research and clinical purposes to drive further advances. There's a mixture of building types.
'One of the newer buildings is Thornton. But it is very much a kind of campus style, with buildings in the landscape, and including some of the remnants of the former Hinxton Hall estate, and the former East Lodge. In terms of the science journey, we are trying to turn this, our plan really is to turn this into much more of a kind of whole place - and into an innovation district. And that's as much about the public realm as it is about the buildings. And that's a bit of a change for this place. One of the things that we need to do over time is bring more density and intensity to this place, because that's how we create more space and forums for collaboration. That's obviously a little bit of a challenge, but it's something that we'll do over time, both in terms of how we modify this side of the road, and how we develop the other side of the road, where the expansion is. It's a very big expansion. We're more than trebling the campus overall.
'We do think it's a very significant project, particularly in that strand of omics and data and AI. And the people that work here, the scientists, do have an important, trusted global leadership role in their particular areas of science. We think that the project here strengthens Cambridge generally, not just strengthening the Genome Campus.
'The expansion takes us to 440 acres, but Wellcome actually happens to own 1,000 acres here. So there is more land available to support this place if it's needed over time. We're trebling the amount of laboratories and workspace. We're adding, for the first time, a significant quantity of homes as we turn this campus into a place. And that's a really big change for this place. We're adding new compute (infrastructure), because that's a growing part of what we do here. But also all the things that real places need, health and fitness, sport and play, nurseries, hotels, food and drink, etc.
'That requires huge amounts of infrastructure, which we haven't put in from scratch. So there's a huge emphasis on new bridges over the road, what's called micro-grid power and ambient loop systems. It's all costing a lot of money, as you can imagine. And at the end, that last point, removing the gates and barriers. This is currently a gated workplace, really. We want to turn it into an open place for everyone, with obviously a real clear science purpose. But we are, as part of the plan, taking away the gates and barriers and opening the whole place up. And the expansion land will be completely open. Of course, the buildings can lock, but the whole point is that the place itself is open to everyone. The facilities and services will be open to
everyone, locally and within Greater Cambridge.
Future Cities Forum would like to thank all its hosts and contributors for the first six-months of discussions. We look forward to welcoming guests to our next Oxford 'Science Cities' event in September, 'Innovation Cities' Bristol in October and our 'Cultural Cities' in November at Smithfield, London.
Image below: Fitzhugh auditorium at Cohen Quad, Exeter College Oxford (courtesy Alison Brooks Architects)
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