Evaluation

Design assessment

A design assessment was undertaken during a detailed site visit, interviews with planning and project management officers and a local resident.  In the opinion of the project team who visited the area, Hammarby Sjostad is a remarkably successful new urban neighbourhood, combining high quality public realm a building design with a diverse range of shops, services and facilities.

The role of the Masterplan in ensuring a strong network of streets and public spaces, and a rounded and sustainable mix of uses, including community uses is particularly impressive.  The aspirations of the Masterplan, which is now over a decade old, are clearly visible within the built scheme, and this is testament to the high level of public sector leadership and the experience of the project team, who acted as 'keepers of the Masterplan' to ensure that its core principles were preserved even in the face of market pressure to deliver something different.

The design process for the neighbourhood has ensured variety in architecture, a fine grain, texture and human scale.  In particular, the way in which the Masterplan area has been divided into sub-areas, each of which was the subject of a collaborative design process ensuring that a variety of different architects were involved, but all working within the context of the Masterplan and its design codes has helped to ensure both unity at a strategic level and diversity of detail.

Hammarby Sjostad makes the most of its waterfront setting and location.  All orientation within the neighbourhood is towards the water, and blocks are designed to maximise views of the water and sunlight.  This setting is the central unique feature of the area, and it has been used to create a true sense of distinctiveness.  Orientation to the water also adds to the area's legibility.

The aspiration of the Masterplan team to create a new 'inner city' district has been carried through effectively, with high density development creating an urban district that can sustain a range or shops and services.  The use of planning policy and financial incentives to encourage shops and services to open before the market had fully formed is particularly impressive.

Central to Hammarby Sjostad's success is an extremely high level of accessibility by public transport, including the development of a new tram link.  This has proved to be an essential public sector investment in infrastructure, which has acted to stimulate the market for residential development in the area.

Hammarby Sjostad has extremely high quality streets and public spaces.  The street pattern is highly permeable and streets are uncluttered.  Accessibility for prams and wheelchairs is excellent.  The network of green spaces and parks is extremely strong, providing a range of environmental and health benefits and making the area extremely attractive to residents.  The natural landscape has been used in the design of public spaces extremely effectively, especially in the waterfront area.

Housing in Hammarby Sjostad is of an extremely high quality and there is no obvious distinction between owned and rented accommodation.

One of the key strengths of the area is the high level of environmental sustainability, supported by the impressive Glass House centre, which provides an educational resource for local people in adopting sustainable lifestyles.
1. safe streets - well lit and overlooked by ground floor uses, balconies or front doors onto the street
2. pedestrian priority on main streets, with speed restrictions and frequent zebra crossings
3. bypass road lowered below street level to minimise impact of noise and pollution

Community, housing and services

Hammarby Sjöstad has succeeded beyond expectations in attracting families with children. There are 981 children under 16 living in the area (approximately 16% of the current population).  741 children are of pre-school or school age, of which 370 go to one of the schools in the neighbourhood.  Demand for school places is high and additional schools places are planned over and above original calculations.

Although the target split between rental and owner-occupied apartments is 50:50, this has been difficult to achieve and the split is currently 40:60.  Critics of the scheme point to its exclusivity and failure to address Stockholm's problems of segregation.  Residents are described as belonging to an 'economically homogenous' group, incomes are on average higher than in the Katarina-Sofia city district to which Hammarby Sjöstad belongs.  Apartments for sale are similar in price to those in the inner city, with higher than average monthly management fees.  Although there are a good proportion of rental apartments in the area, land values mean that they are typically in an inferior location i.e. without direct views over the water.  Rents in the area are considered to be relatively high and Sweden's housing policy means that there is no obligation on developers to provide 'affordable' housing.

In order to attract the numerous shops and services to the area as mentioned above, the Council has adopted a strict land use policy to secure space for ground floor commercial uses along the main streets.  In addition, it has offered a two-year rent-free subsidy in order to attract commercial operators and ensure service provision is established even in the early phases of the development.  It has been relatively difficult to attract shops and services during the early phases of development, in part because the original proposal for the Olympics village in the centre of the current development meant that the phasing was from the inside-out, rather than first linking into established commercial or residential areas.  However, this issue has now largely been overcome and the area seems to be well connected to the rest of Stockholm city.

At present, there are few spaces for community events and meetings.  However, there are plans to open a cultural centre and a new state school, in which it is anticipated that additional space for community events and meetings will be provided.

Environmental issues

According to the project coordinator at the Glass House, the main challenge for the environmental programme has been establishing contact with residents in order to encourage them to assist the Council in achieving environmental goals.  A number of different methods have been used in order to reach residents and businesses, including exhibitions, a website and a newsletter.  By far the most successful form of outreach has been the website, which receives an average of 9,000 hits per day.  The website is also used as a tool for consultation and lobbying, for example residents have been invited to submit views on transport provision, which could then be used as a basis for lobbying Stockholm Transport to improve services further - this exercise has been extremely successful, and the Glass House has plans to roll it out to cover a range of other issues.  The strategic planner acknowledged that even with the high level of resource to support environmental sustainability, it remains a challenge to continue to innovate and design sustainability measures into the later phases of development.

Residents survey

A residents survey (805 responses) undertaken in 2005 revealed that:

* residents are generally very satisfied with the environment in Hammarby Sjöstad.
* two-thirds of all trips are made by public transport, bicycle or walking and a third of trips are car-borne.
* the ferry is used as a link for a quarter of all trips.
* a ferry link directly into the centre of Stockholm and an extension of the tram directly into the inner city were considered the highest priorities.
* approximately 66% of households own a car, which is similar to the average for the inner city.
* over half of all cars are parked in a private garage, the remainder on-street.
* 8% of residents are members of the car pool, which is used mostly for shopping trips.
* The library was the most frequently used service in the area, followed by hairdressers and dry cleaners.  Priorities for additional service provision include another grocery store/supermarket, an off-license, a chemist and post-office services, a bank, a pub and a health centre.

Lessons learned

The particular lesson from the Hammarby Sjöstad case study is the powerful role that strong public sector leadership can play in ensuring development of the highest quality.  The most striking feature of the area is the similarity between the Masterplan on paper, the aspirations it embodies and the physical environment as it has been developed.  This has been achieved in a number of ways, and these are the key lessons to be drawn from the area:

* A strong Masterplan diagram, which forms the basis for land-use policy and the development of streets and public spaces
* The preparation of detailed design codes for individual sub-neighbourhoods, which form the basis for contracts with developers
* The appointment of different developers working with different architectural teams, to design sub-neighbourhoods, ensuring diversity and texture throughout the neighbourhood, within the unity which is established by the Masterplan
* The innovative 'parallel sketches' process for sub-neighbourhood design, with the City acting as the final arbiter and preparing the final scheme
* Strong environmental sustainability aspirations which are followed through at every level, including the preparation of the Glass House environmental education centre, as much to be a resource for local residents as for visitors
* The use of land use policy to ensure that the neighbourhood has a mix of uses which is able to sustain a community
* A strong design ethos which is applied to public buildings, most notably the church, as well as to private development
* A well-resourced, highly skilled team within the City of Stockholm, capable of making careful judgments about design quality