Government calls on CUDEM

10 July 2003

The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister (ODPM) has appointed Leeds Met's Centre for Urban Development and Environmental Management (CUDEM) to establish and co-ordinate a network of top experts from major planning organisations to act as a policy and research ‘think tank’ to inform future Government office priorities.

Led by Professor Simin Davoudi, CUDEM Director and supported by colleagues Stephen Littlewood and Margaret Burton the project will last three years, until 2006. The network's responsibilities will be to:

The work for the ODPM comes at a time when CUDEM has been successful in winning contracts for a range of urban policy research and evaluation projects. Current examples include another ODPM funded study of ‘The Impact of Selected Demolition of Housing’, led by Jane Kettle and Angela Maye-Banbury, and a 30-month EC (Interreg III) funded project to promote transnational co-operation on spatial planning of ‘Sustainable Open Spaces’, undertaken by Steve Littlewood and Kevin Thomas. Professor Davoudi said “It means that we shall be very busy, but it is good to have the expertise and capability of CUDEM recognised so widely.”