Architecture Update: Sites for sore cities

ENGLISH Partnership (formerly the Urban Regeneration Agency), the government body committed to urban renewal, has chosen its first four flagship projects to revive run-down towns and cities.

Launched last November with resources of pounds 250m, the agency has commissioned feasibility studies into the future of the Royal Arsenal at Woolwich, south-east London (which includes a group of 18th-century buildings attributed to Sir John Vanbrugh), the regeneration of Lincoln following plans to build a new university there, a large site in Speke and Garston, outside Liverpool, and the revival of part of Newburn, north of Newcastle upon Tyne.