Just Space is an informal alliance of around 250 community groups, campaigns and concerned independent organisations which was formed to act as a voice for Londoners at a grassroots level.
Just Space has focused originally on influencing planning processes, such as the London Plan. It is important that people affected by those planning decisions feel a sense of community ownership, involvement in how they are made and their impact on the communities where we live and work.
Like any aspect of knowledge creation and sharing, the language and culture of planning as a process can seem technical, intimidating and often daunting to the majority of people. The issues themselves, however, are readily understood: housing, community space, local economies, green space, jobs, transport, pollution, and so on.
During its 13 years as a community network, Just Space has developed more than 10 fully fledged projects, each with their own relationships, sub-networks, communities of involvement and participation, links with community groups and geographical reach.
The aim of Just Space is to improve community participation in such processes as they profoundly affect us.