Moving on without moving out: the impacts of regeneration on the Rayners Lane Estate

Bert Provan, Alice Belotti and Anne Power

Published 6 May 2016

Rayners Lane is an estate in the London Borough of Harrow, comprising 591 homes at the point of transfer from council ownership to Home Group, following a ballot of tenants. Tenants were involved in planning the redevelopment of the estate through a specially constituted Rayners Lane Estate Committee. A Masterplan for the redevelopment was drawn up, which reflected the priority of rehousing existing tenants in the new houses in advance of starting the programme of building for sale. Work continues on the final phase of development, but 434 original Rayners Lane households have already been rehoused, and 40 new social housing tenants moved into the estate’s new rented homes from outside.

Home Group commissioned an objective external evaluation of how the estate is working from the residents’ perspective and what the social return on investment is in relation to spending on Rayner’s Lane. They wanted to know the extent to which the investment of funds has produced social and economic benefits proportionate to or exceeding the value of this investment.