Upper Lea Valley Audit 2014

An audit of industrial areas in the Upper Lea Valley found a wide range of businesses in 24 different sectors.

In late 2014 Cities audited industrial areas in the Upper Lea Valley over the course of two months, we focused on known industrial locations with a door to door survey, identifying businesses of all kinds. We found the oldest business was 165 years old, J.W. Pike Ltd, a wholesale food retailer in the Eley Estate. After service providers, the most commonly found type of business was the restaurant / pub / cafe / food takeaway, with 179 records in the audit. Freeholders were only 20% of the cases. The remaining 80% were either leaseholders or renting. Ikea offered the largest number of jobs, with 480 employees.

The work drew on the pioneering study by Gort Scott called From Around Here (2013), which was based on the audit methods developed by Mark Brearley and on the Tottenham Economic Study [link to internal page] undertaken by Jane Clossick on Tottenham High Road in summer 2014. The work was put on display at Building BloQs in June 2015 as part of the London Festival of Architecture.

Raw data and survey materials from the audit of the Upper Lea Valley and higher quality versions of the images seen here are available upon request, please contact us at cities@londonmet.ac.uk to discuss your needs.