ABSTRACT
Places change. The history of most towns is one of organic change – mostly small changes, but a continuous abundance of them. Until recently, nearly all were generated by local circumstance, only occasionally interspersed with larger changes originating from external sources. The coming of the railways, building of by-passes, motorways or edge-of-town supermarkets brought sudden social, economic and physical re-patterning. Such changes are often outside the absorptive capacity of the organic continuum – just as buildings or activities that change the face of a town or district can also be. Communities (nimbies excepted) may crave employment generators, but if these are too large they're socially and environmentally dislocating.
