Architects choose London eyesores for beauty therapy

LORD ROGERS of Riverside, new Labour's Mr Architecture, joined with ministers past and present yesterday to launch a scheme to transform some of the capital's worst eyesores.

The Architecture Foundation aims to landscape a series of London's most unpleasant locations, ranging from the Hammersmith flyover to areas around Wormwood scrubs. Over the coming months, architects will consult residents from different areas of London on how they want to see the areas changed. In a trial project, people in nine areas of Hammersmith and Fulham are to be consulted within the next three months. The local council has already agreed to put the resulting ideas into practice.

Lord Rogers, chairman of the trustees, was present yesterday as the Architecture Foundation Roadshow was launched. The roadshow will hold public meetings in four boroughs, with the aim of finding ideas and agreement for rescuing key, decrepit public places, including parks, playing fields, riverside walks and underpasses.

The Labour peer was also yesterday appointed by the Deputy Prime Minister, John Prescott, to head a task force advising the Government on how brownfield sites could be turned back into thriving communities.