# Popular UK ## Basic Info **Name:** **What is it:** Research and advisory practice focused on social infrastructure (the places, spaces and structures that enable people to gather, socialize and cooperate). Combines academic research, policy advisory, community engagement, and practical support for community ownership transitions. **Location:** UK-based **Link:** https://www.popular.org.uk **Team:** [[Dan Gregory]], [[Oliver Holtaway]], [[Zoe Walshe]]. Backgrounds span urban policy, community enterprise law, participatory design, organizational ethnography, and sociology. Zoe is an Associate Lecturer at Goldsmiths College; Oliver's doctoral research (also Goldsmiths) focuses on transitions from private to community ownership; Dan has advised governments internationally on legal forms for social and community enterprise. --- ## Entries ### Foundational work — "Skittled Out?" (2018) Dan Gregory's essay for Local Trust, which documented the collapse of social infrastructure in three English communities (Southampton, Manchester, Bristol) and asked who owns and controls the places where social capital is formed. Widely credited with catalyzing the subsequent wave of UK policy and research interest in social infrastructure — including the British Academy's programme, the Levelling Up agenda's attention to "left-behind places," and the [[UK Independent Commission for Neighbourhoods]]. ### Key recent projects: - _[How We Might Live](https://coinstreet.org/sites/default/files/attachments/How%20We%20Might%20Live_a%20model%20for%20future%20neighbourhoods_2025-compressed.pdf)_ (2025) — mixed-method impact study of Coin Street Community Builders on London's South Bank, marking 40 years of community-led redevelopment. - _Pride in Parades_ — report for the Independent Commission for Neighbourhoods on renewing small-scale neighbourhood retail parades in deprived suburban areas. - _[Social Clubs, Community Power and Political Participation](https://office.workers.coop/s/icr985bLda7gTN2?dir=/&editing=false&openfile=true)_ (2025) — on the role of working men's clubs as democratic, member-run social infrastructure. - Dan also researched and wrote the case for a [Community Wealth Fund](https://localtrust.org.uk/policy/the-community-wealth-fund/) on behalf of [[Local Trust]], and delivered feasibility studies for the Mayor of London's [Creative Land Trust](https://www.london.gov.uk/who-we-are/what-london-assembly-does/questions-mayor/find-an-answer/future-creative-land-trust) and [Meanwhile Space](https://meanwhilespace.com/).