Why building a new garden city at Ebbsfleet is a terrible idea

So, the government plans to create a new ‘garden city’ in Ebbsfleet, Kent, with 15,000 new homes. Yesterday’s announcement by George Osborne has been widely praised. The local Tory MP is enthusiastic. Boris Johnson tweets that it’s ‘great news.’ The best critique Ed Balls can muster is that it’s all ‘too little, too late.’ Labour wants 200,000 ‘new homes’ (that emotive mantra) per year by the end of the decade. I don’t live in Kent. This garden city isn’t in my back yard. So why, when I heard this news, did my sentimental heart sink?

‘New homes’ is such a sly use of words. How could anyone be against new homes? What this phrase really means, of course, is lots and lots of brand new houses. However the term that makes me despair is ‘garden city’. Have you ever heard such a contradiction in terms? A garden is not a city.