Forum Talk: The Right to the Water: Public Space or Private Asset?
Speaker: Sally Sutton, Visiting Research Fellow, School of Art, Design and Architecture, University of Plymouth
Abstract: The lived experience of many people during the pandemic was characterised by isolation and restraint. Yet, in the UK and elsewhere, the popularity of outdoor swimming surged. This demonstrated both a public need for exercise and the desire to connect with nature. Along with well documented health benefits, the ‘wild swimming’ phenomena has drawn attention to issues of ownership, water quality, land and water use, public space, and planning. Conflicts over access continue to have profound implications for individuals, local communities, landowners, and policymakers across many sectors. On land, there are long established systems to determine land use, rights, and access. On the water and along its edge, those rights remain complex and archaic. Both are being organically challenged. In this discussion, a comparative analysis, ‘mapping’ recent high-profile campaigns, investigates recent tensions to examine how and why local waterspaces are appropriated by dominant private and political interests and contested by others. An exploration of power relations, along with the inequalities of spatial production, offers a contemporary view on the political nature of waterspaces, their connections to health, and why swimmers’ rights and access to open water have become so contentious.
