More good pro-front garden websites found .....

Have just come across this

http://www.ealingfrontgardens.org.uk/index.htm

To quote from the site:

'This website is about concreting and paving front gardens and the consequences of doing so. It contains detailed research on the extent of front garden surfacing in the London Borough of Ealing, and other information about this increasing problem.

Front gardens disappearing under hard surfacing has reached epidemic proportions in the London Borough of Ealing (as in many other parts of Britain). It has become a serious environmental and social concern.

Their survey found that:

•a quarter of the borough's 74,300 front gardens are completely hard surfaced - no vegetation at all
•a further fifth of front gardens in this borough have nearly all (90-99% of their area) hard surfaced
•well over half of the borough's front gardens have 70% or more of their area under hard surfacing
•the average front garden in the borough has 68% of its area covered in hard surfacing.

The site has a useful set of links to further resources.

Also the Urban Design Alliance:

http://www.udal.org.uk/projects.html

See especially the 'Returning Roads to Residents' link, which charts the processes which have resulted in the creeping and insidious destruction of front gardens.