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This article considers how cultural narratives of queer migration to urban centres are understood through media and cultural references that mark specific non-urban places and times. Through an analysis of queer migration narratives in Smalltown Boy (1984), a song and music video by UK band Bronski Beat, and Boytown (2012), its suburban Sydney reimagining by artist Daniel Mudie Cunningham and DJ Stephen Allkins, I argue that the interconnections between visual, media and cultural artefacts are not merely an additive way to understand queer cultural geographies but rather signal intertwined geographic and aesthetic registers. In Boytown, the explicitly gay lyrics and imagery of Smalltown Boy are paired with other songs and music videos that connote queerness but also directly relate to suburban images of youthful alienation. The attachment to urban narratives and images is supplemented by this distinctly suburban attachment. In this article, I argue that conventional statistical figurations of changes to gay ghettoisation and now well-established critiques of queer urbanity are usefully combined and expanded by considering cultural attachment. This article demonstrates the generative intersection of creative geographies and geographies of sexualities attuned to the queer suburban. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Light Railways Act of 1896 stimulated a new "railway mania" with many local lines being promoted across mainland Britain. Although designed to support transport links to remote agricultural districts and fishing ports, this article explores how the new Act was used to promote a wide range of rural, suburban and industrial railway schemes. It evaluates the nature of the new lines built and the constraints that they faced. Despite the initial "mania", it is argued here that the legislation was not especially successful in encouraging the construction of a large network of new rural railways. The new Light Railway Commissioners were reluctant to sanction schemes that might provide competition with existing mainline railway companies and conservative interests in the railway industry were reluctant to make the radical changes necessary to substantially reduce the costs of railway construction and operation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Taking my cue from work on relations of interethnic conviviality in super-diverse cities across the globe, this paper examines the ways in which conviviality co-exists with racism as found in a suburban British town. My argument is that ethnographic attention to the proximity of interethnic relations of conviviality to racism is necessary to guard against overly celebratory accounts of conviviality that downplay everyday manifestations of racism. By situating my study of conviviality in a suburban town, my account begins to unpack the characteristics of convivial relations formed in suburban neighbourhoods as opposed to super-diverse cities often studied by ethnographers in this area of inquiry. I examine manifestations of interethnic relations between British Asian Muslims and white British residents of this town. In contrast to the mainstream images that depict British Asian Muslims as a potential threat to neighbourhood stability and national security, some white and British Asian Muslim residents formed neighbourly relationships of trust, care and mutual recognition with each other across ethnic, racial, religious, gender, class and generational differences. Yet, my analysis of these convivial relations reveals some paradoxical ways in which individuals’ experiences of interethnic relations co-exist with their xenophobic, racist and Islamophobic attitudes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights: [•] A suburban case study is modelled in ENVI-met using six greenspace scenarios. [•] The ENVI-met modelling is validated against field measurements of air temperature. [•] Adding 5% mature trees may reduce average surface temperatures by 1.0°C. [•] Replacing all current vegetation with asphalt increases air temperature up to 3.2°C. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As the impacts of climate change become more prominent within the next 50 years and beyond, the risk of overheating in homes is a concern. This is specifically relevant in the UK's suburbs where 84% of the population reside. To assess this future impact and the effectiveness of adaptive retrofitting, probabilistic climate change data for the 2030s and 2050s are used to assess the overheating risk in six suburban house archetypes in three cities in the UK: Bristol, Oxford and Stockport. The risks of overheating in typical constructions are assessed and the possibility of preventing overheating through the use of adaptation packages is evaluated through dynamic thermal simulation. Homes in Oxford show the greatest risk of overheating. The most effective (passive) package for tackling future overheating tends to combine fabric improvements and internal heat gain reduction. To assist planners and policy-makers in assessing and preventing overheating risk at a stock level, this adaptation package is further evaluated in selected neighbourhoods across the three case study cities, using the geographical information system (GIS)-based DECoRuM-Adapt (Domestic Energy, Carbon Counting and Carbon Reduction Model) model. The implications for public policy are that the existing housing stock must be future-proofed for a warming climate, particularly retrofit programmes (e.g.the Green Deal) and any upgrading of building regulations. Etant donné que les répercussions du changement climatique vont devenir de plus en plus importantes au cours des cinquante prochaines années et au-delà, le risque de surchauffe dans les habitations constitue un sujet de préoccupation. Ceci revêt une pertinence particulière dans les banlieues du Royaume-Uni dans lesquelles réside 84 % de la population. Afin d'évaluer cet impact futur et l'efficacité du réaménagement adaptatif, les données probabilistes relatives au changement climatique pour les années 2030 et 2050 sont utilisées pour évaluer le risque de surchauffe dans six archétypes de maisons suburbaines situés dans trois villes du Royaume-Uni : Bristol, Oxford et Stockport. Les risques de surchauffe dans des constructions types sont évalués et la possibilité de prévenir l'excès de chaleur par le recours à des trains de mesures d'adaptation est évaluée au moyen d'une simulation thermique dynamique. Les habitations situées à Oxford présentent le plus grand risque de surchauffe. Les mesures (passives) les plus efficaces pour s'attaquer aux futurs excès de chaleur tendent à combiner les améliorations apportées à l'enveloppe des bâtiments et une réduction interne du gain de chaleur. Afin d'aider les planificateurs et les décideurs à évaluer et à prévenir le risque de surchauffe au niveau du parc bâti, cet ensemble de mesures d'adaptation est évalué de manière plus poussée dans des quartiers sélectionnés sur les trois villes faisant l'objet de l'étude de cas, en utilisant le modèle DECoRuM-Adapt (Domestic Energy, Carbon Counting and Carbon Reduction Model – modèle d'énergie domestique, de comptabilisation du carbone, et de réduction du carbone), basé sur un système d'information géographique (SIG). Les implications pour les politiques publiques sont que la pérennité future du parc de logements existant doit être assurée en termes de réchauffement climatique, en recourant en particulier à des programmes de réaménagement (par ex. le New Deal vert) et à toute mise à jour de la réglementation du bâtiment. Mots clés:adaptation, changement climatique, logement, atténuation, surchauffe, réaménagement, suburbain [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although long observed that television is a suburban medium, British television frequently explores the spaces beyond the suburbs. Coast and Countryfile, enjoying large audiences, are in fact at the apex of a whole practice of programme making which includes other examples like Britain from Above. In asking whether there is a geography genre in British television, this article argues that the visibility of these programmes merges into a more general investment in imagining the hinterland across a range of programmes from rural dramas to local news, while adopting standard magazine or presenter based formats. Exploring the role of this imagination, it asks about geographical preoccupations and highlights assumptions about the cultural affiliations and identities of the suburban television audience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]