Research Interests

Christopher is a Senior Lecturer in ImaginationLancaster. His general research interests include decision-making processes; inter/multi/trans-disciplinarity; protest and resistance in urban environments; public space design, use and management; research methods; sustainability; town planning; urban design; and wellbeing.

Christopher led a recently completed ESRC Lancaster University Impact and Acceleration Award called Mobilise! 2 (2020-21), evaluating an online course on active citizenship, aimed at asylum seekers and refugees. The course was developed as part of the Mobilise! project (2019-20), of which Christopher was Co-Investigator. These two projects were rooted in a National Lottery Heritage Fund grant called Remembering Resistance (2018-20), in which the project team captured and celebrated stories of women’s protest in the North of England since 1918, when some women and all men got the right to vote in the UK. The project culminated in an exhibition at Museums Sheffield in 2019, entitled, ‘Empowering Women Empower Women’.

Christopher’s past research has examined the relationship between wellbeing and aspects of the urban environment on a 5-year, £6 million EPSRC project called Liveable Cities (2012-2017). This research builds on his previous work about density and the decision-making process on a 4-year, £3 million EPSRC project called Urban Futures (2008-2012) as well as work on the urban design decision-making process and its relationship to sustainability from a 5-year, £3 million EPSRC-funded research project, VivaCity2020: Urban Sustainability for the 24-hour City (2004-2008).

In between these projects, Christopher co-wrote a UK Government Foresight report about the impacts of the physical environment on mental well-being, and a report about the future of community and values for the UK Ministry of Defence. Finally, he worked on a Lancaster University Early Career Grant with colleagues in Sociology and LICA, studying key changes in the ‘interaction order’ of public spaces.

PhD Supervision Interests

I am interested in proposals from potential doctoral students in the broad areas of urban public space (e.g., the process of creating public spaces, the uses of public spaces), sustainable urban environments, urban design and behaviour and wellbeing.