A world authority on cities has told Brighton and Hove to keep hold of its bright young people if it wants to join the top flight.

Professor Sir Peter Hall said well-educated and dynamic youngsters had the potential to create businesses and take a real place in cities such as Brighton and Hove.

Sir Peter, a former adviser to the Government on planning and the urban environment, was answering questions at the Brighton and Hove City Forum in Brighton College.

The forum was set up four years ago by Brighton College headteacher Anthony Seldon and Canon Douglas McKittrick, former vicar of Brighton.

After speaking on Cities Of Tomorrow, Sir Peter said Brighton and Hove could take inspiration from other settlements on the fringe of large cities, such as those outside New York, and from Santa Monica.

He said successful cities were likely to benefit from a mixture of creative industry and new technology.

Students provided a significant proportion of the population in cities such as Brighton and Hove and higher education was a big employer as well as providing talented people.

He said: "You have a bunch of creative university people and they don't always want to leave a place like Brighton.

"Some of them will invest in small enterprises that turn out to be big industries."

Sir Peter said Brighton and Hove had done well in managing to avoid the decline which had affected many seaside resorts to the east of it and had diversified.

On the current debate over innovative buildings, he said there had to be a mixture of conserved listed buildings and interesting new ones.

"The problem is architecture is becoming big business.

"You see a few architects hitting the jackpot and being bombarded with commissions."

Rather than going for the big names, Brighton and Hove might do better to commission talented young architects living and working in the city.

There were also several enlightened developers prepared to put money into fine architecture.

Sir Peter said Brighton and Hove was unusual in having almost no new sites for building.

It had either to look at some higher-density developments in the city or use land on the other side of the South Downs.

He said extremely high salaries in London were causing a ripple effect in the housing market that was affecting Brighton and Hove.

It was now becoming clear not nearly enough housing had been built in the South-East during the last 20 years.

Friday March 14 2003