Paper short abstract:

This paper considers the development of two places within Manchester’s city centre and their relationship with the electrical infrastructure. The aim of the paper is to show how infrastructures are used in the constitution of different places and how local governance affects such constitutions.

Paper long abstract:

This paper considers the relationship between Manchester's electrical infrastructure and the constitution of distinctive places within the urban centre. Specifically, the paper discusses and compares the development of the Northern Quarter and the Central Business District, two locations within Manchester's city centre. Although these are close to each other, the practices of labour and forms of consumption they support are diverse. I will outline these differences and consider how electrical infrastructure is involved in the constitution of each place. This will be achieved by analysing a series of maps, showing contemporary land use. These maps will be accompanied by relevant figures detailing levels of electricity use. Additionally, city council development strategies will be considered, in an attempt to understand how Manchester's local authority seeks to affect the infrastructures and thus the production of each place. By detailing such differences, I will show how electrical infrastructure is used in the constitution of places: that is as distinctive areas within which correspondingly distinctive practices are performed and interact.