Meeting the neighbours

Bringing people together

Click the image to read the Neighbours Can Help story so far

In today’s society, many people can live in a community for months, or even years, before getting to know their neighbours – often due to fear of rejection or because of ‘traditional British reserve’ and not wanting to appear pushy or nosy.

Now a new project is hoping to encourage and enhance community spirit and acts of ‘neighbourliness’ by bringing people together online.

Neighbours Can Help is developing a social networking web platform that enables neighbours to connect with each other – as well as with local service providers, community organisations and advice services – so that they feel they are able to offer and request help whenever it’s needed.

Encouraging altruism

The internet has completely revolutionised person-to-person interactions and Neighbours Can Help believes it has the capacity to break down the barriers created by shyness and garden fences in residential streets, opening up a whole new avenue for neighbourhood altruism to emerge.

This is regularly demonstrated during heavy snowfalls when neighbours help each other out by clearing pavements and pushing cars. Now the organisation hopes the new website will enable people to make new friends, share experiences and offer support to each other all year round.

It believes the site can significantly strengthen community cohesion, ultimately enabling people to come together to deliver a community-based response to the innumerable hidden needs of every street within the UK.