class 5.1 Flashcards
what is the context Gentrification
the context of economic restructuring, globalization of capital, rise of the FIRE sectors, socio-cultural change.
Sassen and rising spatial polarization between & within cities
Extreme in global cities like London, New York
SPATIAL INCOME INEQUALITY
The extent to which individuals, families, or households are geographically concentrated and segregated by income in a region or a city
Consequences of spatial income inequality
- Urban exclusion
- Eroding municipal tax bases
- Unequal access to quality social services
- Unequal access to quality schools
- Housing affordability & quality
GENTRIFICATION VS. GATED COMMUNITIES
gentrification:
–> raises wealth level in neighborhoods by displacing poorer households
–> shifts location of urban poverty to new places - process of displacement
–> Scholarship looks at how neighbourhoods change because of spatial income inequality
gated communities:
–> physical exclusion through enclosure - fences, walls, gates, islands, etc
–> often policed with private security
who came up with the term Gentrification?
how di they come up with it
Ruth Glass
Ruth Glass writes about observed changes to London’s working-class suburbs in the 1960s following an influx of middle-class residents.
Ø From primarily renter to homeowner neighbourhoods
Ø Increases in property prices
Classical gentrification
“pioneer gentrifiers” move into neighbourhoods that have seen disinvestment, buy properties, upgrade these properties through renovations
- Pioneers tend to be well-educated professionals, e.g. the creative class!
Results in displacement of original inhabitants.
Often rooted in progressive politics, the desire to live in socially mixed areas - creates tensions between being pro-revitalization but anti-gentrification.
EARLY POST-WWII GENTRIFICATION
Linked to protests against urban renewal projects in the 20th century (highways, towers)
Growing interest in preserving history urban neighbourhoods – some new resident groups actively supported gentrification as a way to revitalize neighbourhoods.
- E.g. Brownstone Revitalization Committee
By the 1980s, cities are struggling with deindustrialization & how to reinvent themselves.
__> Urban revitalization becomes a preoccupation of urbanists.
THE STAGE MODEL OF GENTRIFICATION (PHILIP CLAY)
Stage 1: Pioneer gentrifiers: risk oblivious, fixing up homes for their own use.
Stage 2: Slow commercialization of gentrifying neighbourhoods:
–> property values begin to rise,
–_ RE sector gets involved
–> housing becomes scarce.
Stage 3: Investors arrive:
–> prices begin climbing rapidly
–> gentrifying area is seen as a “safe place” for the middle class
–> banks want to lend
–> displacement of older/poorer renters accelerates with conversions.
Stage 4:
–> High earning managerial and business class arrives
–>real estate speculation booms
–> begin to see displacement of homeowners (not just renters)
–> middle class differentiation.
Model points to emergence of conflict as prices climb and residents are displaced
DEFINING GENTRIFICATION
“A process involving a change in the population of land-users such that the new users are of a higher socio-economic status than the previous users, together with an associated change in the building environment through the reinvestment in fixed capital.” (Clark, 2005)
is gentrification a global phenomenon
yes
STUDENTIFICATION
Purpose-built student housing has become a lucrative business for the real estate sector.
In small cities like Waterloo, it’s highly profitable and targets the luxury end of the student housing market.
Ø Bed leases
Ø High turn-over
Ø Guaranteed leases
Increasingly replacing smaller multi-family buildings and bungalows – intensifying gentrification and age segregation in neighbourhoods.
INCLUSIONARY ZONING
Requires developers to allocate a certain number of units to affordable housing.
Often accompanied by incentives like lower minimum parking requirements, tax abatements, density bonuses.
Aims to achieve social mixing in neighbourhoods undergoing development.
Does it always produce inclusive neighbourhoods?
“Poor doors”
Destruction and replacement of existing affordable housing stock (not always 1-1!)
SUBURBAN GENTRIFICATION
Recall discussion on densification as an “antidote” to suburbanization
Strategies for achieving compact, mixed-used neighbourhood growth raises land values
Can reduce supply of older, affordable (rental) housing stock
RURAL GENTRIFICATION
Accelerated during the pandemic
“Counter-urbanization” - higher income urbanites in search of a pastoral lifestyle (e.g. homesteaders)
Raises rural property prices beyond the reach of local residents
what accelerates gentrification?
accelerated because of neoliberal policy reform – the globalization of the FIRE sectors.
