...Gentrification is a process of renovation and revival of deteriorated urban neighbourhoods which results from an influx of more affluent residents, a related increase in rents and property values, changes in the districts character and culture. Gentrification is generally seen by some as a negative and controversial topic, suggesting the displacement of low- income families and small businesses. Others see it as an increase in an area’s economy and a revitalisation of the built environment. In this essay I will be addressing whether gentrification does help or hinder low income, urban communities using references from contemporary examples such as New York City and London, I will outline both positive and negative impacts of gentrification...
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...With reference to examples, discuss the overall effectiveness of urban regeneration schemes (40) Many inner cities have suffered from urban decline in the past 30 years due to many reasons. Urban decline is generally defined as when an area starts losing businesses, people lose their jobs, people move away from the area as the local economy shrinks meaning the desirability of the area as a whole also falls. In response to this urban decline, many local governments have introduced urban regeneration schemes. Urban regeneration is the attempt to reverse that decline by both improving the physical structure, and, more importantly and elusively, the economy of those areas. Re-urbanisation is the movement of people back to live in old city centres and inner city areas that have been redeveloped. The four different processes that drive re-urbanisation are Gentrification (Notting Hill), through partnerships (Sheffield City Centre and Park Hill Flats), property led regeneration schemes (Sheffield Development Cooperation in the Lower Don Valley) and Urban Re-Generation in Mumbai. One partnership scheme which aimed to achieve urban regeneration was the Urban Splash scheme in Sheffield which focused on the regeneration of the Park Hill flats just outside the city’s CBD. The flats were built in 1957 to ease the problem of developing slums in the area. However over time the flats have become an eyesore. They were rundown and crime and vandalism became a problem. The regeneration scheme...
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...In the 1991 American hood drama film, Boyz N the Hood, many global and urban planning issues are exemplified through the urban neighborhood, also referred to as the hood, in South Central Los Angeles. The film puts into perspective the effect gun violence, gentrification and role model relationships in an urban slum. The creation of these urban slums comes directly from a term known as gentrification. Gentrification is the process of shifting an urban community towards a wealthier one by removing the lower class from the area and forcing them to relocate. Resulting from gentrification, new urban slums are created which have a high density of residents on the lower end of the socio-economic hierarchy. Consequentially, these urban planning issues...
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...Gentrification on our doorstep! In this article I will be exploring the term “gentrification” and analysis its real meaning in the real world. I will be also exploring the causes and damages gentrification causes in today's society. The term “gentrification” was coined by British sociologist Ruth Glass in 1964 to describe the influx of the middle class displacing lower class worker residents in urban neighbourhoods.The term was published in Ruth Glass’ book ‘London: aspects of change’ she stated that “One by one, many of the working class neighbourhoods of London have been invaded by the middle-classes—upper and lower” she also claimed that “Once this process of “gentrification” starts in a district it goes on rapidly, until all or most of the original working-class occupiers are displaced and the whole social character of the district is changed.” Many sociologists have tried to explain the causes of gentrification, sociologists Bruce London and J. John Palen came up with a list of five explanations these were: demographic-ecological, socio-cultural, political-economical, community networks, and social movements. These explanations were published in a book in 1984 called ‘Gentrification, Displacement, and Neighborhood Revitalization’. These are seen as the most accurate causes of gentrification. The first cause of gentrification (according to ‘Gentrification, Displacement, and Neighborhood Revitalization’), is demographic-ecological, which endeavors to illustrate gentrification...
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...Research Plan I. Title: Research plan to an area in UK which has potential to become gentrified. II. Investigators Kaie-Liis Asu III. Introduction and goal of the Project This research will be concentrating on using gentrification indicators as a framework to examine and analyse changes to predict the gentrification within community neighbourhoods, to find a solution for an investment company to find an area, which has a potential to become gentrified. The objectives of this programme is to establish and point out the factors influencing gentrification within any town in the world, in this case in United Kingdom, that may be going through gentrification process – changes that result when wealthier people acquire or rent property in low income and working class communities (Grant, 2003). The research needs to be carried out to establish what factors cause gentrification, to examine demographic shifts, how to control gentrification etc...There are two wider areas with main issues that we need to be concentrating, when researching gentrification: Production-supply of 'gentrifiable' property; the workings of housing and land markets; spatial flows of capital and the 'rent-gap'; role of public and private finance; 'uneven development' (Slater, 2000). Consumption- The characteristics of the 'pool of gentrifiers'; 'new middle-class' ideology; consumer demand and consumption practices; (counter) cultural politics; the roles of race, gender and sexuality; education, occupational...
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...How do residents from the Brooklyn area survive gentrification? Introduction Neighborhoods can change in many different forms by social polarization, political factors, and integration of new neighbors or departure of long-time folks. These changes around a specific area are sum up as gentrification. The renewal of neighborhood environments that transform and attract middle and upper-class households and investors, creating problems for those who cannot afford rises of rents. However, what cause some dwellers to remain in their homes despite the rise of property values? Or how lower-class populations persist in gentrified zones? With the aid of federal and government institutions, low-income characters would not be able to continue living in their homes. Even though the process of restoration can result in the increase of the cost of life, some dwellers opt to remain in Green Point, Brooklyn because they enforce a number of methods, such as Section 8, Low Interest Rate programs and rent regulation, to fight displacement. Definition Generally speaking, gentrification is a two-edge process that usually pushes long-time dwellers from a neighborhood as the upgrading or improvement of the urban environment takes place around this specific neighborhood. In other words, residents opt to move out of the neighborhood because of the rise of rents, property value, and the renovation of the stock housing, which usually ends up with the replacement of the lower class with the middle to...
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...The urban in fragile, uncertain, neoliberal times: towards new geographies of social justice? R. ALAN WALKS Department of Geography, University of Toronto Mississauga, Mississauga, Ontario, Cananda L5L 1C6 (e-mail: alan.walks@utoronto.ca) Canadian cities are at a crossroads. The neoliberalization of governance at multiple scales, inadequate re-investment in urban infrastructure, increasing reliance on continental and international trade, and the restructuring of the space economy have combined to weaken Canada’s cities just as the global economic system is undergoing transformation. Canadian urban geographic scholarship has much to offer under current conditions, and is already making significant contributions in key areas. In particular, research on what might be called the contours and impacts of urban restructuring and the neoliberal city, immigration and cities of difference, and urban environmental justice show much promise and are likely to define the core of Canadian urban geography into the future. Key words: cities, urban geography, Canada, economic restructuring, neoliberalism, social justice L’urbain ` une ´poque fragile, incertaine et a e n´olib´rale: vers de nouvelles g´ographies de la e e e justice sociale? ` Les villes canadiennes sont a la crois´e des chemins. e Alors que l’´conomie mondiale traverse une p´riode e e de transformation, la situation des villes au Canada se pr´carise avec les effets de la restructuration e ` n´olib´rale de la gouvernance a multiples...
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...Urban Geography * Urban is a matter of scale * Large size * High density * Vertical geography * Social heterogeneity * What is the minimum population to be categorized as a city in the US? * 2,500 * Physical Definition of a City * Central City – delimited municipality within which local government has legal authority * Urbanized Area – central city plus surrounding built-up suburbs (DOES NOT correspond to government boundaries) * MSA (Metropolitan Statistical Area) – functional area of a city- zone of influence * Central city * Urbanized area with at least 50,000 * County within which city is located * Adjacent counties with high pop. Density plus large % of people work in central city’s county (includes land area that is NOT urban) * Micropolitan Statistical Area – smaller urbanized areas between 10,000-50,000 plus the county in which it is located * Newberry is an example * Consolidated MSA – overlapping MSAs (conurbation) * Washington, Baltimore, Philadelphia, NY and to Boston (Megalopolis) * 1/4th of every American lives there * Megacity – city with more than 10 million inhabitants * About 30 of these exist * Urbanization – process by which the population is cities grow * 2008 – urban/rural = 51/49 * Larger % Urban = higher level of development in the country * Cities occupy < 1% of Earth’s...
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...Page 1 Soc 3 Throughout the 1900’s, the nature of the city/urban neighborhood has become dramatically different. As the decades went by, many changes have occurred in the racial and wealth aspects of the communities in these cities. Racial aspects include The Great Migration, which was an extreme relocation of many African-Americans from southern states, such as Alabama, Louisiana, and Misssisssippi, to northern cities, such as Cleveland, Boston, Baltimore, and New York City. Gentrification, which is the upscaling of a neighborhood, is another factor, one of which that is fueled by an inflow of investment in a particular area. The Great Migration took place in the 1900’s, between 1910 to around 1970. An estimated six million African-Americans moved from southern states into the North and Midwest cities. Some historians differentiate between a Great Migration (1910–30), numbering about 1.6 million migrants, and a Second Great Migration (1940 to 1970), in which 5 million or more people moved and to a wider variety of destinations. This was mostly brought on by the continuous violence against blacks in the south. Even though they were free and segregation laws were passed, they were still denied many opportunities that whites were entitled to. For example, the right to vote and own homes. The number of blacks lynched rose significantly due to the passing of the Jim Crow laws. The south was not a place the blacks wanted to raise a 2 family. The...
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...a) Briefly discuss the effects of gentrification [9m] Effects • Social and economic polarization • The upward spiral of desirability and increasing rents and property values(erodes the qualities that began attracting new people in the first place • Displacement of that community(renters(prices go up, tenants are pushed out • Arrival of new investment, new spending power, and a new tax base(increased economic activity • Rehabilitation, housing development, new shops and restaurants(higher-wage jobs (previous residents may benefit(but mostly to well-educated newcomers • Some local economic activity(forced out either by rising rents or shifting sensibilities • Industrial activities that employ local workers(viewed as a nuisance or environmental hazard • Local shops may lose their leases under pressure from posh boutiques and restaurants • Physical changes(older buildings are rehabilitated and new construction occurs • Public improvement to streets, parks, and infrastructure(new arrivals often push hard to improve the district aesthetically(codify new standards through design guidelines, historic preservation legislation, and the use of blight and nuisance laws • The social, economic, and physical impacts of gentrification(serious political conflict(exacerbated by differences in race, class, and culture • Earlier residents may feel embattled, ignored, and excluded from their own communities • New arrivals are often mystified by accusations that their...
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...Gentrification and Personhood The gentrification of the Tenderloin District of San Francisco epitomizes how those “entitled” possess space which displaces the mostly minority, original inhabitants of the community. I will be analyzing gentrification through a wider processes of inequalities in personhood, where the possessive individualism of some is defined by the denial of personhood to others. I will be in dialogue with “Feral Theory: Editors’ Introduction,” by Kelly Struthers Montford and Chloë Taylor, to construct who is viewed as “unruly” subjects, who don’t “own” or “regulate” themselves. In addition, I will also use Aimee Meredith Cox’s Shapeshifters: Black Girls and the Choreography of Citizenship, chapter titled “Narratives of...
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...Gentrification has been a growing concern for many North American cities – one of them being Toronto. Toronto has emerged as one of Canada’s most highly populated cities and an ideal location for redevelopment. Gentrification has aggressively expanded throughout the inner city, with many residents moving out due to household price inflation. As a result, gentrification has followed them, extending towards the inner suburbs such as Scarborough. The purpose of this paper is to examine gentrification and its impact on the Kennedy Road BIA located in Scarborough. This paper will begin by defining gentrification and its evolutional impact in Toronto. It will follow with an assessment of my field work in the Kennedy Road BIA and a discussion regarding...
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...Definition of Gentrification: Gentrification is just one of the nebulous social issues taking place within modern Brixton, as London becomes more globalized and newer forms of ‘urban renewal’ are put into place. This particular urban phenomenon is best characterized as gentrification, which is defined for the purposes of this argument as a middle-class effort to undermine the local populace’s business, structure, and daily life by asserting their own values (Merriam-Webster). Expressed in expansive economic terms by Eric Clark, gentrification is noted as: “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...
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...Foreclosures and Gentrification in New York City The uneven development of New York City’s outer boroughs has taken a dive into massive foreclosure in the recent years due to high unemployment, unyielding bankers, and gentrification. The issue is on an urban and regional scale and needs to be closely observed and studied to better prevent the spread of this plague. The recent victims in this failure are the middle class, with whom the troubles of foreclosure are starting to catch up. Gentrification is also starting to push the poor out of their homes to make way for the rich. This unevenness came from the inevitable shift of balance that comes with industrial capitalism. A fresh wave of foreclosures is impacting middle-class homeowners in Queens. Queens neighborhoods have been sinking since 2008 when the crisis first started. Come 2011, the foreclosure rate spiked and began to trouble middle-class homeowners. Many homeowners rely on tenants to help them with paying their mortgage. With the recent departure of tenants from the area, Queens homeowners are left with less money and more problems. According to the New York Post, “Foreclosures jumped 19 percent in New York City and 164 percent in Queens in 2012 versus 2011, as The Post reported last week. Four of the hardest-hit sections of Queens — St. Albans, Rosedale, Cambria Heights and Queens Village — saw foreclosure rates more than double, according to RealtyTrac. More than 2 percent of housing units in those areas are in foreclosure...
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...reference to examples, evaluate the success or otherwise of urban regeneration schemes in combating the causes and consequences of urban decline (40) Urban decline is defined as the deterioration of the inner city. It is normally caused by a lack of investment and maintenance as well as social reasons and government policy and these declining areas are characterised by the low economic status, social and environmental decline and problems. Even with this decline, there are ways of regenerating the inner city, such as Urban Development Corporations and City Partnerships. The de-industrialisation of UK inner cities led to unemployment in the area, meaning there was a lack of disposable income and therefore and therefore a lack of expenditure in the local economy. This decreased income and expenditure means that rent prices would be lowered in the area and therefore landlords would not be motivated to carry out repairs and refurbishments, leading to a decline in the standard of living as well. The lack of expenditure meant that mass disinvestment from local businesses occurred as they decided to move to more prosperous areas to further their business ventures. This in turn creates more unemployment and a further lack in expenditure and more disinvestment; and the cycle continues. The local government collect less tax, while in turn having to shell out more in unemployment benefits, leading to further economic decline in the area, as well as a physical decline. This pushes out the more...
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