Week 1
Houterman/Hulsbergen : NH transformation, urban planning /design
Restructuring is about the spatial and functional structure of an area: spatial, functional and
structural topics in relation to societal questions. Demolition and rebuilding as sustainable transf.
Which projects of demolished/rebuilt environments really contribute to long-term spatial,
social and economic urban interests
Urbanism is relevant for defining problems & solutions. It is technical thus must be included
Demolition from an urban planning and design perspective
Doubts about merits of modernism the mono-functional nature of new urban developments, the
lack of human scale and the loss of pedestrian life.
Arguments supporting demolition follow 2 lines of reasoning: pro’s and con’s page 4/96
1. Modernist urban planning and architecture is problematic because it causes social problems
oversimplification but cannot be denied. Social problems related to many other factors
2. The areas’ design no longer function adequately in contemporary society but can be too
closely related to current ideas about ‘good living’.
Bad planning and design aspects in specific cases certainly contribute to the functioning and image of
housing estates but demolish is no imply solution
Urbanism considerations: Sustainable: integration of societal, economic and environmental aspects.
- reaching new equilibriums: the contribution to the common good, not just the private good
- long-term & continuing adaptability of the physical organisation within the changing
frameworks of society, constantly responding to changing social and economic demands
1: Housing for long-term perspective, housing only one of the sectors. Integrated regeneration
includes a variety of actors, and deals with a diversity of spatial scales. housing should be part of a
regeneration strategy aimed at integration and the inclusion of residents who is actually included?
2: Urban structure principles connections: theory of the urban web (salingaros)
- good urban web has a high degree of organised complexity & information
- neighbourhood works only if contrasting nodes are placed to provide active links between
like nodes. Without a sufficient density & variety of nodes, functional paths can never form.
Salingaros’ 3 principles of generating successful urban space: relevant for sustainable urban
development (connections with other city parts & for position of neighbourhood)
1. urban space is bounded by surfaces that present unambiguous information
2. the spatial information field determines the connective web of paths and nodes
3. the core of urban space is pedestrian space protected from non-pedestrian traffic
Urban projects as a tool & strategy to improve connectivity on the local, urban and regional scale
in the transformation of neighbourhoods, demolition should support with priority the safe uses by
pedestrians and cyclists
3: Network approach 3 levels of operators who organise and reorganise space
1. technical networks
2. functional networks of production and consumption
3. network/actual territory of the urban household
, 2
linking this with time, basic rhythms, time use and space-time budgets Network City Approach
today new networks are being produced by developments in information and communication tech.
The Network City Approach: a network is a material and/or virtual set of connections which produces
physical-spatial, social-economic, social-tech and social-spatial networks lot of uncertainty
- approach connected to societal urban processes & accommodation of that in space
- time-efficient & time-consuming networks: demolition should contribute to the
improvement of these networks
4: Urban design principles
- demolition to improve structure and form of public space produce new/popular housing
- demolition to change the programmatic structure, to provide better local services and to link
the neighbourhood to the city’s functional structure
relevant structures = the networks of public and private spaces public spaces: improve the
condition for multi-functional, complex and dynamic use of space
networks of public space, well structured and designed linear elements and nodes, are vital for the
creation of the urban feel also in social sense (exchange perspectives)
- direct mutual visibility of streets, housing and doorways makes space more safe
- include this in the decision what and where to demolish and to build
5: Vulnerability and deprivation Failures of market for certain individuals
Vulnerability and deprivation are crucial concepts for understanding urban problems
- vulnerability: social dimension, different forms of dependences the system that creates
the changes cannot be used to improve one’s own situation
- deprivation: spatial dimension, shortages in the living environment the form and uses of
available space which create the material conditions for either facilitating or restricting
they have to be sharply distinguished in order to prevent fallacies
the combination of vulnerability and deprivation are necessary indicators for the evaluation of urban
development demolition and rebuilding should be evaluated with their impacts on decreasing it
6: Actors and process
Private parties involved: who will take responsibility for sustainable development?
Resident participation is important in terms of efficiency: residents and users have the knowledge of
local dynamics and may have a sound grasp of which services will work and which fail to connect
Conclusion
1. Include urban matters in district transformation because it impacts spatial scales
2. Demolition and rebuilding are strategic instruments, not goals. It solves and stimulates
3. Urbanism is a frontline discipline. Demolition should be combined with improvements &
additional new qualities
4. Priority to needs current residents, including vulnerable and deprived residents/users
5. Focus on available space for building, before demolition
6. Look at the districts, one at a time
, 3
Munro et al. Student impacts on urban neighbourhoods
Studentification to describe changes akin to gentrification
The development of student neighbourhoods private rented sector: the economic incentive to
provide student housing was strong.
- Demand by landlords drives up prices in student areas faster than in surrounding areas.
- self-reinforcing process is established: original students find it profitable to leave and, as
they are replaced by student households, ever more residents are encouraged to leaver
The impacts of increased student occupation
- the dis-amenity caused by the distinctive lifestyles of many students + the impacts on the
physical environment
- problems are caused by the relatively intense occupation of properties not designed for this
purpose, allied to the fact that most students are young and not experienced in managing a
house tangible changes
- less tangible changes: a keen of loss of community and a loss of families
- students live in an eternal present. They have no sense that the area has a past, nor any
commitment to it in the future
- issue of collective efficacy in maintaining particular norms of behaviour and mutually
acceptable levels of disturbance
Positioning the student problem
The purported positive virtues of the process of gentrification have less focus, in contrast, the public
debate around Studentification has focused much more strongly on the negative
- original residents are seen as the community and their voice of resistance is clearly
recognised and heard in the policy process
- while student population is en masse, as individuals they are transient and absent from the
local political process.
Policy responses policy is always developed in the context of contested interpretations and
struggle to shape the policy agenda and definition of the policy problem. Different discourse:
- the discourse that positions the ‘problem’ of student areas as not really a problem at all-
both inevitable and better than the alternative- and immediately implies a certain
impossibility of fixing fundamental problems
- the discourse with ideas about students and student hoods. Student hood is positioned as a
luminal transitional time, between adolescence and adulthood. Thus much acceptance
- a class-based discourse that presumed that students are middle-class. Students are ‘nice, not
blameworthy: that it is thoughtlessness rather than ill-will that causes them to give their
neighbourhood problem.
- so densely occupied by students : an accumulation of occasional transgressions
- Policy approaches tend to be persuasive, light-hearted and light-touch due to ++ spill-over
Any problems were seen to be counterbalanced by the real positive benefits that students brought to
the cities: economic, cultural and social boosts
Policy is constructed in a gentle, persuasive spirit, with no real expectation that the behaviours can,
or should change. The problems are defined as inevitable element of student
, 4
Sage et al – New build Studentification: a panacea for balanced
communities
The question of where and how to accommodate students, while creating harmonious and
sustainable communities, has penetrated community, political and institutional agendas.
- Rise of (PBSA): the backbone of many local authority policies seeking to disperse students in
order to reinstate social mixing. Others have criticised PBSA: local communities seek to resist
urban changes associated with the in-migration of student groups.
PBSA: Gentrification or Regeneration?
The dispersal of students from areas of over-concentrated houses in multiple occupation (HMO)
production is one of a number of desired outcomes of PBSA.
- PBSA has tended to be uncritically represented as solution to improving student living
standards and remedying the social ills of the traditional student urban enclave. But, PBSA is
not cheap, this poses the question about the effects of PBSA on student indebtedness.
From political perspective PBSA can be stimulus for urban regeneration But: location is important.
Direct displacement due to PBSA is unusual. there can be indirect displacement.
- exclusionary displacement which is price-shadowing where lower income groups would be
unable to access property
- socio-cultural displacement where the characteristics of an area become aligned with the
values of social groups moving in.
- PBSA has potentially important implications for deepening existing patterns of socio-spatial
segregation along age and class divides.
Studentification in Hanover and the Impact of the Phoenix PBSA.
Exclusionary discourse: Noise, Nuisance and Fear: Statements from residents stressed a
range of issues, such as litter, parking and in particular, noise-nuisance. Residents experience
low-level anti-social behaviour of students.
Discourses of dispossession: Ownership, Withdrawal and Surveillance: Residents feel like
the campus identity is inscribe into the local area. The experience a sense of dispossession
due to a perceived shift in ownership.
They also experience social withdrawal and ‘imprisonment’, their natural instincts it to
retreat into their homes away from disturbances.
Discussion: PBSA and the Age-divided City?
The contested position of new-build development within discourses of gentrification appear equally
to apply to PBSA. Discussing PBSA in the context of gentrification helps to flag up the potential for
PBSA to instigate long-term processes of neighbourhood change and social displacement.
PBSA increase spatial segregation of society on the basis of age. The rise of PBSA has the potential to
exacerbate extant processes of age/class segregation in university towns and cities and it is
suggested that such exclusionary dispositions inculcated during studenthood might become
magnified as future student cohort’s progress through the life-course.
Conclusion.
While PBSA has sometimes been identified as the panacea to studentification this paper has outlined
a set of economic, social and cultural displacement processes set in motion by the development of
PBSA. This has indirectly changed caused the displacement of established residents, with those
remaining alleging negative experiences of living alongside the PBSA.
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