What is the value of built heritage conservation? Assessing spillover effects of conserving historic sites in Singapore

Quantifying the economic benefits of built heritage facilitates the formulation and assessment of conservation policies and programs. There is however a lack of empirical research about the economic value of built heritage in Asian cities. This lack is problematic, given the rapid pace of demolition and redevelopment of historic landscapes in Asian cities. This study seeks to reduce the current gap in built heritage research by examining whether real estate premiums are generated by the designation of buildings as ‘conserved’ in Singapore, a city-state in South East Asia. Using 20 years of housing transaction data, and controlling for building, neighborhood and year fixed effects, we found that conservation designation had a positive impact on average sale prices per square meter of built area that was largest at residential locations between 800 m to 1.6 km from the conserved site. Findings also suggest that lower-cost public housing resale units gained a substantially smaller premium compared to private housing units. While our findings suggest an economic justification for building conservation programs in Asian cities, they also raise questions about such programs potential impact on neighborhood gentrification, and the need for appropriate taxation policies to ensure horizontal equity between property owners.     

Synergy between urban planning, conservation of the cultural built heritage and functional changes in the old urban center—the case of Tel Aviv

The old urban center of Tel Aviv, like other urban centers in the western world, is undergoing accelerated development processes. Together with the trend towards gentrification are processes of urban renewal and infrastructure development and increasing demand for land and buildings, all of which increase the value of the land. The difference between Tel Aviv and other cities in the western world, as well as in Israel, is its young age and its quick pace of change. The old urban center of Tel Aviv is unique in that it is less than one hundred years old and is changing rapidly. Tel Aviv, which in 1909 was a small suburb of Jaffa, has evolved into an independent city, which is today the center of economic and cultural activities in Israel. Tel Aviv's short but significant history, together with its rapid changes, creates its image as an active and vivid metropolis with embedded heritage values. However, rapid development brings with it dilemmas. On the one hand, urban planners, tourists and entrepreneurs identify the center of town with its historical nucleus and heritage values. On the other hand, the rapid development and need for urban renovation are clearly in conflict with the need to preserve Tel Aviv's historical values and unique qualities. The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate that conservation of built heritage and urban development in ‘Young Tel Aviv’ can coexist and synergistically support each other, and that the historical values have economic potential, which may contribute to urban development. Heritage values can be formulated and even artificially produced to promote urban development. Although Israel has many very old cities with universal historical values, the young city of Tel Aviv is at the forefront of conservation.     

Spatial restructuring and the logic of industrial land redevelopment in urban China: I. Theoretical considerations

We harness the game-theoretic approach to propose a new conceptual framework for industrial land redevelopment research. Stemming from Harvey's notion of “urbanization of capital” and Foucault's study on “power relations”, we analyze the driver and regulator of urban spatial restructuring. We contend that the redevelopment of industrial land should be re-conceptualized as the competition for land rent gap or land rent surplus. Land redevelopment in urban China could be theoretically interpreted as multiple games between the original land-user and local government or the alliance between local government and new developers. Different equilibriums of games lead to various models/types of redevelopment.     

价值捕获与财政可持续的城市更新模式 ——天津市的实证分析

研究目的：基于价值捕获理论建立符合中国现行制度的城市更新模式,以识别可行的城市更新项目,明确其优先序,实现城市更新的财政可持续目标。研究方法：空间分析和多元聚类法。研究结果：（1）从价值捕获的视角,城市更新项目可分为价值捕获型、难价值捕获型和增值不显著型。其中,价值捕获型项目对城市更新项目可持续开展起到重要作用。（2）利用包含公共设施完备度、地价增值空间、更新成本、项目面积和地类适宜性5项指标的评价体系,可有效识别价值捕获型项目和非价值捕获型项目,明确各项目的实施顺序。（3）公共设施完备度提升是实现城市更新地价增值的基础,天津市的实证分析表明,相比于地铁站和小学,三级医院、商服中心和绿地覆盖率提升是更为迫切的方面。（4）实证分析中,82个待更新项目中至少27个可归为价值捕获型,其中西沽、同义庄、席厂下坡项目等适于优先开展城市更新。研究结论：建立识别价值捕获型等不同类项目的指标体系,根据体系的分析结果开展城市更新工作,是一种财政可持续的城市更新模式。     

Brownfield redevelopment in Toronto: an examination of past trends and future prospects

Although the development of greenfield sites in suburban peripheries is still the predominant trend in Canada, in the decade of the 1990s a growing inclination to redevelop under-utilized urban brownfield sites emerged. This study describes brownfield redevelopment patterns in the former “City of Toronto” during the 1990s and examines the key factors shaping them. The relevant data for the study were compiled from a City of Toronto land-use database, the appurtenant policy and planning studies, interviews with stakeholders, and case studies. Toronto's redevelopment experience has obvious implications for cities of similar socio-cultural and socio-economic character undergoing redevelopment planning and can thus be viewed as a “case-in-point” in brownfield redevelopment planning and policy.     

存量规划时代城镇低效用地再开发的思考

研究目的:总结中国城镇低效用地再开发试点的总体情况和主要特征,分析再开发的现实挑战,探讨再开发的重点与方向。研究方法:对比分析法。研究结果:(1)从总体情况来看,存在内涵外延尚未统一、工作目标基本一致、改造类型因地制宜等特点;(2)从主要特征上看,试点城市工作开展的内在动因各异,规划模式多样,激励措施丰富;(3)从现实挑战上看,主要存在政策瓶颈未突破、规划统筹仍不足、制度体系不健全等问题。研究结论:从10个试点城市开展的城镇低效用地再开发情况来看,存量规划时代应当重点完善目标内涵、落实规划先行、推动实施创新。     

统筹发展与安全背景下的城市更新行动——基于社会空间融合的视角

研究目的：以建设包容多元差异的社会空间为切入点，探索统筹发展和安全战略下城市更新促进城市共建共享共治的理论和现实路径，以期为中国城市的高质量发展和高水平安全提供参考。研究方法：文献分析法和归纳演绎法。研究结果：（1）城市更新是处理城市发展和安全问题的重要手段，社会空间融合是存量发展阶段城市更新促进城市发展与安全统筹的关键工具；（2）社会融合理论和社会空间理论构成社会空间融合问题的认识基础，空间布局、资源配置、社会互动和身份认同是解构社会空间融合问题的4个关键维度；（3）空间融合、资源升级、纽带建立和认同感塑造是城市更新实现社会空间融合目标的4条理论路径；（4）城市更新促进社会空间融合的现实路径以空间治理为载体，并可以从多尺度共治、多主体合作和多维度干预三个方面展开。研究结论：统筹发展和安全背景下，社会空间融合应成为中国城市更新实践的重要导向。空间治理是城市更新的载体，通过多尺度共治、多主体合作和多维度干预助力社会空间融合的实现。     

Decision support for sustainable urban renewal: A multi-scale model

Developed cities are troubled by various challenges, including urban dilapidation, environmental pollution, traffic congestion, lack of facility provision, and economic decline. Urban renewal, as an important agenda in most countries, holds the aim of addressing these urban problems. With the inherent complexity of urban renewal, renewal initiatives do not always follow an unsustainable path, which has obtained much criticism from both academia and the public. Therefore, an informative decision-making process would contribute to better renewal outcomes. Previous research has mainly focused on one aspect of urban renewal, in which a comprehensive perspective is lacking. The multi-scale feature of urban renewal initiatives also adds complexity and uncertainty to decision-making. Therefore, this paper proposes a multi-scale model that supports decision-making on realizing sustainable urban renewal. Three sub-modules and a supporting database are included in the model. City, district, and neighborhood scales are the foci of the three sub-modules. Both temporal and spatial data are included in the database. Through experimental study and expert interview, the effectiveness of this model is validated.     

State,war, and land dispossession: The multiple paths to land concentration

We focus on the role of the state in land dispossession during war. State agencies promote land accumulation not only through coercive paths, but also by combining political and market mechanisms. Each mechanism may link the state with different actors and coalitions. We illustrate how this worked in Tibú, a Colombian municipality in which violence against civilians and land accumulation took place in more or less distinct phases. The case highlights the fact that land accumulation during war is not only achieved through coercion. At the same time, it shows the importance of identifying the specific coalitions through which states establish their presence in contested territories during war. We explain such variation as resulting from the types of alliances and coalitions that the state establishes with different sets of stakeholders, and the aims pursued by coalition actors.     

城市土地利用结构相对效率的判别性分析

研究目的:介绍DEA模型在土地利用结构效率分析中的应用,分析城市土地利用结构效率的特点及与城市规模之间的关系,为中国城市合理的土地利用结构及其调整方向提供借鉴。研究方法:采用DEA(数据包络法)进行相关系数的计算,通过概率的基本原理挖掘多目标的信息。研究结果(:1)整体上中国城市土地利用结构效率偏低,规模收益报酬处于递减状态,不同等级的城市表现出完全不同的相对效率和规模收益报酬递增/减规律。(2)不同土地利用类型对相对效率的影响差异较大,并在不同等级的城市内表现出不同的影响强度和个性。研究结论:不同等级的城市存在相对合理的土地利用结构状态。     

How and why large scale agricultural land investments do not create long-term employment benefits: A critique of the ‘state’ of labour regulations in Ghana

Support for large scale agricultural investments in Africa has been mainly premised on their employment prospects for local populations. However, despite earlier calls by Tania Li to centre labour in the land grabs debate, labour is generally invisible in both mainstream policy and academic research. This paper, through a governance lens, draws attention to the implications of the global land rush on wage labour. In principle, policy frameworks that emphasise the labour potentials from large-scale land investments also gravitate towards regulations that seek to facilitate capital accumulation and mitigate negative impacts on communities – congruent with Ghana’s policy direction. This paper assesses the political-economic context of the legislative gaps in the current governance framework for wage labour and large-scale agriculture in Ghana; characterised mainly by absent, illusively present and repressive institutions. It is supported with empirical findings from the nature of farm workers’ incorporation into a transnational oil palm plantation in Ghana, their struggles over the nature of the investment, and the political orientation of the existing regulatory institutions. The study calls for policy measures which address power relations that shape the distribution of benefits from land investments, and also recognise structural inequalities that exist in and outside of agriculture.     

Inventorying heavy metal pollution in redeveloped brownfield and its policy contribution: Case study from Tiexi District,Shenyang, China

As the pollution of urban soil in brownfield redevelopment sites can adversely affect the surrounding ecosystems and human health, China's rapid urbanization and industrialization necessitates the remediation, treatment and redevelopment of contaminated urban soil. This study aims to address the policy implications of inventorying and mapping soil heavy-metal pollution in brownfield redevelopment sites in China, using the Tiexi district in Shenyang as a case study. Enrichment factors analysis of the soil samples proved that the soil in the brownfield sites was highly enriched with copper, cadmium, lead, zinc, arsenic and nickel relative to background values. Furthermore, the analysis of the pollution index and the integrated Nemerow pollution index also indicated that the soil was most heavily polluted by cadmium. The hot-spot metal contamination areas, determined using geographical information system technology, were mainly located near historical high-pollution enterprises. Based on our findings, policy recommendations for further brownfield management are proposed.     

Institutional stakeholder participation in urban redevelopment in Tehran: An evaluation of decisions and actions

Experimentation with citizen participation in urban redevelopments is increasing worldwide. This paper aims to scrutinise this trend through an in-depth case study of the decisions and actions taken by the institutional stakeholders involved in participatory urban redevelopment in Tehran, Iran. The discussion is based around two contrasting urban redevelopment areas which set out to adopt a participatory approach involving various stakeholders including institutions (the Municipality of Tehran and the Heritage Organisation) and local owner-occupiers, developing new knowledge, understanding, and clarity about the concept and application of participation in urban redevelopments in developing countries. In both areas, the institutions invited owners to participate in the physical and economic improvements of their places through land assemblage or sharing redevelopment costs. In this study a range of qualitative methods are used including photo-elicitation techniques (PEI) and semi-structured interviews with locals, officials and professionals.The results show the vulnerability of the process. This was revealed when one institution did not maintain their role and when some owner-occupiers acted as free-riders. This highlights the challenge of building an enduring collaboration between institutional stakeholders from the planning to in-use stages, in particular the difficulties that arise as different institutions become involved in the process. This issue is more problematic when resources are limited and/or intermittent. As the results show, the institutional collaboration was smoother when fewer stakeholders were involved in decision making. In the commercial case, there were more complaints about overdue completion in the projects due to poor institutional collaboration. We recommend the need for an agreed mechanism prior to such initiatives where the role of the various stakeholders and their responsibilities are clearly cited, and where all different impact scenarios from the planning to in-use stage are set out.     

Exploring the ‘layeredness’ of recurring natural resource conflicts: The role of Loita Maasai leadership in the Naimina Enkiyio Forest conflicts in Kenya

This article examines two successive conflicts over the same forest in Kenya, which, when analysed separately, have led to interpretations that do not hold when the conflicts are studied in relation to each other. Inspired by political ecology, it employs a processual view of natural resource conflict, which recognizes that such conflicts may be ‘layered’ and composed of various struggles − or layers − at once, and that some of these struggles may not be discernible at first sight or when resource conflicts are studied in isolation. The conflicts presented in this article occurred between 1993 and 2005 and revolved around the Naimina Enkiyio Forest in south Kenya. They were initially triggered when a local authority, Narok County Council, and later the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), intended to implement plans and projects that would affect the way the forest was being used by the Loita Maasai. Rather than viewing the conflicts as being between a local community and powerful outsiders, I argue that they are best seen as different crystallizations of coalitions between local and outside actors running along a longstanding cleavage in the Loita’s leadership. This article examines how opposing Loita leadership groups forged outside alliances and mobilized support and resistance in Loita and elsewhere. In doing so, it will demonstrate that a particular layer was overlooked or minimized in the various interpretations that have been posited for the separate conflicts, namely a longstanding struggle within the leadership of the Loita Maasai. In fact, this struggle has proved to be crucial for providing a valid and consistent explanation that holds for the two conflicts when they are considered together.     

What socioenvironmental impacts did 35 years of export agriculture have in Mexico? (1980–2014): A transnational agri‐food field analysis

In this article, I propose to study environmental degradation and the deterioration of the health of workers and other inhabitants in regions of Mexico where intensive fruit and vegetable production for export has been developed. My proposition is that to understand the unsustainability of such agricultural practices in all their complexity, it is necessary to analyse historically the total agri‐food field of relations established by producers, distributors, and consumers in codependency with the natural environment. This analysis of the agri‐food field allows a multidimensional and multiscale study to be conducted of the hierarchical distribution of power and of economic benefits among the different social actors of the food system. This analysis also allowed us to study the development of the capitalist regime without going into the dichotomy of centre and periphery and to propose that it is a decentralized process with a multiplicity of locations that operates on the basis of mutual associations and influences between human and non‐human elements, with the active participation of a great variety of independent, collective, and institutional actors who have differentiated motivations, ranges of power and scales of value. The case study of Mexican export agriculture was the result of long‐term research based on a wide review of regional studies, field work statistics, and archives in Mexico and the United States. This cross‐border study makes it possible to identify asymmetrical transnational relations in a context in which the Mexican government has renounced its territorial and agri‐food sovereignty and Mexican consumers face greater vulnerability.     

Land acquisition compensation in post-reform China: Evolution,structure and challenges in Hangzhou

This paper focuses on evolving land acquisition compensation policy and practice in Hangzhou, a better-developed coastal city in the Yangtze River Delta Region, by assessing the evolution of land acquisition compensation and the interplay among the main actors, especially the local government and affected individual villagers and rural collectives. It evaluates the hybrid compensation governance that includes monetary compensation, employment alternatives, share-holding co-operative, social security assurance, and rural collective retained land. The study reveals that while land acquisition compensation has been gradually improved in many aspects, land-lost villagers are still subject to various uncertainties in sustaining their lives, competing in the labor market, and adapting to urban life. Furthermore, markedly improved land acquisition compensation in Hangzhou has created newly emerging socio-economic problems amongst dislocated rural villagers. The paper reveals how different compensation measures have redefined rural collectives and land-lost rural villagers in the urbanization process.     

Sorting through Neoliberal Variations of Ghost Cities in China

Since 1978, the Chinese central government has undertaken a series of market-oriented policy reforms which has led to responsibility for urban development shifting from central government to the local level, i.e., the provincial, prefectural city and district governments. As a result, local district governments in China’s larger cities have become key players driving economic development through an intensive process of entrepreneurial urbanization (where markets drive urban policy). These urban projects are best characterized as property-led, encouraged by neoliberal policies such as government support for land-based urban growth coalitions and property speculation. Based on local government planning and infrastructure development, this process has led to several newly built districts or towns. However, they have become ghost cities due to their lack of inhabitants and empty apartment units (apartment units are often purchased as part of an investment portfolio rather than as primary residences). This paper will unpack economic mechanisms and government motivations behind three iterations of ghost cities, to explore how local governments interact with central government as well as with property developers to expand urbanization. We examine three cases, the distinct urban contexts of Shanghai Thames town, Ordos, and Kunming (reflecting suburban tourism; debt-financed urbanism; and pro-growth strategic urbanism respectively) – to examine the variations across ghost cities in China (both in terms of neoliberal mechanisms and its outcomes).     

Paths of urban planning in a post-mining area. A case study of a former sandpit in southern Poland

Decision-making on the directions of spatial development are particularly visible in post-mining areas in large cities. This issue is one of the key themes in a discourse that focuses on how to reconcile strategic urban planning and urban policy in post-mining towns, and is based on the concepts of brownfield regeneration and just transition. This paper approaches the issue by taking the redevelopment of the site of a large former stowing sand pit, operated for the needs of coal mining in Sosnowiec near Krakow (southern Poland), as an example. The dilemma concerns turning the former mining area into a new zone for industrial investment or transforming it into a leisure area around a new reservoir. An important part of the study involved obtaining, via a questionnaire survey, the opinions of residents as to their vision for how the former sandpit should be redeveloped. The paper underlines that due to limited social participation in this regard, this is a challenging issue for local urban policy. In post-mining towns, in which sustainable development is particularly important, the changeability of socio-economic phenomena on the one hand and residents' opinions on the other merit special attention.