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TORONTO’S REVITALIZATION SCHEMES: CAN GENTRIFICATION BE PREVENTED IN NORTH AMERICA’S FASTEST GROWING CITY?



INTRODUCTORY EXCERPT


“The real question is not whether investment should be welcomed or rejected, but rather how it should be managed for the betterment of all and geared towards existing communities” (Vernon, 2018). Urban regeneration processes appear different both with respect to their implementation as well as results, that can vary depending on the context and actors involved. Defined as a “holistic process of reversing economic, social and physical decay” (Cowan, 2005:425), urban regeneration brings back underutilized assets and redistributes opportunities, increasing urban prosperity and quality of life. Urban regeneration initiatives are complex, lengthy and run the risk of gentrifying private space or privatize public one (UN Habitat). As a consequence, such interventions articulate differently across time and space: having distinct consequences as well as distributional effects amongst urban communities.




Debate around regeneration schemes leading to gentrification is frequent in modern planning: as more and more often “the rehabilitation of residential property in a working-class neighbourhood by relatively affluent incomers leads to the displacement of former residents unable to afford the increased costs of housing that accompany regeneration” (Pacione, 2001). However, this is not always the case: by analysing two regeneration schemes that took place in the same urban context, it is possible to gain significant insight about the linkages between regeneration and gentrification as well as the importance of communities’ inclusion and relocation in urban renewal processes.

CITIES AND SOCIAL CHANGE | UNIVERSITY COLLEGE LONDON | FALL 2023








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