Gentrification
is a global problem. It's time we found a better solution
Today
we begin a new series looking at the impact of gentrification and
rising housing costs all over the world – and the ways some cities
are trying to tackle this global phenomenon. Share your stories here
Oliver Wainwright
Thursday 29
September 2016 12.48 BST Last modified on Friday 30 September 2016
11.36 BST
First come the
artists, then the cranes. As the kamikaze pilots of urban renewal,
wherever the creatives go, developers will follow, rents will rise,
the artists will move on, and the pre-existing community will be
kicked out with them.
Such is the accepted
narrative of gentrification, a term first coined more than 50 years
ago by the German-born British sociologist Ruth Glass to describe
changes she observed in north London – but it is a phenomenon that
has been at the heart
Today we begin a new
series looking at the impact of gentrification and rising housing
costs all over the world – and the ways some cities are trying to
tackle this global phenomenon. Share your stories here
First come the
artists, then the cranes. As the kamikaze pilots of urban renewal,
wherever the creatives go, developers will follow, rents will rise,
the artists will move on, and the pre-existing community will be
kicked out with them.
Such is the accepted
narrative of gentrification, a term first coined more than 50 years
ago by the German-born British sociologist Ruth Glass to describe
changes she observed in north London – but it is a phenomenon that
has been at the heart of how cities evolve for centuries.
Gentrification is a
slippery and divisive word, vilified by many for the displacement of
the poor, the influx of speculative investors, the proliferation of
chain stores, the destruction of neighbourhood authenticity; praised
by others for the improvement in school standards and public safety,
the fall in crime rates, and the arrival of bike lanes, street
markets and better parks.
Your opinion might
depend on which side of the property-owning chasm you are on, and the
respective consequences: an uplift in the value of your assets, or an
increase in the rent you must pay to stay. In all cases, the winners
are the landowners, who profit handsomely from the unearned income of
neighbourhood improvement.
For years,
gentrification boosters such as Richard Florida have argued it is the
surefire formula for urban regeneration, proselytising their magic
recipe to rapt mayors around the world. Blighted neighbourhoods could
be miraculously transformed by incentivising the arrival of the
“creative class” of artists, gay couples and brave bohemians:
those frontline pioneers who would take on rundown buildings and seed
the pop-up micro-breweries, artisanal bakeries and farmers’ markets
that would encourage the more timid middle classes to follow. Houses
are done up, community gardens appear, and investors flock to reap
the rewards.
The “urban
renaissance” of the past two decades, masterminded in the UK by
Richard Rogers in the form of New Labour’s urban taskforce, set out
to revitalise decaying inner city cores, breathe fresh life into
post-industrial “brownfield” land, and make cities happier,
healthier, safer places to live and work. Rather than escaping to the
suburbs, successful young professionals would be lured back into the
city, bringing an upwardly mobile, cappuccino-supping class to
activate a whole new generation of urban public spaces.
There have been many
upsides. But the consequences of the rate and scale of change, the
displacement of poor by rich, the loss of workspace and the hollowing
out of neighbourhoods by buy-to-leave investors, is now frightening
even the most ardent promoters of trickle-down regeneration.
Brownfield
developments have too often resulted in lifeless dormitory blocks:
clone-town apartments built without the social infrastructure of the
corner shops, doctors’ surgeries, pubs and primary schools needed
to make viable places to live. Projects that were planned as
mixed-tenure neighbourhoods have seen their “affordable” housing
quotas relentlessly squeezed out, thanks to the clever accounting of
viability consultants and well-paid planning lawyers.
Starting today, this
Guardian Cities series will examine the consequences of
gentrification around the world, and interrogate what is being done
to tackle it. From Vancouver’s pioneering gentrification tax to the
efforts of a tenants’ cooperative in Brooklyn, from housing
evictions in Johannesburg to the impact of Airbnb in Amsterdam, we
will hear from groups on both sides of the regeneration machine about
the impacts, challenges and tactics being deployed on this
ever-shifting battleground.
My own view is that
the best solution to mitigate the impact of the almost inevitable
tide of urban gentrification is a tax on the value of land, which
would capture the value of improvements for the local community,
rather than lining the pockets of investors.
This is an idea that
has enjoyed the support of economists throughout the ages, from Adam
Smith (who said “nothing could be more reasonable”) to Milton
Friedman (who called it “the least bad tax”), but it is most
closely associated with Henry George, whose 1879 book Progress and
Poverty argued that land-value levies should replace all other taxes,
leaving labour and capital to flourish freely, thus ending poverty,
unemployment, inflation and inequality.
At present, when
gentrification increases the value of an area, the windfall is to the
landowners. The community group that gets together to revive a street
market or establish an urban garden, or the penniless artists who
turn a leaky warehouse into a gallery, are indirectly responsible for
catalysing the very forces they are usually determined to prevent.
Such amenities
increase the “locational value” of properties in the area,
attracting buy-to-let investors, land speculators and estate agents
who feature these very community assets in their glossy brochures.
The arrival of the allotment and the “makerspace” puts into
motion a sequence of events that will ultimately drive them out: the
cast-iron rule of gentrification is that the things that make an area
attractive will be displaced or destroyed.
A land value tax
shifts this dynamic. Rather than taxing property, it taxes the value
of the land itself – determined by its location, not what is built
on it. The rise in value that results from neighbourhood improvements
is therefore captured and returned to the community, to be reinvested
in the area.
Such a tax also
penalises those who hoard vacant plots of land with no intention to
build, while driving inflated land values down by taking into account
the value of future levies that will be applied.
In short, it would
mean the next time you see a bearded hipster wheeling his sourdough
trolley to the local festival of sustainable street art, you could
take solace in the fact that the perceived value he is creating will
not be siphoned off by a developer, or lead to an increase in your
rent, but ultimately generate more revenue to make your neighbourhood
a better place to live.
Are you experiencing
or resisting gentrification in your city? Share your stories in the
comments below, through our dedicated callout, or on Twitter using
#GlobalGentrification.
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