Revitalizing Underserved Communities Through Temporary Urbanism
By: Aynaz Lotfata
Tags: Gentrification, Underserved Communities, Neighborhoods, Urban Planning, Urbanism

Highlights:

· Common temporary projects include community gardens and other green spaces, special events such as festivals or concert series, and stores or restaurants.

· Temporary use practices can encourage a socio-ecological approach to land use and increase the likelihood that a vacant space will eventually find permanent use.

Vacant land is a common condition in urban areas across the globe. Disinvestment, suburbanization, industrial decline, contamination of land, out-migration, land market failure, and public acquisition for future development can be major reasons for the emergence of vacant lands across the globe. (Kremer and Zoe 2015). In contrast to a common belief that vacant lands can cause urban ills, they can function as urban resources to revitalize dysfunctional urban areas. They can help to meet the social and environmental goals of society when they are used as a tool for the temporary and permanent transformation of urban areas. To support creative activities, it has been suggested that vacant land not be permanently designed or developed (Németh and Langhorst 2014). Moreover, temporary projects (e.g., community gardens engage in a one-to-three-year lease with a city agency) lack a legal foundation to determine its longevity. NeighborSpace in Chicago works to secure permanent tenure of urban vacant land to allow community groups to continue the projects already begun.

Although vacant land is often considered both a cause and consequence of disinvestment, temporary projects can convert the unattractive urban context to attractive hotspots for investments. Therefore, in the first stage, what identifies a temporary project? In other words, what items identify the term “temporary”?

The term has multiple definitions. Temporary can be based on the nature of use, or whether a user is formal or informal and or longevity of temporary use. However, Bishop and Williams (2012) identified the term temporary based on the intention of the user, developer, or planners. This broad definition unveils projects that are short as a few hours or as long as several years, are legal or illegal, are community-driven, state, or privately financed. In the second stage, the projects require a suitable site. Former industrial areas, railroad stations, waterfront areas, and unused commercial zones to vacant residential neighborhoods and public institutions can be used for temporary projects. However, the choice of the site depends on the desired purpose of the temporary project and the former use of the vacant land is often thematically incorporated into its new use. In the third stage, who are initiators and supporters of the project? Initiators of the project have a large amount of social and cultural capital, a high degree of energy and commitment, and a great willingness to improvise. They tended to be newcomers to an area rather than longtime residents. Additionally, the success of a temporary use depends on several other supporters, including lease contracts, official permits, organizational structures, and political and administrative support. Finally, a project’s survival depends on its customers- that is, the public. For instance, social networking applications such as Facebook and Twitter are used to generate public awareness and gathering political support.

There are many projects of temporary urbanism to temporarily reactive underutilized space. Urban activists have been converting vacant land into community green space for decades. A community garden is in bloom in the Englewood neighborhood, Chicago by initiating temporary projects. Residents use the vacant lands to “grow food and enjoy community”. Lack of investment and maintenance caused the urban decline in this neighborhood. It is often accompanied by a decrease in population numbers, decreasing economic performance, abandoned buildings, vacant lands, and unemployment (Friedrichs 1993). Englewood society transforms and maintains vacant land as green space. While such conversions have been successful at smaller scales, they can set up an invaluable strategy to transform the large areas of vacant land. Gobster et al. (2020) argue that “the implementation of vacant land greening programs may result in tradeoffs between social and ecological goals in short-term, but related research also shows that proactive support initiatives (e.g., outreach and assistance) can help such programs achieve a broader range of both social and ecological benefits.” Also, Rigolon et al. (2020) argue that “privately-led greening initiatives might follow the early stages of gentrification” in the Englewood neighborhood. The greened vacant lands can trigger environmental gentrification by boosting the value of nearby residential properties. However, gentrification often pushes residents out of their neighborhoods. It is therefore a challenging process for temporary use initiators to keep planning and improving spatial and socioeconomic change in a neighborhood while protecting local life.

Community Garden in Englewood Neighborhood, Chicago

Low-density Englewood neighborhood which has fewer households per square mile is seeing the highest Covid-19 infection rates according to the Illinois Department of Public Health through cutting off the residents from public services. Vacant lands and buildings can be converted into public services, including health centers, pharmacies, restaurants, and local markets. Another valuable strategy to revive the Englewood neighborhood centers on constituting a special event or experience. For example, the Flint Public Art Project has pioneered the Stone Street Residency program, which provides free or low-cost housing to artists and designers interested in pursuing short-term projects.

The successful temporary use can convert underutilized land into productive land and minimizing many undesirable externalities. More importantly, temporary projects are flexible and can respond quickly to emergencies and changing conditions and demands. For example, for city administrators facing financial deficiency, temporary use projects can be a cost-effective strategy for dealing with vacant land that yields rapid results.

Moreover, temporary use projects that revitalize the underutilized lands can lead to eventual permanent change. A large number of temporary projects in a specific location can alter existing identities and cultures for neighborhoods that make neighborhoods attractive to investors. Cities and neighborhoods should adopt temporary strategies as a primary tool for generating economic growth, especially shrinking neighborhoods such as Englewood might be more willing to experiment with such nontraditional approaches to relieve the causes of the problem by vacant lands.

The role of temporary interventions will increase as societies shift from the landscapes of production to landscapes of consumption. The productive use of vacant lands is an adaptive approach to make cities responsive to emergencies and re-shape cities, not from outside or above, but from within. The answers to the below-listed questions will therefore contribute to establishing the research framework for the temporary use projects in the emerging area of urban planning:

· What measures can governments take to encourage the development of temporary use projects?

· What types of temporary projects have the greatest economic, social, and cultural effects on their communities?

· How can planners respond to legal and liability issues to ensure productive and socially progressive temporary uses?

· What types of temporary projects initiate the gentrification in the underserved neighborhoods and what measures can temporary use initiators take to revitalize a neighborhood without pushing residents out?

The answers to these questions will shed light on how temporary use projects can help make urban the landscape that is equitable, economically productive, and dynamic.

References

Bishop, P., and Williams, L. (2012) The Temporary City, London: Routledge,5.

Flint Public Art Project website (www.flintpublicartproject.com/). Accessed 29 November 2020.

Friedrichs, J. (1993) A Theory of Urban Decline: Economy, Demography, and Political Elites. Urban Studies 30(6):907–917. doi:10.1080/00420989320080851

Gobster, P.H., Hadavi, S., Rigolon, A., Stewart, W.P. (2020) Measuring landscape change, lot by lot: Greening activity in response to a vacant land reuse program, Landscape and Urban Planning, Volume 196,https://doi.org/10.1016/j.landurbplan.2019.103729.

Kremer, P. and Hamstead, Z. (2015) Transformation of Urban Vacant Lots for the Common Good: an Introduction to the Special Issue, Cities and the Environment (CATE): Vol. 8: Iss. 2, Article 1. Available at: http://digitalcommons.lmu.edu/cate/vol8/iss2/1.

Németh, J. and Langhorst, J. ( 2014) Rethinking urban transformation: Temporary uses for vacant land. Cities 40: 143–150. doi:10.1016/j.cities.2013.04.007.

Rigolon, A., Stewart, W.P., Gobster, P.H. (2020) What predicts the demand and sale of vacant public properties? Urban greening and gentrification in Chicago, Cities, Volume 107,https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cities.2020.102948.