New‐build gentrification: its histories, trajectories, and critical geographies

Abstract

New‐build gentrification has been the subject of renewed attention of late. The impetus was Lambert and Boddy, who asserted that inner‐city new‐build developments in British city centres should not be viewed as a form of gentrification. While the term has long been generally accepted, Lambert and Boddy, and, more recently, Boddy, argue that the demographic transformations stimulated by city centre new‐build developments are relatively innocuous. They do not cause population displacement, and are not associated with the rent‐hike and eviction processes of gentrification proper. Indeed, within a move to rethink the workings and consequences of gentrification more generally (e.g. Butler), there has been a new questioning of whether this, or any, contemporary form of gentrification produces significant displacement concerns. In this paper, we address these new debates. We begin by tracing the histories of new‐build gentrification, highlighting its long‐standing presence, and then we move on to look at its trajectories, focusing our lens on London to demonstrate the diversity and complexity of this process in just one city. We outline the presence of displacement – both direct and indirect – as a complex and nuanced process (not just a spatial moment), but one that has nevertheless had a real‐life impact on real people. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Traditional Retail Markets: The New Gentrification Frontier?

“…At the centre of all these recently and soon to be developed spaces, Kirkgate Market stands out as a rundown building which does not necessarily attract the sleek, young, pin-striped city dwellers and professionals. The analysis of recent regeneration policies reveals the same classic cycle of disinvestment and regeneration "encroachment" that we find in housing gentrification (Davidson and Lees 2010).…”

“…We remain surprised that the gentrification of shopping streets and consumption practices has been little commented on in the academic literature, with Zukin's work being a prominent exception. We believe that the passing reflections of authors who have written about gentrification from the setting of London-from Butler and Robson (2001) to Davidson and Lees (2010)-suggest that this represents a highly important but little-studied aspect of the class-based urban restructuring process, and we suggest that our understanding of this process would benefit from more work on retail gentrification. Finally, we believe that any such research should foreground the role of the state as a principal agent in contemporary gentrification.…”

New forms of gentrification: issues and debates

“…Davidson and Lees (2009), who coined the term 'new-build gentrifi cation' in 2005, argue that the concept should be elastic enough to cover the different forms of the class remake of the urban landscape. Rérat et al (2009) point out that an extended definition of the concept is heuristically profi table because it allows a better articulation between studies dealing with the mechanisms through which cities are revalorised.…”

“…A restrictive defi nition focuses on reclaimed brownfi elds or on in-fi ll developments on vacant lands (Rérat et al, 2009;Rose, 2009), whereas others also include the demolition/reconstruction of existing residential areas (Davidson and Lees, 2009;He, 2009). There are also hybrid forms such as the Aragon Tower in London, a building that has been totally refurbished and to which fi ve extra fl oors of penthouses have been added, which escape simple categorisations (Davidson and Lees, 2009). …”

“…In London, new-build gentrifi cation is discussed by Davidson and Lees (2009) as a means of expanding the class remake of inner urban areas into marginal, derelict, and industrial sites along the Thames. It is described as a process through which the working class is displaced, be it literally or symbolically, through the loss of a 'sense of place'.…”