Renovating houses, neighbourhood change and ‘mixité’. A case study in Ghent, Belgium

摘要

Upgrading housing quality increasingly implies transforming existing housing and neighbourhoods. But neighbourhood change can lead to gentrification, pushing out low-income groups and replacing them by urban elites. This paper explores this problem on the basis of a case study in one urban neighbourhood in Ghent, Belgium. A 2005 housing survey showed that physical housing quality in Flanders (the northern region of Belgium) has improved in recent years. Some inner city neighbourhoods characterized by urban blight in the 1990s, have become more attractive, leading to a process of gentrification. Based on a neighbourhood survey, interviews with inhabitants as well as an architectural analysis of their dwellings, this paper investigates the impact of this house-by-house process of neighbourhood change, comparing it to larger-scale transformation projects that also occurred in the area. It concludes that the step-by-step renovation process results in a ‘mild’ gentrification. Large projects have a more disrupting impact in terms of ‘mixité’, creating closed off sub-communities within the neighbourhood.