Regeneration and revival of historical context
Reza Alishahi; Najma Esmailpoor
Abstract
HighlightsLeveraging economic potential from cultural heritage and community engagement are key strategies for regenerating Iran's deteriorated historic areas.Urban events provide a link between culture-based and community-driven approaches to regeneration.Aligning regeneration policies with holistic ...
Read More
HighlightsLeveraging economic potential from cultural heritage and community engagement are key strategies for regenerating Iran's deteriorated historic areas.Urban events provide a link between culture-based and community-driven approaches to regeneration.Aligning regeneration policies with holistic frameworks enhances the success of revitalization efforts in Iran's historic urban areas. IntroductionIn recent years, urban regeneration has gained significant prominence as an approach in urban preservation and revitalization, aiming to transform abandoned or underutilized urban spaces. This approach not only seeks to restore these areas but also fosters economic growth, improves competitiveness, promotes sustainable development, strengthens cultural identity, enhances citizens' quality of life, and advances urban management practices. Despite extensive research on urban regeneration, few studies have holistically examined the integration of its dimensions and components. This study aims to investigate the role of various dimensions and components of urban regeneration in enhancing Iran’s deteriorated historic areas.Theoretical FrameworkUrban regeneration entails a series of actions aimed at improving life quality in economically, socially, culturally, or infrastructurally deprived areas by mobilizing local assets and fostering civic participation. As an interventionist strategy, it works to modernize and revitalize these spaces, paving the way for sustainable urban futures. In Iran, the past decade has seen urban regeneration initiatives attempting to tackle urban inefficiency and developmental challenges. Key milestones in this journey include the 2014 "National Strategy Document on Revitalizing, Upgrading, Renovating, and Enabling Deteriorated and Underutilized Urban Fabrics" and the 2018 "Executive Bylaw of the National Sustainable Urban Regeneration Program."These policies aim to strengthen urban governance, alleviate poverty, enrich cultural identity, and enhance urban resilience. Yet, misalignment between policy frameworks and real-world conditions, combined with the absence of concrete action plans, has hindered progress toward these objectives. Urban regeneration encompasses a wide range of dimensions—social, cultural, economic, design, management and law, and environmental—each containing specific elements intended to rejuvenate urban spaces and improve residents' quality of life. As such, urban regeneration serves not only as a tool for physical transformation but as a comprehensive and sustainable development strategy.MethodologyThis study employed a three-phase qualitative approach. In the first phase, a literature review was conducted to identify relevant dimensions and components, validated through the Content Validity Index (CVI); items with a CVI score below 0.79 were excluded. Twenty-two experts participated in the CVI assessment. In the second phase, a systematic review of articles from 2011 to 2021 yielded 28 studies on urban regeneration, which were analyzed using MaxQDA 2020. The content analysis produced 111 open codes, 38 components, and 6 dimensions. The study's reliability was confirmed through Cohen’s kappa coefficient, and VOSviewer was used to visualize spatial relationships among the elements.Results and DiscussionThe findings reveal that, throughout the 2010s, the social, economic, and cultural dimensions have been most emphasized in urban regeneration studies. The social dimension was the most prominent, with a particular focus on social participation and social vitality, which are essential for empowering communities and enhancing urban spaces. Within the economic dimension, the neighborhood and urban economy components were the most frequently highlighted, underscoring their role in improving economic conditions. The cultural dimension, meanwhile, was dominated by an emphasis on cultural heritage. Over 70% of the reviewed studies incorporated a mix of social, economic, and cultural dimensions, aiming to boost tourism and, in turn, the economic and social well-being of urban areas by capitalizing on cultural heritage and attracting investments.ConclusionUrban regeneration studies generally pursue two main goals to address urban decay and inefficiency: revitalizing the economic and social aspects of declining areas by activating existing community potentials, emphasizing social participation and its links to neighborhood and urban economies; and utilizing cultural assets for economic revival and rebranding, with a focus on authenticity and heritage. Future research should investigate the synergy of these approaches, especially the role of urban events as a connecting force between social and cultural regeneration.Comparing these findings with Iran's urban regeneration policy framework reveals alignment with the overarching research objectives and the vision of improving residents' living conditions. However, insufficient attention to environmental, managerial, and legal dimensions in the policies may have contributed to their limited success during Iran’s fifth and sixth development plans. Aligning the policy framework with comprehensive theories—such as eventful cities and Iranian-Islamic urbanism—could increase the effectiveness of development goals.This study focuses on the role of urban regeneration dimensions and components in improving Iran’s obsolete historical fabrics, drawing on Farsi-language articles from the 2010s. Primarily analyzing Ministry-approved urban planning journal articles, this research highlights the need for broader source inclusion in future studies to deepen the understanding of urban regeneration. The findings serve as a basis for identifying research challenges and gaps in this field, guiding policymakers and professionals toward more effective strategies for revitalizing historic urban areas.
Urban Planning
fatemah esmaeilpoor; mohammadhosein saraei; najma esmaeilpoor
Abstract
Highlights The prestige and identity of the middle tissues of Arak has been effective in the cost of land and has resulted in the destruction of usable residential units. Contrary to Bergess's theory - which describes the central fabric as a fabric with depressing neighborhoods with a sad and ...
Read More
Highlights The prestige and identity of the middle tissues of Arak has been effective in the cost of land and has resulted in the destruction of usable residential units. Contrary to Bergess's theory - which describes the central fabric as a fabric with depressing neighborhoods with a sad and sometimes ruined appearance and the habitat of immigrants and low-income cities - the high price of land and the profitability of investing in the central fabric of Arak make it attractive. And has become the residence of the upper social and economic classes. 1. Introduction Throughout history and all around the world, the living spaces of different classes in cities have been segregated given their socio-economic conditions. The central fabric of the city of Arak, Iran is characterized by the highest housing and land prices, and many citizens wish to live there. The high price of land in this area has led to a high demand for housing. As a result, many of the buildings are demolished and converted into new, multi-story condominiums although usable by the owners and builders. Problems have arisen currently, and inappropriate prospects are expected for the future due to the replacement of single-family houses with multi-family apartment buildings without other residential needs considered, such as transportation, provision of health services, education, open and public green spaces, and parking spaces. The purpose of this article is to provide a structural modeling of the reasons for the above tendency and for the high prices of land in this fabric and of the impact of social status in the neighborhoods on regeneration. 2. Theoretical Framework The urban ecology perspective distinguishes cities from three aspects of household: socio-economic, family, and ethno-racial. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the role of the socio-economic status of high social classes on the high prices of land in the central fabric of Arak and its impact on the regeneration of the central city neighborhoods. Just as the lower classes and ethno-racial groups regard segregation as a way of uniting and preserving their identity, the upper classes try to maintain their residential territory in terms of habits and behaviors by segregating prestigious neighborhoods. Dignity or prestige results from approval by others. Therefore, social class can be defined as a group of individuals with similar positions in the labor market or with similar lifestyles and cultures. According to Weber’s socio-economic theory of capitalism, economic conditions alone do not necessarily determine one’s way of life. 3. Methodology This is an applied quantitative descriptive-causal study. For investigation of the orientation toward the central fabric and its effects on this fabric, different aspects of questionnaire data analysis and in-depth interview were considered using structural equation modeling and the Smart-PLS software. 4. Results and Discussion The findings demonstrated that the central fabric of Arak has appealed to the population, contrary to Borges’ theory. The high prices of land in this fabric is mainly associated with its validity and authenticity (T value = 2.682). Its easy access to the city center is another factor affecting the orientation toward this fabric and the increase in land prices therein. These high prices have led to the demolition of single-family houses that are not yet very old, to be turned into multi-story apartment buildings. The effect of the low cost of transportation on the individuals’ decision to choose these neighborhoods to live in was not confirmed (T value = 1.306). The regeneration of the fabric has changed its demographic conditions and the departure of low-income classes (T value = 23.861). The output of the final matrix and the design of the interpretive structural model placed the two variables of transportation and social status in the dependent zone, the housing price variable in the linking zone, and the variables of demographic change and land use diversity in the independent zone. The central fabric of Arak appeals to citizens due to its originality, prestige, and expensive land. This is contrary to Borges’ theory, which describes the fabric around the city center as one with distressed neighborhoods and a miserable, destructed appearance where immigrants live. 5. Conclusion Given that the original neighborhoods with indigenous populations in Arak provide proper opportunities for regeneration, gentrification of this fabric must be avoided, since land is a scarce resource in cities, and it is extremely costly to meet the infrastructure requirements of development. Moreover, urban managers should consider the current trend as an opportunity to provide a plan for efficient use of these lands because the lands in central Arak involve capacity and demand for housing. Thus, infrastructure and superstructure facilities and services also increase proportionally to the increase in density and residential construction. Acknowledgments The authors hereby express their gratitude to the Municipality of Arak for provision of the required information.
Urban Planning
Najma Esmailpoor; Zahra Heravi; Elham Heidari Hamane
Abstract
The growing trend in illegal construction of residential buildings is a problem that has impacted the urban planning and management system in Iran in the past few decades. Violation of urban planning and technical regulations is a fact that has existed long. Despite the penalties that have been considered ...
Read More
The growing trend in illegal construction of residential buildings is a problem that has impacted the urban planning and management system in Iran in the past few decades. Violation of urban planning and technical regulations is a fact that has existed long. Despite the penalties that have been considered for infractions in construction, the phenomenon has been observed extensively in the city of Yazd, including the territory of Municipal District 3. For prevention of infractions in construction, it is necessary to study the nature and causes of the issue from different aspects. This is an applied survey with a descriptive, causal, and correlational methodology. The factor analysis technic was used for decreasing the large number of factors affecting the commitment of infractions in construction around cities. The research population was divided into two groups: a sample of size 161 of the municipality visitors over 20 years of age and all the expert officials of the municipality. The main purpose of the research was to organize, systematize, and regularize residential construction practices, and the operational objectives were to identify the major causes of infractions in the field of residential construction and to propose appropriate solutions for their reduction in the target municipality. The study involved an investigation of the relationship between the increase in the construction infractions committed by the citizens and three factors including the attitude of the municipality toward infractions as a source of revenue, inefficient monitoring of construction practices on the part of the municipality, and the bureaucracy dominant in the municipality issuing construction permits. Based on the findings from 12884 cases of infraction in construction committed within the territory under investigation between 1991 and 2016, 60% of the infractions concerned construction practices without permits, and 40% pertained to ones where the permit contents had been violated. The most frequent issued sentences involved demolition and penalization along with reconstruction in some cases. The following conclusions were made based on the obtained results. 1- Six major factors that account for about 60% of the tendency to commit infractions in residential construction practices within Municipal District 3 of Yazd include insufficient documentation, poor instruction plans, permit applicants’ incomplete knowledge of the construction regulations, bureaucracy, and violation of the decisions made by the municipality and poor monitoring. 2- The visitors’ opinion on the causes of infractions is not exactly the same as the experts’. 3- Being the committers of the infractions, the visitors regard the above items as the major causes, in that order. The experts, however, consider the following items: the high costs of obtaining construction permits and completion certificates, constructors’ unwillingness to obtain permits, long process of permit issuance, lack of correspondence between constructors’ authorities and responsibilities, low enforceability of the Article No. 100 Commission decisions, dependency of the municipal budget on the revenue from infractions, poor monitoring of construction practices, and limited sustainable financial resources for the municipality. 4- There is a relatively high correlation between the commitment of infractions in construction and the three factors of the attitude of the municipality toward infractions as a source of revenue, inefficient monitoring of residential construction practices on the part of the municipality, and the bureaucracy dominant in the municipality in the process of issuing construction permits. Therefore, it can help decrease infractions in construction within the territory of Municipal District 3 to enhance public awareness of urban construction regulations, lower the cost of issuing construction permits and simplify the procedure, provide sustainable sources of revenue, enhance the construction monitoring system of the municipality, and improve the relevant bureaucracy in the municipality.
