Countering gentrification in Tāmaki Makarau: Towards a framework for urban environmental justice

Abstract

This policy brief argues for urban policies that actively aim to end gentrification.

Gentrification is intimately tied to state-led processes of urban renewal. Though historically understood as the displacement of low-income households as an unfortunate byproduct of socioeconomic and demographic neighbourhood change, contemporary gentrification is constituted by profit-driven investment decisions that erase undervalued neighbourhoods and their communities in the name of urban renewal (variously referred to as redevelopment, regeneration, renaissance, or revitalisation).

These processes of gentrification fundamentally contribute to environmental injustice. At the same time as creating ‘zones of abundance’, neighbourhood regeneration projects simultaneously (re-)create ‘zones of neglect and sacrifice’, which are burdened with environmental risks. As low-income and ethnic minority households are more likely to either reside in or to be displaced into these neighbourhoods, they are disproportionately exposed to environmental risk factors.

Moreover, gentrification enables and legitimises the exclusion of marginalised communities in multiple ways: 1) it devalues existing places and their residents in favour of regeneration, 2) it displaces longtime residents from regenerated neighbourhoods because of increasing property values, and/or 3) it alienates longtime residents as neighbourhood aesthetics, amenities and services change and become unaffordable and/or irrelevant.

As gentrification contributes to low-income households’ experiences of precarity and severs community ties and place attachments, it generates significant costs to personal and community health and wellbeing as well as social cohesion. The recommendations articulated in this brief emphasise the importance of transformative policy solutions that actively counter gentrification. These include: • Equitable investment in urban infrastructure • Prioritising affordable housing • Ensuring accessible transportation • Empowering local communities • Implementing a Te Tiriti o Waitangi approach to policy development