China City Planning Review (No.3, 2024)

♦ Micro Community Renovation Based on Life Cycle Concept: The Case of Gejiaying Community in Wuhan

Author: Huang Jingnan, Huang Xintong, Li Danzhe, Duan Xiang, Zhou Jun

Translated by Li Caige / Proofread by Liu Jian

DOI: 10.20113/j.ccpr.20240303a

Abstract: As Chinese cities undergo a transition from incremental development to retrofit development and urban governance tends to be more refined, the renovation mode of old residential communities is also under the transformation from large-scale bulldozer demolition and reconstruction to small-scale refined renovation and regeneration. However, the practice of micro community renovation has encountered a number of challenges throughout the implementation process, including conflicts between multiple stakeholders in the initial stage of planning, unconcordance between different implementation bodies in the intermediate stage of construction, and the lack of guarantee mechanisms in the later stage of maintenance.

Based on the concept of life cycle, this paper divides the practical process of micro community renovation into seven steps, i.e., establishing communal platforms, identifying community features, cultivating communal organizations, designing community activities, formulating planning schemes,conducting participatory constructions, and establishing long-lasting mechanisms. It takes the Gejiaying Community in Wuhan as a case to verify the above analysis, in the hope of providing a reference for the current practice of urban regeneration and community renovation in China.

Keywords: life cycle; urban regeneration; micro community renovation; Gejiaying Community

Full text is available at:<http://www.ccprjournal.com.cn/news/10316.htm>

♦ Governance Mechanism of Community Regeneration Based on Property Rights Regime: A Case Study of Shanghai KIC Garden

Author: Qin Mengdi, Xiao Yang, Liu Yuelai, Fan Haoyang

Translated by Qian Fang / Proofread by Lai Yuan

DOI: 10.20113/j.ccpr.20240304a

Abstract:With the focus of urban regeneration gradually shifting to the community level, community regeneration has become an important path for improving residents’ quality of life and the governance of grassroots society. How to innovate the governance model and how to improve the community public space utilization efficiency become vital questions. From the perspective of property rights regime, this paper puts forward the theoretical framework of “property rights regime ‒ governance model ‒ space utilization,” and argues that the property rights regime can be adjusted through the subdivision of property rights, which can change the governance model of public space and affect the space utilization efficiency. Through an in-depth investigation of the community regeneration of Shanghai KIC Garden, this study finds that different property rights regimes affect the process and results of collective action in public space governance, and the monocentric governance model formed by the concentration of governmental power can easily lead to the governance dilemmas such as rent-seeking, ineffective supervision, and information asymmetry. By subdividing and decentralizing property rights, social organizations, and community residents can be introduced to participate in the process of spatial governance, so as to facilitate the sinking of governance centers to the grassroots level and form a polycentric governance model. Moreover, multiple stakeholders can be motivated to make full use of public space through the property rights regime adjustment, and the public space utilization efficiency can be enhanced as a result.

Keywords:community regeneration; property rights regime; spatial governance; multi-party collaboration

Full text is available at:<http://www.ccprjournal.com.cn/news/10317.htm>

♦ Community Residents’ Heritage Preservation Intentions and Influencing Factors Based on the Extended Theory of Planned Behavior: A Case Study of Historic Districts in Tianjin

Author:Zhang Tianjie, Tang Shan

Edited by Liu Jinxin / Proofread by Tang Yan

DOI: 10.20113/j.ccpr.20240305a

Abstract:Community residents are important stakeholders in preserving historic districts. This paper introduces the extended theory of planned behavior to explore the intentions of residents to participate in heritage preservation, and further explains the influencing factors. Seven historic districts in Tianjin are selected as case studies. The results show that the residents’ intentions to preserve heritage are positively influenced by three subjective perception factors of heritage preservation attitude, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control, as well as two objective situational factors of environmental quality of historic district and policy guidance for heritage preservation. Furthermore, the objective situational factors indirectly influence heritage preservation intentions through the subjective perception factors. Based on these findings, this paper puts forward corresponding suggestions to enhance the heritage preservation intentions of community residents.

Keywords:theory of planned behavior; community residents; heritage preservation intention; historic districts in Tianjin

Full text is available at:<http://www.ccprjournal.com.cn/news/10318.htm>

♦ Understanding Why People Complain: Using Spatial Embeddedness to Explore Residents’ Satisfaction in China’s Danwei Neighborhood Renovation

Author:Li Yue, Zhou Peiling

Edited by Li Min / Proofread by Liu Jiayan

DOI: 10.20113/j.ccpr.20240306a

Abstract:Against the backdrop of China’s socio-economic transition, there is a growing imperative to examine neighborhood renovation initiatives in addressing the emerging needs of residents. Developing Granovetter’s classic work on embeddedness, this paper proposes a conceptual framework of spatial embeddedness to understand changes in the physical space brought about by neighborhood renovation, in order to explore how it affects residents’ satisfaction in a dynamic temporal and spatial process. It presents whether and why residents’ real feelings produced from their interaction with neighborhood renovation are (un)different, and how their feelings are shaped based on six months of fieldwork in a danwei neighborhood in Xi’an, China. The paper conceptualizes the relationship between the neighborhood space and embeddedness by adopting spatial embeddedness to capture the interplay of temporal, spatial, and social factors in the process of danwei neighborhood renovation. This framework not only integrates multiple perspectives and scales, but also reflects different levels of residents’ satisfaction, trying to establish a connection between the abstract space and the renovation space. It suggests that spatial embeddedness should be considered as a response to the negative social impacts resulting from changes in the physical space in neighborhood renovation.

Keywords:spatial embeddedness; danwei neighborhood renovation; residents’ satisfaction; abstract space; China

Full text is available at:<http://www.ccprjournal.com.cn/news/10319.htm>