Building Code Enforcement Burdens and Central City Decline

Since the enactment of Hammurabi's Code in ancient Babylon, building regulations have been relied upon to protect the public from the hazards of substandard building materials and slipshod construction techniques. Unnecessary building code requirements and strict enforcement practices, however, have been widely criticized for increasing the costs of new construction and rehabilitation, particularly within central cities. These burdens reduce the ability of central cities to compete successfully with surrounding suburban areas for population and economic development. In this article, we address the linkage between enforcement of building codes and construction activity. We show that central cities can capture a larger share of the market for single-family detached housing in their metropolitan areas and also spur commercial rehabilitation if they adopt more “business-friendly” approaches to building code enforcement. These gains can be achieved without reducing the degree of compliance with building regulations as long as enforcement efforts are strong. In short, one key to increasing economic development in central cities is to foster the right kind of enforcement, rather than having weak enforcement of building regulations.     

Achieving a Socio-Spatial Mix? Prospects and Limitations of Social Housing Policy in Santiago de Chile

In the Chilean housing sector, the combination of free-market imperatives guiding investment decisions and a long tradition of social housing subsidies has generally had remarkable success in quantitative terms but has also contributed to the large-scale segregation of poor families on the urban periphery. With the goal of a better socio-spatial mix and, ultimately, social integration, the Chilean government recently revised its guidelines for housing subsidies, promoting small-scale social housing in central locations. This paper examines the early effects of this new housing policy in a cluster of the so-called “pericentral” municipalities in Santiago de Chile. Specifically, it raises the question of whether the policy has a chance of achieving its objectives in light of prevailing free-market conditions. We demonstrate strong interrelations between the current dynamics of real-estate investment and government-led housing programs which together continue to promote uneven socio-spatial development and segregation of the urban poor on a smaller scale.     

美国包容性区划对我国保障性住房建设的启示

通过对现阶段我国保障性住房建设主要特征与问题的认识,提出保障性住房建设应转变传统的供给方式。转变方式的一个重要方面是,借鉴美国包容性区划实践经验,在城市中心区普通商品房开发项目中配建一定比例的保障性住房。通过对美国包容性区划经验的学习以及中美相关背景的比较,认为我国目前采用与包容性区划性质相似的保障性住房配建政策不仅具有重要的现实意义,同时具有较强的政策执行优势。最后,论文提出当前采用保障性住房配建政策尚需解决的主要问题和解决建议。     

“混合型”经济适用房在美国大城市的实践和启示

首先以美国加州地区为背景分析了住房成本对所在地劳动力成本、城市长期繁荣、环境和其他社会领域的影响。然后试图通过波士顿和波特兰两个混合型经适房项目的实践,初步探究美国此类项目的运作策略,通过对相关案例的解读为中国的实践提供借鉴和参考。     

广州市保障性经济适用房住房研究

经济适用住房是我国住房保障制度中不可缺少的一部分。本文通过对经济适用住房现状进行分析,和对广州的经济适用住房进行调查研究,指出其存在的一些问题,并提出解决这些问题的对策。     

中国经济适用住房政策评析与建议

经济适用住房的建设、流通与消费必须遵循市场经济运行规律,以销定产;同时考虑中低收入家庭的承受能力和对住区生活环境的要求,合理选择建设区位和确定销售价格,实现国家提出的加快住房建设,促进国民经济增长,满足城镇居民日益增长的住房需求目标。本文就这些方面的问题进行了深入探讨,提出了看法和建议。     

税收政策对保障性住房供给的影响分析

在我国保障性住房有效供给严重不足、政府决心加大保障性住房建设的情况下,对保障性住房供给方式以及税收政策的影响进行了分析与研究。根据住房过滤与梯度消费理论,完善性地构建了保障性住房多层次供给模型。并以这个模型作为税收政策对保障性住房作用的契入点,分析了现有的税收政策对各种保障性住房供给的影响,提出了对保障性住房供给方税收政策改革的合理化建议。     

Implicit Land Taxation and Affordable Housing Provision in England

The paper considers the proposal in England that a continuing requirement for residential developers to contribute directly to the supply of affordable housing in return for planning permission should operate alongside a new tax on land value increases due to planning permission. The paper asks whether it is right in principle for affordable housing to be supported by the implicit taxation of development. It is argued that in terms of transparency, clarity, and certainty explicit taxation is to be preferred to implicit taxation. It is thus suggested that once the new explicit tax is in place developers should no longer be routinely required to pay an additional implicit affordable housing tax. Affordable housing should, it is argued, be supported on the basis of need, not the resources available from the development process. The link between the provision of affordable housing and planning obligations should be broken.     

Thinking Alike

Few studies have compared planners from different countries. This article reports the findings of a study of selected attitudes of a sample of Dutch, Spanish, and American planners from the mid 1990s. It looks specifically at the extent to which planners in these three countries think similarly or differently about a range of process, substantive, and work-setting issues relevant to the planning field. While differences show up on some attitudes in the process arena, we found that the three groups of planners thought much more alike than differently than the national, cultural, and planning system contexts in which they operate would have suggested. We discuss the dimensions of a common planning ideology that cuts across national boundaries and consider the implications of this finding for the planning field in a global context.     

Hoping for more: redeveloping U.S. public housing without marginalizing low-income residents?

Urban restructuring policies have uprooted residents and dismantled communities. Previous studies focus on housing redevelopment that minimizes the fraction of housing units left for poor residents and on interviewing residents only once the redevelopment has been announced. By contrast, this paper examines how residents over time experienced the HOPE VI redevelopment of the Orchard Park public housing project in Boston, which sought to preserve a low-income community. Using official records and a unique set of interviews with residents before and after redevelopment, we find marked declines in crime and increased residential satisfaction, which are attributed to changes in tenant composition. The redevelopment process reduced the total number of public housing units yet maintained the vast majority of housing for poor families while creating a new social mix. The findings suggest that to more fully capture the impacts of restructuring, existing theory must be expanded to consider who is displaced and how poverty is deconcentrated.     

发达国家住宅适老化改造政策与经验

在对既有住宅进行适老化改造方面,发达国家已积累政策制定和实施的丰富经验.本文选取目前发达国家常见的三类老年住宅改造政策进行介绍,对每种政策在各个国家的实施依据和情况进行了论述,并探讨其对中国的启示.     

Affordable housing finance companies in India: how do they ‘differently’ serve the underserved?

Abstract

Over the years, the importance of access to affordable finance has inevitably been recognized as a critical component of developing the third world. Against the backdrop of huge under-penetration of the housing finance sector in India, this study reflects on the functioning of Affordable Housing Finance Companies (AHFCs), which are among the important stakeholders providing affordable housing loans to the low-income segment households. However, the process through which these new entrants have been able to down-market housing finance remains a black box till date. In light of this research gap, this study proposes a conceptual model that succinctly captures the business process of AHFCs across three main dimensions: Outreach Approach, Lending and Underwriting Practices and Risk Management Interventions. This model reflects on the kaleidoscope of process innovations that the AHFCs have embraced to cater to the housing finance needs of the low-income customers, while achieving profitability and social impact.     

Community Perspectives on Localness and ‘Priority’ Housing Policies in Rural England

Policy actors tasked with delivering against rural housing needs face a key conceptual conundrum familiar to researchers: how to define need and how to link that concept to the idea of localness. Community perspectives on this issue reveal that ‘official’ priorities are often not considered to reflect the true nature of local need. There is considerable appetite for setting ‘community priority’ and for assuming direct responsibility for housing delivery. Discussions with community groups in different parts of rural England are used to expose these concerns, which accord with the UK government's localism agenda, a component of which is the empowerment of parish councils to deliver additional homes for ‘local need’, above planned allocations. However, although community perspectives may become vital in driving future policy outcomes, there are associated risks. These perspectives may belong to a dominant minority, with a tendency to draw narrow definitions of localness and local interest as a means of closing the door to unwanted development.     

Repackaging the poor? Conceptualising neoliberal reforms of social rental housing

This paper considers the need for conceptual renewal in comparative housing research. Since the mid-1990s, Kemeny’s model of ‘unitary’ and ‘dualist’ rental markets and Harloe’s classification of ‘mass’ and ‘residual’ social housing provision have been repeatedly recycled in comparative studies of ‘social’ and ‘public’ housing provision. Amidst international neoliberal policy mobilities, their models based on liberal welfare regimes wield particular power. Conceived during neoliberal cutbacks of public services, Kemeny’s ‘dualist’ rental market and Harloe’s ‘residual’ model of social housing similarly depict state-subsidised rental housing provision as bureaucratic, and targeted to the poor. Despite empirical change, these models are still used to describe liberal welfare regimes, and to theorise international policy convergence. Based on a review of recent market-oriented reforms of state-subsidised rental housing provision in the US, Australia and England; original neoliberal ‘sites of production’, this contribution asks whether these conceptual models still reflect the empirics. Findings diverge from the models, undermining their assumptions about how neoliberal reforms progress.     

Opportunities and Constraints in State Housing Policy: The Example of Tasmania's 'Affordable Housing Strategy'

The lack of Commonwealth government funds for public housing has encouraged state governments across Australia to develop 'Affordable Housing Strategies' to address the problems that result from the shortage of housing available for low-income households. However, to date there has been limited discussion of the implications of these affordable housing strategies and their significance as a form of policy intervention. This article highlights the Tasmanian Government's 'Affordable Housing Strategy' as a case study to illustrate the obstacles that confront state housing policy makers. These include difficulties in securing partnerships with the private sector, an inability to influence macro-economic policy settings, fluctuations in the property market cycle and a reliance on small and uncertain budgetary allocations. However, there is limited scope to address some of the problems that have undermined previous state and Territory housing policy initiatives by reaching agreements with local government to ease planning controls for social housing, boosting the capacity of the community housing sector and using additional budgets judiciously.     

Opportunities and Constraints in State Housing Policy: The Example of Tasmania's ‘Affordable Housing Strategy’

The lack of Commonwealth government funds for public housing has encouraged state governments across Australia to develop ‘Affordable Housing Strategies’ to address the problems that result from the shortage of housing available for low-income households. However, to date there has been limited discussion of the implications of these affordable housing strategies and their significance as a form of policy intervention. This article highlights the Tasmanian Government's ‘Affordable Housing Strategy’ as a case study to illustrate the obstacles that confront state housing policy makers. These include difficulties in securing partnerships with the private sector, an inability to influence macro-economic policy settings, fluctuations in the property market cycle and a reliance on small and uncertain budgetary allocations. However, there is limited scope to address some of the problems that have undermined previous state and Territory housing policy initiatives by reaching agreements with local government to ease planning controls for social housing, boosting the capacity of the community housing sector and using additional budgets judiciously.     

基于历史数据的南京保障房空间结构演化研究

我国保障房的大规模建设对城市的社会空间结构造成了巨大影响.本文以南京市为例,利用2002年至2012年的保障房建设历史数据分析了近10年保障房建设的空间结构演化,总结了当前保障房住区呈“偏远化、集中化、规模化”的宏观布局特征.南京市自2010年开始建设的大规模集中式保障房社区犹如“造城运动”,在有效解决中低收入群体住房问题的同时,将可能加重城市空间分化和居住分异,进而引发一系列社会问题.对此,在分析保障房住区居民通勤、就业、购物、教育、养老等社会活动的基础上,提出了分散建设、发展多中心模式、大力建设配套设施和构建动态影响监测平台及预警机制等策略,为城市社会空间结构的优化提供了新的视角.