Module 5: Cities as Social Space: Housing and Neighbourhoods

Vocabulary flashcards covering key urban geography concepts, housing market models, residential mobility, and gentrification from the lecture notes.

Neighbourhood

part of the city where people share similar housing types (homogeneity/ uniform), income levels, or ethnic backgrounds.

• reflects shared social values

Kibera (Nairobi, Kenya)

One of the largest informal settlements in the world; although largely lacking basic sanitary infrastructure and formally constructed housing, it is a thriving community home to hundreds of thousands of people.

Economic Restructuring

urban social shift away from heavy manufacturing/factories toward a service-based economy (like retail, food service, and tech), which mostly creates:

• low-pay

• part-time jobs

• widens the gap between rich and poor.

Changing Demographic & Household Formation

Social trend, where cities with ageing population have to adapt overtime to accommodate this population range

Increased Internationalization

Immigration driving changes to the demographics (age, ethnicity, income, household style), cultural mix, and social layout of cities.

Retrenchment (Cutting down) of the Welfare State

state/government cutbacks, including:

• reduction of (government) subsidized housing and social assistance programs (financial aid, disability and food).

• pulling back its financial support

Coal Harbour (Vancouver, BC)

• Most expensive area in BC

• Next to adjacent to the Central Business District (CBD)

• containing a mixture of commercial and residential buildings

• representing some of the highest land values in Canada.

Housing as a Commodity

Viewing housing as a product to be bought, sold, and traded for profit in a market, where its price is driven by location and economic value

• used more in MDW

Housing as an Entitlement

An ideological approach in the More Developed World (MDW) viewing housing as a universal right and basic social service that everyone should have access to, regardless of ability to pay.

Singapore Public Housing Model

A system where over 80 per cent of citizens live in subsidized, government-built housing units, making homelessness virtually non-existent while allowing the government to regulate transactions and give priority access to heterosexual married couples.

Redlining

an illegal and racist process where financial places drew red areas around certain regions of city and this targeted:

• low income areas

• low poverty

• where some black populations live.

People in these regions are denied access to:

• loans

• insurance

• mortgage

• Reinforces racist segregation because of "high risk" areas

Filtering

As a house ages, it gets passed down through time to people from different income levels (usually going from higher to lower income as the building gets older).

Downward Filtering

Rich people leave older homes to move to newer areas, and as those old homes age and get a bit run-down, they become cheaper for lower-income people to rent or buy.

Upward Filtering

A housing process wherein wealthier buyers or investors purchase cheaper, older homes (often rented out) to repair, renovate, or flip them at higher prices.

Gentrification

When higher-income people move into a lower-income inner-city neighborhood, changing its social and economic makeup (transform it).

• originates from 'gentry', referring to people of high social standing immediately below those of noble birth

Locke Street (Hamilton, ON)

A street undergoing rapid gentrification that is now home to upscale restaurants, coffee shops, and boutiques catering to an increasingly upper-middle class population.