Describing Changes in the Built Environment of Shrinking Cities: Case Study of Incheon, South Korea
Publication: Journal of Urban Planning and Development
Volume 142, Issue 2
Abstract
In the early 2000s, nearly 30% of South Korean cities reportedly shrunk in terms of population, number of enterprises, and property disinvestment. Although many researchers have already documented socioeconomic changes linked with shrinking cities, little is known about how changes in a neighborhood’s built environment influence the process of shrinking within a city’s local context. Here, a neighborhood called Songhyun-dong in Incheon, which was previously one of the busiest mixed-use retail neighborhoods in Korea, was empirically documented through nontechnical analyses of urban-form data for the years of 1937, 1985, 1995, and 2013. It was discovered that urban planners’ institutional response to urban shrinkage, such as development of extensive transport infrastructure and imposition of a rigid gridiron layout, failed to contribute to the recovery of the shrinking neighborhood. The resultant loss of securely-enclosed residential areas and adaptable market-space characteristics has amplified the downward spiral of the shrinking process.
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Acknowledgments
This research was supported by Basic Science Research Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) funded by the Ministry of Science, ICT & Future Planning (NRF-2014R1A1A1037046).
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Published In
Journal of Urban Planning and Development
Volume 142 • Issue 2 • June 2016
Copyright
© 2015 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Aug 15, 2014
Accepted: Jul 2, 2015
Published online: Sep 24, 2015
Discussion open until: Feb 24, 2016
Published in print: Jun 1, 2016
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