Critical Concepts in Urban Studies – serie

The pursuit of regeneration and renewal has played an important role in the history and development of the world’s cities, and the theoretical and applied issues around these critical concepts are of increasing importance to governments and local populations, as well as to urban professionals and scholars. Particularly in postwar North America and Western Europe, this growing concern has often resulted from the decay and deterioration of cities associated with the decline in traditional industries and the associated loss of employment, and populations, to the suburbs and beyond.This new title in the Routledge series, Critical Concepts in Urban Studies, meets the need for an authoritative reference work to make sense of the explosion in research output on regeneration and renewal as a significant historical and contemporary urban process of economic, social, cultural, and political importance. Edited by a leading scholar, this Routledge Major Work brings together in four volumes the canonical and the best cutting-edge scholarship on the topic.The collection is divided into three principal parts. Part 1 (‘Cities in Transition’) covers the wider social, economic, political, and urban geographical context for urban regeneration and renewal, and documents the nature of changing cities. These processes and changes are inextricably linked with urban regeneration and renewal initiatives, and an understanding of these transitions is essential to place Parts 2 and 3 in perspective. Part 2 (‘Responses to Urban Change from National Governments’) brings together the best overviews and critiques of urban policy initiatives implemented by central governments in developed countries during the postwar period. The materials gathered here span experiences and city examples from advanced economies across the world.The final part (‘City Responses to Urban Change’) draws on the approaches taken by cities themselves in response to urban problems, particularly those designed to improve economic competitiveness and to combat social exclusion. Key research on the wide array of thematic approaches that have been followed is assembled in this part. Within the wider urban processes explored in Part 1, this part examines particular policy responses that have arisen in many cities, and considers a number of case-study cities from the UK, North America, continental Europe, and Australasia.With a full index, together with a comprehensive introduction, newly written by the editor, which places the collected material in its historical and intellectual context, Urban Regeneration and Renewal is an essential work of reference. It is destined to be valued by scholars, students, and researchers as a vital research resource.

In the first forty or so years following its revival at the end of the nineteenth century, the burdens placed on cities hosting a modern Olympic Games were relatively modest. However, as the Games have grown in size and stature, morphing from a small-scale summer festival into an intensively mediated global lollapalooza, demands on host cities have massively increased, resulting in the construction of vast and expensive new stadia, Olympic villages, and associated infrastructure. Moreover, after the Second World War, host cities have increasingly used the Olympics as a means to achieve ambitious non-sporting policy goals.Edited and introduced by two leading scholars, this new four-volume collection from Routledge brings together key primary-source materials and the best scholarship and serious commentary to elucidate and explore the planning, making, and generation of Olympic cities. The gathered materials (some of which are reproduced in facsimile to give users a strong sense of immediacy to the original texts) cover topics such as how cities have embraced the Olympics into their town-planning strategies; built new stadia and sports facilities; and constructed new transport and other communications networks. From what is widely seen as the paradigm of Olympics-led urban regeneration (Barcelona, 1992) to the planning disaster of Montreal, 1976, issues around the short-term impact, and longer-term legacy, of the Olympics on various cities are also closely interrogated.Fully indexed and with a comprehensive introduction, newly written by the editors, which places the collected material in its historical and intellectual context, The Making of Olympic Cities is an essential work of reference. It is destined to be welcomed as a vital one-stop research tool.

A striking consequence of contemporary globalization has been an increase in the importance and prestige of cities. Whereas only a generation or so ago cities were commonly viewed as ‘problems’, the sites of society’s ills, today they are more readily seen as ‘solutions’, places where twenty-first century dilemmas can most successfully be resolved. Hence, argue the editors of this new four-volume collection from Routledge, while globalization is generally viewed as eroding the influence of states, cities have come to the fore as the new spatial frame of the future. The old modern international organization of states as a worldwide mosaic of borders is being challenged by transnational spaces of flows organized through city nodes in global networks.As serious work on and around the subject flourishes as never before, Global Cities answers the need for an authoritative reference work to map and make sense of a vast body of literature and a continuing explosion in research output. Edited by a team of leading scholars, the collection brings together in four volumes the very best foundational and cutting-edge contributions.The set is fully indexed and each component volume has a comprehensive introduction, newly written by the editors, which places the gathered material in its historical and intellectual context. Global Cities is an essential resource and is destined to be valued by scholars and students as a vital one-stop research tool.

The study of cities is one of the grand challenges of twenty-first-century science, and mathematical modelling—in this case, urban modelling—provides a crucial contribution to scholarly and practical projects fully to comprehend their workings, evolution, and associated planning problems. There have been significant developments in urban modelling over the last fifty years or so (though foundational work dates back to the nineteenth century and beyond), and it remains a highly active and flourishing field of research and study.Urban modelling draws on population demography and economics. It seeks to represent the activities and structures associated with employment, residential location, and housing, the use of services such as retail, education, or health and associated transport and telecommunications interactions. The history of urban modelling can be seen as the development of submodels which, in more ambitious projects, are then combined into comprehensive models. These models can then be deployed as ‘What if?’ forecasting tools to test plans for future urban development. The retail model, for example, is extensively applied commercially.In five volumes, this new Routledge collection—edited by the scholar whose work in urban and regional modelling established the research agenda for the field from the 1970s onwards—answers the need for an authoritative reference work to map the vast body of published literature and to make sense of the continuing explosion in research output. Much of scholarly literature generated by this multidisciplinary enterprise remains inaccessible or is highly specialized and compartmentalized, so that it is hard for many of those who are interested to obtain an informed and comprehensive overview. Bringing together the very best canonical and cutting-edge contributions, this collection offers an invaluable, one-stop resource.Volume I captures the early history of modelling up to the early 1960s. Volume II demonstrates the development of the comprehensive model, building on Lowry’s 1964 work and the foundations of transport modelling, enhanced by the introduction of entropy-maximizing methods in 1967. Volume III covers the 1970s and 1980s, which in part demonstrated the power of mathematical programming and also the introduction of effective dynamic analysis. The final volumes collect the best scholarship from the 1990s to the present day, focusing particularly on applications of modelling and the areas where the dynamic urban model still remains incomplete.Urban Modelling is fully indexed with a comprehensive introduction, newly written by the learned editor, which places the gathered materials in their historical and intellectual context. The collection is certain to be recognized as an indispensable reference work.

Since the "Opening Up" period of 1978-80, China has urbanized with unprecedented speed. The construction of completely new cities and the dramatic redevelopment of existing urban centers have completely transformed the Chinese landscape. This urban revolution has generated an astonishing number and size of cities, undertaken with little thought for environmental and social consequences. Scholars striving to understand and analyze these remarkable and often contradictory urban phenomena have contributed to a large English language literature in multiple disciplines (geography, sociology, political science, urban planning, architecture, anthropology, and history). Since 1980, this literature has evolved alongside changes in the Chinese city, charting alterations in central government policies, municipal decision-making, and development practices along with their spatial outcomes. A key issue has been obsolescence. Keeping up with these transformations requires continuous research and revision, producing a literature rich in detailed studies of specific cities and regions but with few comprehensive works. Thus, the collection format is ideally suited for this body of scholarly research. This collection, organized chronologically and thematically, will allow students, professors and scholars easy access to key works on Chinese urbanization covering a range of topics across three decades of research. This will clarify the shifting and often confusing terrain of urban scholarship on China. We will survey leading authorities in the field to identify the most significant and relevant contributions to the scholarly literature.