UNIVERSITY OF GRONINGENFACULTY OF SPATIAL SCIENCESFINAL REPORT

Qualities aspects that influence the Community Sense in situations of Urban RenewalCase of Study - The Hoogte and Tuinwijk neighbourhoods

Fernanda Alves de Campos - s2805529 - campossfernanda@gmail.comAndr Tin Gimenez - s2805502 - andretgimenez@gmail.com

GroningenJune 19th, 2015

1.Background31.1.Personal Motivation - Housing Stock in Brazil31.2.Housing in the Netherlands41.3.Urban Renewal41.4.Perceived Quality of Neighbourhoods (Walton et al, 2008)51.5.Sense of community (Mannarini et al, 2012)51.6.Social capital (Kleinhans et al, 2007).61.7.Theory of Place71.8.Case of study in Groningen, The Hodge and Tuinwijk neighbourhoods.82.Research Problem Definition113.Research Goal Definition114.Research Questions125.Methodology125.1.The choice of the method125.2.SCI questions selection and adaptation135.3.PREQ questions selection and adaptation155.4.Selection of the areas165.5.Participants186.Application197.Analysis207.1.Analysis of the interviews207.2.Quantitative247.3.Image analysis (Kevin Lynch)247.4.Segregation within the neighbourhood (Kleinhans et al, 2007)258.Discussions and Conclusions279.References3110.Appendix32

Background1.1. Personal Motivation - Housing Stock in BrazilIn the last decade, Brazil has developed a program called Minha Casa, Minha Vida (MCMV) that in free translation means My Home, My Life, which aims to decrease the quantitative deficit of houses that the country has. This program subsidy homes below a threshold cost, and the houses are built by private developers. Commonly, those buildings have poor quality and flexibility an often necessary quality for the population it aims at. The typical houses that participate in this program usually fits between a group of buildings, from 4 to 6 store-high structural brick, or H-shaped concrete structure, although many other typologies can be found. Those are generally built next to an already existing road infrastructure, next to the limits of the built environment or in areas in where the cost of the land is still not high, or in which the municipal government give the land to this development. In these regions the lack of infrastructure it is common, such as public spaces, connections to the city center, proximity with commercial activities and public transportations.In Brazil, only nowadays the government started to supervise more closely the policy that requires that all buildings, from the design till after the construction, must have a technical manager (e.g. an architect or an engineer). This policy is still far from being fulfilled by the population, since it is in the Brazilian background the self-produced houses - those that do not have a direct help of an architects or an engineerings and represents about 70 per cent of the housing stock at a national scale (MinC, 2011). This happens as an outcome of a historical disconnection between wage and house price (Arantes, 2009) and imply in a need to increase the housing quality in the following years, mainly in the MCMV housing program, but in those estates development as well. Quoting an example of Chile, a south-American country with better quality of life figures (e.g.: IDH and GDP per capita) than Brazil, and that had a program similar to MCMV for more than three decades after many political reforms in the late 70s, is already been through a similar process: the demolition of buildings from their program is already happening, because of a lack of interest in those houses due to their below then demanded construction quality, poor urbanistic quality and many social problems such as drug dealing, domestic violence and others. (Rolnik, 2013). 1.2. Housing in the NetherlandsSince 1945, the Dutch housing policy has a long tradition of controlling rents, offering subsidies and loans and supporting the rental sector (Priemus, 1998). Housing context in The Netherlands is very different from Brazil. The process of urban development is characterized by the amount of plans and projects needed to build everything, being considered as one of the most planned countries in the world (Hajer, 2000). The Dutch government has played a major role in the delivery of new housing and has made design quality an important part of the government policy (Cousins, 2009).Still according to Priemus, most Dutch cities were concerned with building affordable dwellings for households with a low income. However, the difference between the two scenarios, the Brazilian one and the Dutch one, is that in the Netherlands the government is concerned with the mismatch between rent and income. Since 1989, there is a policy that the most inexpensive rental houses were supposed to be occupied by low-income people and the most expensive rentals were intended for households with a high income. At the same time, efforts were made to relate rent levels more closely to the quality of the dwelling (Cousins, 2009).1.3. Urban RenewalIn situations of poor quality of the housing stock, due to the age of the building, lack of maintenance, or in dwellings that are incapable to satisfy the current requirements of residents, an urban renewal may be necessary. Usually, those urban renewal consist of demolishing of the worst buildings that have some kind of technical problems, or would be too expensive to restore, the adaptation and sometimes the union of existing dwellings, the construction of new houses, usually for the middle class as part of the state-led gentrification process, sale of some dwellings to increase the share of owner-occupied houses - a goal defined at national scale - redesign of public space and other social actions, such as language lessons to ethnic minorities, more facilities for leisure, provision of caring services for the elderly or educational programmes (Ouwehand, 2002).This is only possible due to the status of association, which means a private organization with social goals. The government can, for example, define the areas in need of restructuring and set goals for the housing associations like the increase of the owner-occupied share (Ouwehand, 2002). This make possible the state-led gentrification. With the assumption by the government that a higher share of middle class can increase the overall quality of the neighborhood, and the assumption of the housing associations that by selling of houses, especially in consolidated neighborhoods, their stability can increase, the urban renewal projects displace residents and gentrify certain regions as a tool of urban development (Priemus, 1998). 1.4. Perceived Quality of Neighbourhoods (Walton et al, 2008)Quality perception can be describe as the opinion of the user/consumer regarding the ability of some product to fulfill his or her expectations (Jan-Benedict, 1990). However, the perception of quality can have many meanings, since the definition of quality is quite general. Based on this assumption, Carp and Carp (1982), developed the Perceived Environmental Quality Index (PEQI) in order to create a method to evaluate the satisfaction of residents towards their living environment. Their method consists of 11 scales that assess the respondents satisfaction with aspects of the environmental quality of their neighbourhoods, such as aesthetics, air quality, noise and neighbourhood characteristics and others. The goal of this method was to see if objective information about the environment could measure its quality (Walton et al, 2008). According to Walton, a similar method was developed, based in the PEQI, by Bonaiuto, the Perceived Residential Environmental Quality (PREQ). The PREQ was developed to evaluate resident perceptions of their nearby environment, and aim was to predict neighbourhood attachment (Bonaiuto et al, 1999). Looking forward to create a more accurate method, Bonaiuto tried to make more precise questions in PREQ.1.5. Sense of community (Mannarini et al, 2012)According to Mannarini (2012), the term psychological sense of community (PSOC) is the feeling of being a member of a larger community supported by interpersonal sharing and an emotional connection. In her article How identification process and inter-community relationships affect sense of community, she describes that, based on the Social Identity and Social Categorization Theory, it is possible to investigate how the identification with the physical component of a community, the perception of a community and the perception of one or more territorial communities affects the PSOC. Contextualizing, primarily the term PSOC refers to a feeling of being a part of a complex entity, it captures the psychological component of life in community and the emotional connections and ties between individuals and the community (Mannarini et al, 2012). Inside the concept of the sense of community, there are two identification process, the first one is the identification with a place, and the second one is the identification with a group. In order to identify the peoples perception regarding the sense of community, several methods were developed through the years. The most important ones are the one created by Miretta Prezza in 2009, which was used by Mannarini in her work, and the one created by Adam Long in 2003, that will be the one used for the later development of this paper. The table 1 demonstrate how the Long method has an approach more local regarding the questions asked.

Table 1: A. Long method to analyze sense of community. Items and Factors Relevant to the Present Analyses.Source: Long, D. A., Perkins, D. D., 2003. Confirmatory Factor Analysis of the Sense of Community Index and Development of a Brief SCI.1.6. Social capital (Kleinhans et al, 2007).For Middleton (2005), social capital is seen as the foundation on which social stability and capacity of a community to help itself are built; and their absence is considered a key factor in reducing neighborhood. According to Kleinhans, Priemus and Engbersen (2007), in a neighborhood context, social capital refers to the benefit of surface interactions, common standards on how to treat each other and behavior in space, trust and collective actions of residents for a common purpose.With the growth of urban restructuring in Dutch cities it is common to see residential mobility, causing substantial population changes, splitting the population in the stayers, movers and newcomers. The main idea behind almost every urban renewal project is to create a socially mixed neighbourhood population. It is already know that attracting middle-class residents to a renewed neighbourhood helps to reinforce social networks. According to the research conducted by them in two neighbourhoods in Rotterdam, social capital is an asset that newcomers bring to the neighbourhood, since providing role models for the lower-incomers households, their behaviors and aspirations will increase, as well the social capital of that neighbourhood. Nowadays, many politicians argue that urban regeneration must not only improve the physical quality of neighborhoods, but also the welfare of its inhabitants. They stand that some factors are associated with higher levels of social capital. They include a higher income of the residents, the presence of families with children, a stronger place attachment, increased quality perception of the neighborhood and single-family homes.1.7. Theory of PlaceFollowing the theory of social capital, place is an important aspect. According to Vanclay, Higgins and Blackshaw (2008), place matters to every person. They agree that sense of place is a about the individuals connection to the place and to their experience of place. And also that place attachment it is the closest component part to sense of place. It refers specifically to the extent to which an individual has positive feelings about their local environment and/or community. According to this definition it is possible to connect everything that it is presented here. The perceived quality, sense of community and social capital are closely connected by the idea of place. Without the place attachment and the sense of place, no individual would be able to feel that have a part in the community, would be unable to identify the quality of the environment in which they live or to help develop the social capital in their neighbourhoods.1.8. Case of study in Groningen, The Hodge and Tuinwijk neighbourhoods. The city of Groningen is located in the northern part of the Netherlands. After the analyses of all the topics previously presented, two neighbourhoods were selected in the city of Groningen, The Hodge, situated in the Northeast part of the city, and Tuinwijk (also known as Concordiabuurt) is in the North part of Groningen. Both neighbourhoods were chosen due to the renovation process that they went through in the last few years. The exact location of both neighbourhoods can be seen in the map 1, below.

Map 1: Location of the neighbourhoods Tuinwijk and De Hoogte in the city of Groningen.Source: Google maps, 2014. Modified by authors.The neighbourhood The Hoogte went through a renovation process that ended in 2011. The goal of the urban renewal of this neighbourhood was to create a livable and safe neighbourhood, and, at the same time, retain the original character of there. The whole renovation did not reached the whole neighbourhood, only a part of it (as can be seen in map 2 and figure 1) and had as an outcome 494 renovated houses, which 283 are rental houses and 55 owner-occupied. The other neighbourhood, Tuinwijk, went through a renewal process that ended in 2012. The aim of this renovation was to give the neighbourhood a better image, since the housing state had a bad image because of drug-related problems, and the quality of the buildings were terrible. As well as in the other neighbourhood, Tuinwijk was not completely renewed, it is possible to see renovated part in the map 4 and figure 2 below (KAW, 2014).

Map 2: Specific location of the renewals in De Hoogte.Source: Google maps, 2014. Modified by authors.

Figure 1: Renewal plan in De Hoogte.Source: KAW NL.

Map 4: Specific location of the renewals in Tuinwijk.Source: Google maps, 2014. Modified by authors.

Figure 2: Renewal plan in Tuinwijk.Source: KAW NL.

Research Problem DefinitionUrban renewal will inevitably impact in the sense of community of a neighborhood, as it interferes in the physical aspects and social networks and also in the population composition. Giving the outcomes that a sense of community can promote (Mannarini, 2012), evaluate the impact of the renewal in the sense of community is necessary to better understand the social impacts of the project. The qualitative changes can attract or distract specific populations, similar in a gentrification process, in which the rise in quality standards can select those who are going to move in and move out of the region. Those quality-focused urban renewal can, then, contribute or destroy the sense of community. Furthermore, we need to identify which of both apply.Research Goal Definition Explore peoples perception about the restructured area to find out how these restructurings plans affects the sense of community and the quality of the built environment; Identify the relation between the different kinds of quality improvements and place identity in the studied neighborhoods.Research Questions How the urban renewal is associated with the perceived quality of the built environment and the sense of community? How the urban renewal affected the sense of community?I. Does it have a positive or negative impact?II. Which features are responsible for more or less impact?III. Does it enforced or denied the place identity? What are the improved qualities in those neighborhoods?I. How they affected the place identity?Methodology5.1. The choice of the methodAfter analyzing the pre-selected literature, the necessity of choose a method to conduct our research emerged. Among all our sources, we managed to choose two articles that stand out from the others, due to the methodology used to defend and proof their ideas. Both articles consisted in surveys applied to the population in the area that was being studied, and the two methods were very successful. First, the method used to evaluate the sense of community was the Sense of Community Index (SCI) adapted by Long & Pekins (2003). This method was presented by Chavis and McMillan in 1986 and went through many changes over the years. The SCI is the most frequently used quantitative measure of sense of community in the social sciences. The original SCI stated that a sense of community was a perception with four elements: membership, influence, meeting needs, and a shared emotional connection. In Long & Perkins (2003) their specific method, the Brief SCI, is composed by 12 questions in which the respondent show how much they agree or disagree with the sentence. Variations of this questions were made relating to a period before the urban renewal. The assumption is that the respondents memories of the previous state of the neighborhood was going to be valid and show the shift in the community sense of the residents. One could say that the memory could be wrong and the answer would reflect the actual wishes of the resident (he had experienced a development in his social relations but he fantasized about the past to show a dissatisfaction towards the renewal, or the other way around) but this limitation of the method is assumed to not be relevant. Moreover, by asking for a before and after value, it is possible to evaluate how much the person perceive an increase in a given aspect, as well as the actual value of the present state. The other method was choose to address the quality of the environment. It was made a selection and adaptation of the Perceived Residential Environmental Quality (PREQ) scales, which was created by Bonnes et al (1997) and used by Bonaiuto et al (1999) and by Walton, Murray and Thomas (2008). The PREQ also consisted of scales, and are included in the four generative criteria as follows: three scales deal with spatial aspects (i.e. architectural planning space, organization and accessibility of space, green areas); one scale concerns human aspects (i.e. people and social relations); four scales relate to functional aspects (i.e. welfare, recreational, commercial and transportation services) and three scales deal with contextual aspects (i.e. pace of life, environmental health, upkeep). Also, here the respondents had to answer the questions with values, that corresponded to completely agree till completely disagree. 5.2. SCI questions selection and adaptationIn their work, Confirmatory factor analysis of the sense of community index and development of a brief SCI, Long & Pekins developed 12 questions (table 2), to be answered regarding the period before the urban renewal and after it. In our research, we decided to keep the before and after structure, but we had to adapt some of the questions and choose only the ones that could be applied in our neighbourhoods, since our research was quite smaller than the original one, and also a few questions could not be applied in our neighbourhoods in the same way that were applied originally. We managed to use 7 of the 12 questions after small adaptations. Also, we decided to ask if people agree, disagree or feel neutral about the questions, in order to make the questions more reliable. The final SCI questions that we used in our survey can be seen in table 3.

Table 2 12 SCI questions proposed by Long & Pekins (2003)Source: Confirmatory factor analysis of the sense of community index and development of a brief SCI (2003)

Original questionAdapted question

I can recognize most of the people who live on my block.-

I have almost no influence over what this block is like.I have participated in the urban renewal process.

I think my block is a good place for me to live.-

People on this block do not share the same values.-

It is very important to me to live on this particular block.-

I feel at home on this block.-

I care about what my neighbors think of my actions.-

Table 3 7 (adapted) SCI questions proposed by the authors.Source: Confirmatory factor analysis of the sense of community index and development of a brief SCI (2003) Modified by the authors.5.3. PREQ questions selection and adaptationThe PREQ questions were first introduced by Bonnes (1997), and better developed by Bonaiuto (2003), and, Wanton, Murray and Thomas (2008), who used this method again and were able to adjust the original survey to one that had less problems. This research were developed in an index of scales, (Bonaiuto, 2003). The index is consisted of 12 scales (categories), and factors (subcategories), as can be seen in table 4. To adapt this research to our work was also necessary to make some changes in the questions. We choose to use only 4 scales and focus on their subcategories (table 5), since not every PREQ scale could be applied in our research and a bigger amount of scales could decrease the response rate, decrease the quality of the answers and make the analysis more difficult.

Table 4 12 scales from the PREQ questions in Bonaiuto (2003).Source: Indexes of perceived residential environment quality and neighbourhood attachment in urban environments (2003).

Original questionAdapted question

Building details are well-made.Building are well-made.

This neighborhood is aesthetically unpleasant.-

Open spaces and built up areas are well balanced.-

There are green areas for relaxing.There are public spaces (parks, squares) for relaxing.

You feel watched. People have enough privacy in here.

It is not risk to go around late in the evening.I feel safe in this neighborhood.

People tend to be isolated.-

Residents show care for their neighborhood.-

Many buildings are in poor conditions.-

Table 5 9 (adapted) PREQ questions proposed by the authors.Source: Indexes of perceived residential environment quality and neighbourhood attachment in urban environments (2003) Modified by the authors.5.4. Selection of the areasAfter the selection of the questions, and the creation of the survey, it was necessary to decide where in the neighbourhoods the surveys would be applied. In order to have many different answers as we could get, we needed to deliver the surveys in different parts of the neighbourhoods, and not only in the parts where the urban renewal occurred. It is possible to see in the map 5 (The Hoogte) and map 6 (Tuinwijk) the areas where the urban renewal take place and the areas where the surveys where applied.

Map 5: Selection of areas in The Hoogte NeighbourhoodSource: Google maps, 2014. Modified by authors.

Map 6: Selection of areas in Tuinwijk NeighbourhoodSource: Google maps, 2014. Modified by authors.5.5. ParticipantsAlthough we did not know to who we delivered the surveys, it was possible to predict that we were going to get answers in between our age range. It is possible to see in table 6 below, the population of both neighbourhoods in 2014.The Hoogte Tuinwijk

Population37501542

Male1939 (51.7%)765 (49.6%)

Female1811 (48.3%)777 (50.4%)

People from 20 to 24 years old (%)14.120.9

Table 6: Population in both The Hoogte and Tuinwijk neighbourhoods in 2014.Source: Geemente Groningen (20114) modified by authors.The population of people from 20 to 24 years old is highlighted as this population in this range is commonly of students, that usually just moved in to Groningen and did not had time or will to develop a sense of community. This population of students that did not used to live in Groningen was disregarded. The percentage in the table, close to the city average (17.1%) shows that those neighborhoods are not a student neighborhood.The population of neighborhoods that had an urban renewal plan has six categories of inhabitants: the stayers, the forced movers within the neighborhood, the forced movers to surrounding neighborhoods, the forced movers to other neighborhoods and the newcomers, both from surrounding or distant neighborhoods (Kleinhans et al., 2007). In our case, we gathered this information based on when the person had moved in to the neighborhood and from where.ApplicationThe data collection was done through surveys, which were applied with the drop-off and the pick-up method. It was decided to do the application through a weekend, in a way that we could pick-up the surveys on a Saturday, when we expected to find more people at home. Thursday, May 21st, we drop-off in the mail box of our intended respondents a letter (appendix 1), with a handwritten signature, explaining slightly the research and saying that we would be back to collect the survey answered the next Saturday, the 23rd, and a survey (appendix 2). However, unfortunately a mistaken with the dates occurred and in the letter that we put in the mail boxes we said that we would collect the survey on the 24th in that case, a Sunday. Thus, although it was a Sunday and later on we find out that it was also an extended holyday, we had to go collect the surveys on the day scheduled. Although we have not experienced any problem when dropping off the surveys, a few obstacles came up in the day that we were collecting it. First, as already said before, as it was a Sunday, and a holyday, many people were not at home, and some that were, claimed that as it was a special holyday that weekend, they had not yet had time to answer or was not at home when we came to pick it up. Also, although we have translated the survey to Dutch, a few people that did not speak English could not understand us when we knocked on their doors to ask for the survey filled in. Another issue that came up was some aggressiveness that we get in a few houses in The Hoogte neighbourhood, in some of the houses, although they spoke English, they did not seem very inclined to answer our questions. Also, a few dwellers not even looked to us to hear what we had to say, just saying that they did not have what we wanted. Finally, another complication was in the Tuinwijk neighbourhood, in which we delivered around sixty surveys in the Concordiastraat, and turn out that when we get there to collect, we find out that almost half of the street was composed by temporary houses destined to patients of a psychiatric clinic, so we could not get any answer on those houses. Nevertheless, although all those problems that were faced, the method of dropping off and picking up it proved to be very effective. As can be seen in table 7 bellow, we listed a few negative and positive points regarding this kind of method application.Positive aspectsNegative aspects

Respondents have more time to think and answer.Never know if the house is a real house.

Good response rate, given the problems.Difficulty to make interviews after collecting the survey, as people would just give us back and avoid conversation.

Minimum problems due to language barrier.Further comments and dialogues would usually start in Dutch.

Lack of a broader understanding in the unpredicted consequences of the urban renewal.

Table 7: Positive and negative aspects of the drop-off pick-up method.Source: Created by the authors (2015).Analysis7.1. Analysis of the interviewsTwo interviews were made. Although a small amount, some insights about the history and image of the neighborhood were made. 1st InterviewOne of the interviews was made with a resident that did not answer the survey but was really interested in helping in the research, and lasted for about 25minutes. The 30 years old man, who lives with his wife, is a resident of the northern part of The Hoogte, in one of the newly built buildings (figure 3). He said he decided to move to that building due to its closeness to the city center, the presence of parking spaces and because he used to live in the southern part of the neighborhood. He described the southern part as a not good place to live, with the presence of drug dealers, single-mothers and many other problems related to this although he did not specified which kind of problems are those. He characterized people from the southern part of the neighborhood as less educated and of lower income. When comparing the Brazilian problem presented by the interviewer with the one of his own neighborhood, he presented his view, in which the development of those poor people would happen by surrounding the region where they live by wealthier areas and wealthier people, and thus promoting an improvement in the region. When displacement was introduced as a common practice in Brazil, he said that they could not get rid of those people, as it would be racism.

Figure 3: Location of where the first interview happened.Source: Google maps, 2015.He liked the neighborhood itself due to its location and its accessibility to the city center and other parts of the city, and decided to make an investment to buy a better house there. He said that the house is of good quality, and that he really likes it, although an architecture decision made his house to not have a direct solar incidence, which he desired but did not see when buying the house. However, he considered this his own fault and that it is his responsibility to be careful about this. He talked about the eyes on the street that the new buildings created and how this fosters the safety of the area. However, he said at another moment in the conversation how people do not care about noise in the street. He listed problems that happened in the region during the years he has been living there, such as vandalisms in the plant vases that his neighbors used to put in front of the doors, many cases of house burglary nearby and people from the southern part of the neighborhood making noise, knocking parked bikes and scratching parked cars. Once he heard some noise and went out of his house, but the vandals fled as soon as they saw him. But what else could I do? he said. Another problem was the lack of parking space near his house, as the other residents of the higher white buildings would prefer to park their cars in front of their windows, instead of in their parking space in the back of their building. But he said it was a minor problem, it was more an inconvenience. The places that he pointed while he was talking about places to park his car were very close to those where he pointed the action of the vandals. Other problem listed by him was dogs popping in the grass and dogs pissing on peoples car. When asked if there were many kids in the neighborhood, he said there was more than he expected, and that the playground is too far away, so kids have to walk about two or three blocks to play.During the conversation, it was possible to see that he and his direct neighbors have connections. During the talk, a neighbor with a glass of beer complimented him and asked if the neighbor of the next door was travelling or not, and said he was coming back later to talk with him. In the end, he said that the place indeed improved a lot after the renewal, with a decrease in drug traffic and violence, and that this is a development process and will probably get better. Impressions and remarksThe first problem that arises is the possibility of intra-neighborhood segregation, which could not be evaluated in a neighborhood scale analysis. This problem was already identified in (put source here), and this is an indicative that a research about this could be done. The offer of better housing in a part of a neighborhood can create the concentration of people that got an increase in rent and perhaps an increase in their social capital, or the influx of higher income class just in a region, which would not lead to a spatial development. An increase in socio-economic or quality indexes in a neighborhood level can hide this kind of spatially distributed process.The concentration of people based on preferences the market research made to identify the kind of dwelling and family that those houses were aimed at can influence in the community index too, as people of the same group are more easily identifiable with each other. Even the place attachment process of two groups (one of newcomers and the other of old residents that stayed in their houses plus old residents that changed of houses) will be different, thus it should be better understood and made in a research that properly divide those two groups. A few times in the conversation, he referred his part of the neighborhood as us and the other part as them However, the way in which the interviewed said about his model of development made the impression that he considers himself as part of an urban development and is proud of it. Except for the car parking space, the said reasons for choosing that neighborhood are not really balanced with the bad points and the problems that he already knew. Perhaps there is an economic factor but, more important, a neighborhood effect and an attachment to the place that influenced his choice. A better understanding on the reasons to move within the neighborhood in the cases of urban renewal would be an interesting factor to avoid the intra-neighborhood segregation or to use potential community integration that some individuals have. 2nd interviewThe second interview was a small one with a Vietnamese single-mother who lives with her two sons of about 4 and 6 years old. She was sunbathing outside while her kids were playing in the street (figure 4). She lives in Groningen since she was 6 years old, but she moved into the neighborhood only recently, after the renewal. She said her house is quiet small, but it is what she can afford, and she likes the place.When asked what she knew about the neighborhood before the renewal, she told me that she heard it was a bad place, with a lot of drug dealing and single mothers. At this moment she made a remark saying she is a single-mother because she wants to. She said that there is still drug dealing, but nowadays she do not hear about this frequently, and that is probably better than before.

Figure 4: Location of where the first interview happened.Source: Google maps, 2015.She said she did not really integrated with the rest of the neighborhood, saying it was mainly due to the distance of her house of the public spaces, like that one that exists in the De Hoogte street. She commented about this public space three times during the conversation, one of them implying that this feature would promote a better integration between the residents of the street. She said that there is a neighborhood association and there are regular meetings, but she does not participate. She said that if she did, she would probably know more people and be more integrated in the neighborhood.7.2. QuantitativeAll the values presented ahead are in the same dimension, in which positive is desirable and negative undesirable. The negative questions (e.g.: this neighborhood is aesthetically unpleasant) where multiplied by -1 to be in the same scale as the positive ones. The color grades are as a visual reference only.The SCI was calculated by the sum of a weighted average of each question. The weight is based on the number of dimensions the questions interferes. The SCI scale has a domain from -5 to 5. The PREQ was calculated with an average of questions that are for the same dimension, summed up. PREQ domain is from -7 to 7. The HoogteThe question of how the residents rate their quality of life did not entered in the calculation of the PREQ, and it was analyzed separately.1. Respondents In the Hoogte neighborhood, there was 23 answers, 12 of them of female residents, and 10 of them male and 1 person that did not want to answer the demographic questions. The majority of the respondents were from 30 to 54 years old, while none were less than 18 years old. There were 11 new residents and 11 old residents.

2. Question by question.QuestionBeforeAfterChange

Sense of CommunityIndex (SCI)I can recognize most of the people who live on my block-0.25-0.180.07

I have participated in the urban renewal process-0.92-0.910.01

I think my block is a good place for me to live0.580.48-0.11

People on this block do not share the same values-0.50-0.430.07

It is very important to me to live on this neighborhood-0.08-0.43-0.35

I feel at home on this block0.500.30-0.20

I care about what my neighbors think of my actions-0.42-0.170.24

Perceived Residential Environmental Quality (PREQ)Building are well-made-0.270.000.27

This neighborhood is aesthetically unpleasant0.080.220.13

Open spaces and built up areas are well balanced-0.080.000.08

There are public spaces (parks, squares) for relaxing0.000.130.13

People have enough privacy in here-0.08-0.22-0.13

I feel safe in this neighborhood0.330.430.10

People tend to be isolated0.250.300.05

Residents show care for the neighborhood-0.25-0.170.08

Many buildings are in poor conditions0.000.300.30

How would you rate your quality of living?3.423.640.22

Table 8: Average values for the survey questions. Scale from -1 to 1, except the last question, which goes from 0 to 5.Source: Created by the authors (2015).ChangeIn the table 8 above, it is possible to see how the main guidelines cited by the architects were achieved in the plan. Within the PREQ questions, the upkeep and care is the question with the higher increase, as the project aimed to restore and put the buildings in better conditions. Moreover, the improvement in the built up area quality is clear with positive answers in all the three questions. The increase in the public space was another aim in the project and was voted positively. The lowers values are in the category of people and social relations, with a decrease in privacy, and a minimum increase in the other three questions. It should be noted that 4 questions had a negative value before, while only two have it after. This shows a persistent although less problematic aspect related to care of the neighbors with the neighborhood, and an increase concern with privacy. As for the SCI, the values are much lower, with 3 out of 7 questions with negative values and only one with an increase higher than 0.07. These values, however, are not precise, especially those related with place attachment, as the table above shows the average of old and new residents. These values are better analyzed by dimension and in the calculated SCI below. However, it is interesting to note a big decrease in the importance the residents give to living in the neighborhood, and how they think their perception of the block as a home decreased. This shows a decrease in the levels of place attachment that should increase in the following years. The value of privacy showed a decrease, which can be interpreted as an increasing concern with this aspect. When asked about the quality of living in the neighborhood, the score was good and presented an increase of 6%.NowadaysFor the SCI questions, the values of after the renewal are mostly negative (5 out of 7). None of the results that had an imagined increase are positive nowadays. The level of participation in the renewal process is extremely low, achieving an average of -0.91. The levelThe nowadays values of quality are generally positive, but show a concern with privacy and care. The nowadays values shows a low attachment of the residents with the neighborhood. It is interesting to note the importance that people give to live in the block (0.30 and 0.48), and the lack of importance that people give to live in the neighborhood (-0.43), perhaps shows that the image of a neighborhood decreased.3. By dimension

This section analyses the responses based on categories proposed by the literature of SCI and PREQ. It analyses only a change in the value of all residents. CategoryDimensionChange in value

Sence of Community Index (SCI)Group membership0.07

Social connections0.04

Need fulfillment-0.02

Place attachment-0.07

Emotional connection-0.10

Perceived Residential Environmental Quality (PREQ)Architectural and town-planning spaceBuilding aesthetics0.20

Building density0.08

Green areas0.13

People and social relationsDiscretion and civility-0.13

Security and tolerance0.10

Sociability and cordiality0.05

Upkeep and care0.19

The dimensions shows a general negative value of the SCI dimensions, especially place attachment and emotional connection, although those two are highly dependent on the time of living in that place. It is interesting to note an increase in group membership.4. SCI and PREQ based on groupsSCIPREQ

beforeafterchangebeforeafterchange

All residents-0.820.83

Old residents-0.78-1.51-0.74-0.25-0.38-0.13

New residents0.022.14

gender

Male-1.11-0.570.54-1.070.001.07

Female-0.31-1.32-1.011.671.08-0.58

age

< 18----

18 - 29-1.30-1.300.001.00-4.50-5.50

30 - 54-1.69-0.950.73-2.201.003.20

55 +0.95-1.23-2.181.88-0.38-2.25

Summary table of responses based on time living in the neighborhood, gender and ageDifferent results were indicated depending of the gender, the age and if the person moved into the neighborhood before or after the urban renewal.

The PREQ had a slightly decrease in old residents, together with a major decrease in the SCI. This may point out how the renewal process did not improved (or it was not perceived as an improvement) for this group, while still affecting their place and sense of community. As for the new residents, their sense of community is basically zero. Although it is expected to be low, this value after 4 years after the renewal shows the lack of community sense to the other residents and to the rest of the neighborhood. The high level of perceived quality was expected as well, as they would not move in to a new neighborhood if they do not at least expect a good quality.

For women, it is possible to see a big decrease in the sense of community. Giving the reports in the interviews, there is a possible explanation: the single-mothers are more sensitive to place and community change. It is not possible to sustain a relation between SCI and women, as in the other neighborhood analyzed below their value increased.

In the point of view of one resident with age from 18 to 29 years old, the quality decreased a lot. Although this value is shown, it should be disregarded. Residents from 30 to 54 years old have an increase in both SCI and PREQ, although still having low values of SCI. One explanation for this is the satisfaction of the new residents with the neighborhood. The major decrease was from people of 55 years or more.

Tuiwijk1. Respodents

In Tuinwijk neighborhood, there were 26 answers, 10 of them of women, and 16 men. Again, the majority of the respondents were from 30 to 54 years old, while none were less than 18 years old. There were 15 new residents and 11 old residents. 2. Question by questionQuestionBeforeAfterChange

Sense of Community Index (SCI)I can recognize most of the people who live on my block0.270.350.07

I have participated in the urban renewal process-0.36-0.54-0.17

I think my block is a good place for me to live0.820.960.14

People on this block do not share the same values0.000.080.08

It is very important to me to live on this neighborhood0.270.350.07

I feel at home on this block0.640.810.17

I care about what my neighbors think of my actions0.090.310.22

Perceived Residential Environmental Quality (PREQ)Building are well-made0.450.690.24

This neighborhood is aesthetically unpleasant0.450.730.28

Open spaces and built up areas are well balanced0.360.690.33

There are public spaces (parks, squares) for relaxing0.640.770.13

People have enough privacy in here0.550.50-0.05

I feel safe in this neighborhood0.730.770.04

People tend to be isolated0.360.460.10

Residents show care for the neighborhood0.180.620.43

Many buildings are in poor conditions0.640.850.21

How would you rate your quality of living?4.004.190.19

Table 9: Average values for the survey questions. Scale from -1 to 1, except the last question, which goes from 0 to 5.Source: Created by the authors (2015).

ChangeOn SCI questions, different from the previous neighborhood, it had only one negative value in one question, which had a mistake in the way it was written, and thus it cannot be used as a reference. The increase was in all bigger in the questions about emotion connection and related to the block itself, although again the value of shared values within the neighborhood was low.About PREQ, there was an increase in upkeep and care, architecture and built-up area and green spaces questions. It should be noted that the value of those questions is already way above those of the other neighborhood, but still saw a higher increase. The value of people and social relations answers did not increase, but their values are already high. The value of privacy showed a decrease, which can be interpreted as an increasing concern with this aspect. When asked about the quality of living in the neighborhood, the score was high and presented an increase of 5%.NowadaysAs stated, the values of almost all the aspects of PREQ are already about 0.6, with only two exceptions. The condition of the buildings, the amount of public spaces, the safety of the neighborhood and its aesthetics has the highest scores. As for the SCI, the high level of acceptance of the block (0.96) and the feeling of being at home (0.81) shows a very different context with the other neighborhood. The only negative value is the one about participation, which is comprehensible as usually only a share of the population of the residents actually participate, and this value is already much higher than the other neighborhood.

3. By dimensionCategoryDimensionChange in value

Sense of Community Index (SCI)Group membership0.27

Social connections-0.05

Need fulfillment0.11

Place attachment0.14

Emotional connection0.15

Perceived Residential Environmental Quality (PREQ)Architectural and town-planning spaceBuilding aesthetics0.26

Building density0.33

Green areas0.13

People and social relationsDiscretion and civility-0.05

Security and tolerance0.04

Sociability and cordiality0.10

Upkeep and care0.32

The renewal changed what it was meant for and increased basically all dimensions, except the social connections and discretion and civility one. 4. SCI and PREQ based on groupsSCIPREQ

beforeafterchangebeforeafterchange

All residents1.764.63

Old residents1.332.080.753.504.771.45

New residents1.524.53

gender

Male1.101.360.262.794.191.40

Female1.742.390.654.755.350.60

age

< 18----

18 a 290.231.351.121.834.652.82

30 - 541.652.040.394.584.650.07

55 +2.031.87-0.172.754.501.75

Summary table of responses based on time living in the neighborhood, gender and age

Different results show up depending of the gender, the age and if the person moved into the neighborhood before or after the urban renewal. And different from the previous case, all responses have a positive value in both SCI and PREQ.

It is clear that this neighborhood already had a previous value of SCI and PREQ much higher, and in this case the value increased for the old residents as well, which have a similar value of PREQ of the new ones. The sense of community of the old residents is higher than those of the new ones.

Both women and male have an increase in the values of SCI and PREQ, although the first group experienced a higher increase in SCI, while the second group experienced a higher increase in PREQ. Similar to the other case, the female values started higher than the male ones.As for the gender, the only group that experienced a decrease in the SCI is the one of people of 55 years old or more. However, they experienced a major increase in PREQ. The group of 30 to 54 experienced an increase in SCI, although an irrelevant increase in PREQ.

7.3. Image analysis (Kevin Lynch)Kevin Lynch in his most famous work, Image of the city (1960), highlight the way how we perceive the city and its parts from a study conducted in three American cities. In his work, people were questioned about their perception of the city, how they structured the image of the city in their heads and how they located themselves. Lynch identified that the elements that people used to form a mental image of the city can be summarize in five types: paths, boundaries, districts, nodes and landmarks. He also concluded that this perception is piecemeal, therefore, the time is an essential element. Furthermore, he verified that nothing is experienced individually, but in relation with the surroundings; meaning that similar elements, located in different contexts, acquire different meanings. Moreover, he realized that every citizen has associations with certain parts of the city, and the image that each one create is impregnated of memories and meanings. His work can be utilized to analyze this research. It was possible to notice that every person understands and see their neighbourhood in their own way and, also, have their own memories. Asking people, even in a subjective way, if they are able to percept if the quality of the environment where they live increased, or if their community sense is stronger, and if that is directly related with the urban renewal that happened in the neighbourhood is a difficult task. As stated, every person acts and remember things in their own way, which makes the analysis of the surveys difficult, and even more complicated, since there were only objective questions. Lynch defends that in order to realize if the population of an area really understand their region and feel part of it, you must conduct a data collection with the creation of mental maps, and not objective questions. When asking a person to draw determined area in a paper, the researcher is able to get into the deepest level of understanding of what that person experiences in that neighbourhood. He also says that when asking specific questions, with answers pre-created, it is not possible to really comprehend how much each person is connect with the place. 7.4. Segregation within the neighbourhood (Kleinhans et al, 2007)According to Kleinhans, Priemus and Engbersen (2007) neighbourhoods who have gone through an urban renewal has a higher chance of experiencing segregation in the neighbourhood. They conduct three studies in Rotterdam and came to a conclusion that, while bring people with a higher income to the neighbourhood in fact helps to increase the social capital in the areas, at the same time, the social segregation happens. Kleinhans and his colleagues were able to create an image to represent how this segregation happens (figure 5).

Figure 5: Representation of segregation in neighbourhoods who have been through an urban renewal.Source: Understanding social capital in recently restructured urban renewal neighbourhoods, Kleinhans et al (2007).They explain this theory by saying that there are five kind of people related to a neighbourhood that went through an urban renewal. There are the stayers, who remain living in the same house. We could notice that in our research we find very few people of this group; the movers within reconstructed houses, who move to renovated or newly constructed houses, who represented a few of the respondents; the movers from surrounding neighbourhoods, which have proved that this phenomenon really happened in our neighbourhoods, many people that have moved after the urban renewal proved to be from neighbourhoods adjacent; the newcomers, who usually move to the new or the renovated houses, as also proved to be true in our neighbourhoods; and the forced movers, who are forced to move to others areas in order to open space to the new constructions, we were unable to find an integrant of this group.Furthermore, it was possible to see that the segregation in the neighbourhoods happened more clearly in The Hoogte. It was quite noticeable how the area is divided in lower class people, immigrants, elderly people and families. Every region in this neighbourhood is completely segregated from the others even though there is no physical division and one area is adjacent with the other. In the Tuinwijk neighbourhood it was possible to notice that most of the newcomers are concentrated in the area where the urban renewal happened, but it was not possible to notice any social segregation besides that. Discussions and ConclusionsThis paper has focused in how the qualities aspects influence the community sense in situations of urban renewal. According to our results, it is possible to get to some conclusions. First, the urban renewal should focus on the creation of spaces of social conviviality such as commercial places and common public areas, in order to increase the social welfare of the population and increase the place attachment, social capital e help to develop the place identity. The urban renewal that happened in the Tuinwijk neighborhood is a good example of creating these acquaintanceship spaces. This social characteristic of the space is important in Dutch urban planning already for some time, as stated by Wagenaar (2013), and have many aspects to be accounted such as the built up area, the population, types of jobs and sociability of the community etc. Not taking them in consideration can lead to a coexistence and not a situation of potential socialization. The cooperation in social occasions is a mean to think on how to endorse public participation, increase social capital, develop social trust and foster sense of community and guarantee social cohesion.Furthermore, we notice that the presence of negative values regarding the implementation of the urban renewal, can be considered as an indicative of low acceptance of the new project. The social impacts of it may be due to the lack of a good profiling of the neighborhood to identify properly the groups, especially those vulnerable ones such as single mothers, immigrants, low income classes and low social capital classes. The low amount of people that considered themselves as participant in the urban renewal process in The Hoogte, for example, is an indicative of this. Without a proper profile of the region, two consequences were clear: the project could not fit the demands of all the communities that composes this population and they could not be informed of the benefits that it may create for them, thus decreasing its social acceptance. The resistance of the residents of this neighborhood is another indicative of a lack of dialogue and a context of lack of social trust. Moreover, it was possible to conclude that according to our survey, the perceived community sense and the qualities aspects when the urban renewal is only a plan, can be highly influenced by the implementation of it. For example, in a community with a more resistance to an urban renewal, the attempt to make it will probably be on listing the problems of the neighborhood to show how the renewal is necessary. In other words, it will market the bad qualities of the neighborhood so a bad impression of it is created and the renewal, them, become viable. The influence of this process in the perceived quality and sense of community after the urban renewal is completed is not completely clear, so research could be done with the negotiation process of those plans, as well as replicate this kind of study before, during and after the urban renewal process of a new neighborhood with disadvantaged communities. The measurement of the imagined changes could be a way to evaluate on how the social interactions of the process influences the sense of community and quality perception of the residents.Additionally, it is important to note that the sense of community here is not based on the abstract communities that are common sense, but in aspects of social relations that end up creating community relations. This was important in this research as the Dutch case is characterized by the high density and the historical interest in promoting social mix. Evaluate the presence of communities based on rent, ethnicity, color, job, age, gender etc., would ignore social relations between those groups that are context dependent of each region. However, the analysis made this kind of abstraction and showed two results: the decrease of elderly people, in conformity with the bibliography, and a social problem in The Hoogte neighborhood probably due to the presence of single mothers, but perhaps the lack of appropriated playgrounds. Finally, although this research went through some difficulties, we were able to answer all of our research questions that were established in the beginning of our work. First, the question about how the urban renewal was associated with the perceived quality of the built environment and the sense of community. We concluded that the urban renewal has different results depending of the communities of the renewed area. In the first neighborhood (The Hoogte), the perceived quality and sense of community of, for example, old residents is very low, below the values of their answers about the previous state. However, this same group, in the other neighborhood (Tuinwijk), has a positive value for both indexes. Also, the urban renewal can decrease the perceived quality of the environment in a short span of time, as the place attachment and social relations decrease. This can change in a long run, as aspects such as upkeep and care, architecture and built-up area are relatively stable in the long-run, and place attachment increases on time. The change in sense of community, however, is more complex and context-dependent. Some groups, such as old people, old residents and women, can experience a decrease in their sense of community, while new residents can, with three years live in the place, not develop a sense of community. But, some of those same groups (women and old residents) can experience an increase in those values in another neighborhood. The renewal seem to be a opportunity to change the environment and the social relations attached to it, but, without a proper profiling and assessment of its impacts, a problematic situation can be created. Vulnerable communities and groups can be negatively affected and a decrease in social cohesion can happen, instead of the desired improvement in perceived quality and social relations. The implementation of the renewal and the quality of its plan seem to be very important for its success.Secondly, the question about how the urban renewal affected the sense of community had three sub categories, the first asked if have had a positive or negative impact and the research showed that it depends. In The Hoogte neighborhood, old residents, women and old people were negatively affected. Male and people from 30 to 54 were positively affected. In the Tuinwijk, the only group negatively affected was the one of people of more than 55 years old. The second sub-question was about which features were responsible for more or less impact, and we could speculate that relevant features are: the gender - women are more susceptible; if the women is a single woman; the age range of the resident; and the location of the resident within the neighborhood. The last sub-question was about if enforced or denied the place identity. It was possible to notice that in the architects discourse, the renewal has the aim of enforce the identity of the place. Although the short time-span to evaluate this feature, it seems that decreased in The Hoogte neighborhood and increased in the Tuinwijk. The northern expansion of the neighborhood in a different aesthetics and the lack of participation of the residents in the renewal process may create a place that they do not identify. In Tuinwijk, the recovery of the old aesthetics and a good acceptance of the renewal is probably an element that enforces this identityFinally, the last question was also divided in two questions. The first was what were the improved qualities in those neighborhoods, and what we could notice was that in The Hoogte the care of residents for the neighborhood increased, the architecture and build-up space quality, specially aesthetics, green areas for relaxing, an increase care between the neighbors, increase in the security and cordiality and also an increase in upkeep and care of the neighbors. In the Tuinwijk neighbourhood was noticeable that the general perception of quality and of community of the residents increased, as well as the perceived quality and sense of community of old residents and the care of residents for the neighborhood. Also, the architecture and build-up space quality, including aesthetics and the perceived density, the green areas for relaxing, the care between the neighbors and the upkeep and care of the neighbors also represented an improvement. The second and last questions was how they affected the place identity. We could notice that the meaning and significance of places for their inhabitants and users change. Place identity is not the same thing for everyone. It is also hard to evaluate the effects in place identity with only objective questions, but as far as we were able to analyze, the identity of the neighbourhoods could be analyzed in accordance with the community sense. In both neighbourhoods the community sense has decreased to the elderly, but in The Hoogte neighbourhood the decrease in the SCI was also noticeable in the young womans and former residents. This showed to us that they probably notice a difference in the identity of the place, and that is why the community sense decreased.

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AppendixAppendix 1. The letter.

Appendix 2. The survey.

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