Social role of urban parks in global cities: a case study of Cheonggyecheon Restoration, Seoul and Diagonal Mar Park, Barcelona

Asian Urban Places, pp. 7-15
Heng Chye Kiang, Oscar Carracedo García-Villalba and Zhang Ye (eds.)
School of Design and Environment, National University of Singapore | Singapore | 2014 | ISBN 978-981-09-3687-7

Provision of urban parks is considered to be an important instrument, which helps addressing social and territorial cohesion in global cities. Yet local governments strive to create new investment opportunities for global capital and provide spectacle for expanding tourism and cultural industries, which often makes urban parks into an instrument of competition between global cities rather than an effective approach, dealing with their social and environmental problems. Speculative urban development considers urban parks merely as an economic asset, which can be stripped off their social meanings, and turned into a commodity that can easily be marketed and consumed.

The paper compares Cheonggyecheon Restoration in Seoul and Diagonal Mar Park in Barcelona to explore the changing social role of urban parks as urban commons and meaningful communal space in global cities. Cheonggyecheon is a large urban park in the downtown Seoul, constructed after the Cheonggye Expressway was demolished and an ancient stream was recovered on its place. It quickly became a popular public space and a new tourist attraction in Seoul. Diagonal Mar Park, constructed on a former industrial site in Barcelona, is less centrally located and is one among many urban parks in the city. Although the two parks seem to have little in common at first sight, the paper argues that the instrumentalisation of Cheonggyecheon and Diagonal Mar Park, in order to improve economic competitiveness and global appeal in Seoul and Barcelona, has negatively affected their social role in a similar way.

Source: Academia.edu

Transformation of Barcelona’s Eastern Waterfront: From the City Periphery to the Central Public Space in the City

City:Edge, pp. 51-59
Uroš Lobnik and Peter Šenk (eds.)
Založba Pivec & HAM Publications | Maribor | 2014 | ISBN 978-961-6897-65-5

The transformation of Barcelona’s eastern waterfront, between the Olympic Village, Poblenou and the new Forum, is a characteristic example of successful urban regeneration, where the former city periphery was developed into one of the central public spaces in the city. In order to fully understand urban regeneration process and its consequences on everyday life in the city, the paper examines both the urban planning approach and the historical and social background of the area. The large-scale transformation of the former periphery into a public space namely not only alters spatial relations, but it also affects social and symbolic relations in the city. The evolving civic awareness about importance of integrating the city periphery into everyday life in Barcelona contributed to the eventual success of urban regeneration.

Source: Založba Pivec

Changing approaches to urban development in South Korea: From ‘clean and attractive global cities’ towards ‘hopeful communities’

International Development Planning Review, 35.4, pp. 395-418
Liverpool University Press | Liverpool | 2013 | ISSN 1474-6743

South Korea is one of the world’s most urbanised countries. While the country is well known for the rapid economic growth and massive urbanisation in the past, it is overlooked that approaches to urban development in South Korea are beginning to change. The paper addresses this by considering different urban design projects in the Seoul metropolitan region in terms of how they address the local history and culture, the quality of everyday life, economic competitiveness, diverse uses of public space and civic participation in decision-making. The Kkummaru Visitors Centre, Dongdaemun Design Plaza and Park, Bupyeong Culture Street and Gwanghwamun Plaza are discussed as case studies of recent urban design projects. While all cases show that novel approaches to urban development are taking place in South Korea, the paper argues that the urban design, which fails to sustain the existing social and cultural structures, to create inclusive places of social interaction or to involve citizens in the decision-making does not significantly differ from the past.

Source: doi.org/10.3828/idpr.2013.27

Legitimizing the Architecture of Edvard Ravnikar and Kim Swoo Geun. Between Regionalism and National Narratives

45+ Post-War Modern Architecture in Europe, pp. 13-24
Stephanie Herold and Biljana Stefanovska (eds.)
Forum Stadt- und Regionalplanung | Berlin | 2012 | ISBN 978-3-7983-2435-0

Slovenia and South Korea do not seem to have much in common at first sight. Yet both countries were affected in similar ways by economic, social and political changes during the post-war reconstruction. While Slovenia was a part of Tito’s communist Yugoslavia, general Park Chung-hee ruled South Korea. The new authoritarian regimes used every opportunity to consolidate their political power by controlling every bit of society. Architecture was no exception in this sense since the regimes systematically constructed and exploited important national projects to legitimize the dominant ideology.

The paper attempts to address some of the practices, which were to legitimize the architecture and consequently the dominant ideology in modernizing Slovenia and South Korea. It compares the architecture and legitimization of the Regional People’s Committee in Kranj in Slovenia and Buyeo National Museum in South Korea, designed by Edvard Ravnikar and Kim Swoo Geun, who were two of the most prominent modernist architects in each country. Although they eagerly followed the principles of modernist architecture, the two buildings were also affected by what the architects perceived as regional and national culture. It seems that the legitimization of architecture in this case was not framed only by personal experiences or cultural references of the architects but also by the dominant ideology, which in Yugoslavia favoured cultural diversity, while in South Korea it strived for a strong and uniform national culture.

Source: doi.org/10.14279/depositonce-3358

Comparing urban renewal in Barcelona and Seoul: urban management in conditions of competition among global cities

With Matjaž Uršič
Asia Europe Journal, 10.1, pp. 21-39
Springer Verlag | Berlin | 2012 | ISSN 1610-2932

Cities have become increasingly autonomous economic and political actors which actively respond to the pressures and opportunities of globalisation. Consequently, the urban management of any particular city is often based on the assumption that the city can improve its position against rival cities by efficiently managing its strategic resources and promoting its presumed advantages. Though such an approach to urban management may help cities to improve their global competitiveness and the quality of their residents’ everyday life, it can sometimes result in negative consequences at the local level, thus actually narrowing the development prospects of the cities in the end. This article discusses urban management against the backdrop of the competitive urban policy in Barcelona and Seoul, and compares the local consequences of urban renewal in both cities. Based on a comparison of the two cases of urban renewal, 22@ Activity District in Barcelona and the Cheonggyecheon restoration in Seoul, this article argues that, in conditions of competition among global cities, even very different approaches to urban management and urban renewal may result in similar consequences at the local level.

Source: doi.org/10.1007/s10308-012-0319-1

Selling global Seoul: competitive urban policy and symbolic reconstruction of cities

Revija za Sociologiju, 41(3), pp. 291-313
Croatian Sociological Association | Zagreb | 2011 | ISSN 0350-154X

The paper focuses on a process of symbolic reconstruction of cities, where the existing image or meaning of places is purposely changed with the aim of attracting new investments, events or tourists to a particular city. The process of symbolic reconstruction is situated within the context of growing competition among cities. Symbolic reconstruction also affects tourism development in cities by providing an easily marketed and consumable image and meaning of places. The case of the Cheonggyecheon restoration in Seoul helps in understanding how symbolic reconstruction of cities is related to and affected by competitive urban policy, urban renewal and city marketing. Observing local consequences one can conclude that while the Cheonggyecheon restoration and resulting symbolic reconstruction of the city helped Cheonggyecheon to become the major tourist attraction and icon of global Seoul, it also resulted in a decline in local places and cultures. Such outcomes of urban renewal contradict strategic goals of urban policy and may prevail in the end over the benefits, which the Cheonggyecheon restoration brings to tourism development and everyday life in Seoul.

Source: doi.org/10.5613/rzs.41.3.2

Industrial heritage in Barcelona: between vacant monuments and everyday life

AB, 41(190-191), pp. 40-42
Association of Architects of Ljubljana | Ljubljana | 2011 | ISSN 0352-1982

The 22@ district of activities is a typical case of urban regeneration of a former industrial area in Barcelona. The plan envisages an extensive economic transformation and urban regeneration of a working-class neighbourhood Poblenou whereby the city authorities would create new investment and employment opportunities and improve the city’s competitiveness. A lot of attention has been directed towards the protection of industrial heritage as an important aspect of Poblenou’s unique identity with the plan outlining various schemes to transform the former factories into new manufacturing, educational, residential or community spaces.

The practice has shown, however, that the protection of industrial heritage in Poblenou is more focused on preserving the appearance of the former factories than on the questions of their future purpose and significance, which has led to a conflict between the residents of the neighbourhood and the city authorities. The industrial heritage, which represents a part of everyday life to the residents of Poblenou and is a symbolic expression of their working-class past, was understood mostly as an opportunity for new investments by the city authorities. The 22@ district of activities thus shows that the successful protection of industrial heritage in Barcelona is largely due to the strivings of the civil society for the right to common memory, which makes the case of Poblenou relevant also for the Slovene environment.

Source: dlib.si/details/URN:NBN:SI:DOC-CULIDJ4O

Urban regeneration in global Seoul: new approaches, old divides?

Viennese Contributions to Korean Studies II, pp. 185-204
Koreanologie am Institut für Ostasienwissenschaften, Universität Wien (eds.)
Praesens Verlag | Vienna | 2010 | ISBN 978-3-7069-0619-7

The Cheonggyecheon restoration, as the most known example of urban regeneration in Seoul, has drawn a lot of attention in Korea and abroad for its innovative approach. The restoration is often presented as a case that has noticeably improved quality of life and resolved growing social, economic and environmental disparities in the city. Yet the Cheonggyecheon restoration also plays an important strategic role as an instrument of urban policies, by which Seoul Metropolitan Government is trying to improve global competitiveness and global image of the city. In this paper we show that it is precisely the discourses and policies of globalization that have become not only a motor of urban regeneration, but also an important source of emerging social and spatial divides in Seoul. We argue that exclusion of local residents, caused by the Cheonggyecheon restoration, may lead towards decline of civic participation and alienation of the city as a common political agent of all citizens. Such undesired social, spatial and political outcomes may at the end prevail over the actual benefits of urban regeneration.

Source: Praesens.at

Local responses to global challenges: cultural context of urban change in Barcelona and Seoul

Založba FDV | Ljubljana | 2009, ISBN 978-961-235-386-5 | 2012, ISBN 978-961-235-501-2 (ePub)

Local Responses to Global ChallengesThe book Urban Change and Local culture in Barcelona and Seoul talks about how globalization influences everyday life in cities and about the importance of local culture for urban change. With a broad cross-cultural study of 22@ Activity District urban renewal in Poblenou in Barcelona and Wangsimni New Town urban redevelopment in Seoul the book reveals how structural inequalities on the global and national level influence everyday experience of both cities. Residents in Poblenou and Wangsimni actively respond to the changes in their everyday living environment, which are caused by the globalization, and in this way influence the transformation of both neighbourhoods. Contrary to a general belief that due to globalization cities are becoming more similar to each other, the book shows how local culture remains an important source of urban change in cities today, while being at the same time the source of their distinctiveness and diversity.

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Urban change and local culture: responses to urban renewal in Wangsimni

Journal of Seoul Studies, 37, pp. 117-153
Institute of Seoul Studies | Seoul | 2009 | ISSN 1225-746x

Urban renewal is a process, which improves quality of life in cities and addresses disparities caused by past urban development at the local level. Yet cities have also become increasingly integrated at the global level. The competition between them influences the way a particular city reacts to pressures and opportunities of globalization. Urban renewal is therefore often instrumentalized by political elites and private investors for improvement of global status of a particular city, which may in turn result in undesired social, economic, environmental or political outcomes at the local level. Seoul is no exception in this regard. This paper deals with the urban renewal in Wangsimni, an old neighbourhood east of the downtown Seoul, in order to study how globalization affects the urban renewal, how urban renewal constrains everyday life in cities, and how the citizens respond to challenges caused by it. In the conclusion the article argues that local culture has been a major source of responses to urban renewal in Wangsimni, although in this particular case the actual outcomes of those responses were far from desired. Urban renewal in Wangsimni namely seems closer to developmentalism, characteristic for Seoul in the past, than to anticipated sustainable development of Seoul in the future.

Source: earticle.net/article/A113855