出版者・発行元：Cities  

Spatial inequality in Asian megacities has recently accelerated against the formation of a hybrid development-state-neoliberalism policy and the existing unique characteristics of the built environment, i.e., the coexistence of and conflicts between planned and self-shaped urban areas. This study attempts to examine the process of gentrification and spatial inequality in urban areas in Tokyo, where large-scale urban regeneration projects were promoted through the relaxation of urban planning regulations under neoliberal urban policies. First, we surveyed how the transformation of urban development policies promoted gentrification in Tokyo. Second, we conducted a statistical analysis of the unique characteristics of spatial inequality in Tokyo. Finally, we conducted a detailed case study of the gentrification process in a workers' community where large-scale urban redevelopment projects had been implemented. We conclude that spatial inequality has widened in Tokyo because of government-led gentrification since the 2000s. Particularly, gentrification rapidly increased in the eastern areas of Tokyo, developed historically as workers' communities, and spatial inequality at the local level widened. Furthermore, local characteristics were rapidly transformed by the loss of urban industries. Instead, with government-led urban regeneration, a new urban nexus so called ‘urban suburbia’ comprising elements such as high-quality condominiums, shopping malls, and franchise shops emerged.

DOI： 10.1016/j.cities.2023.104247

Web of Science

Scopus

出版者・発行元：International Journal of Urban and Regional Research  

Inner-city areas function as incubators of creative industries in metropolitan cities. The areas adjacent to Tokyo's city center also play an important role as a location for small to medium-sized creative industries. First, against this background, this article explores the relationship between the characteristics of locations of creative industries and Tokyo's built environment. Aside from the city center itself, where the creative industries’ major customers are located, the authors observed a creative industry cluster to the west of the city center. We named this area the Tokyo West Creative Industry Cluster (TWCIC) and found that a ‘live–work’-style cluster has developed there, which functions as an incubation place for creative industries. Second, by conducting a case study on urban regeneration in progress in the Shibuya Station area, a core area of the TWCIC, we further examine how gentrification caused by property-led urban regeneration is now threatening the TWCIC. The article concludes that commercialization and purification will eventually widen spatial inequality and lead to the loss of the unique culture of tolerance and freedom that has hitherto nurtured the creative culture in TWCIC. Consequently, fundamental changes are required in property-led creative city policies.

DOI： 10.1111/1468-2427.13144

Web of Science

Scopus