P. Procee (1997).

described urban decay as the deterioration of the inner city often

caused by lack of investment and maintenance, it occurs when a part of a city falls into
disrepair and abandonment. Urban decline is thus characterized by high unemployment
rates, high crime rates, depopulation, desolate-looking landscapes, and abandonment
of buildings and split families. The decline therefore does not have one single cause,
but rather a combination of many, including poor urban planning, poor political decision
making, redlining, poverty, suburbanization and racial discrimination. Although urban
decay cuts like a knife into the built environment, they are measures put through to
revitalize or renew the urban environment. It is this approach that intends to reverse the
process of physical deterioration and social and economic decline that prevents urban
areas and their inhabitants from being an integrated part of the current urban
development process. The following discussion will paint out the impacts and solutions
of urban decay.
Firstly poor urban planning causes urban decline, as proposed by F Davidson (1996),
since urban planning involves planning for land use and transportation. A city could
propose to use land in poor ways so as to accelerate the urban decay. For example,
when a major employer in the city decides to move outside the city or country, it would
experience high rates of population decline because people would move with the
employer or other area in search of employment. A country could have made the
company stay by offering more appealing offers, but instead, the moving of the
company leaves more land unused and buildings abandoned, for instance the case with
Zimbabwe during the industrial closure era thus 2008, it witnessed many investors
moving away because the economy was unstable and this resulted in people leaving
the country to seek employment in other countries. A typical example is the closure of
Willowvale industries which saw High field residents near the Gaza land shopping
centre in Harare abandoning their houses, which are now eye disturbing, to go and seek
employment in other countries. That is urban decay is as a result of poor decision
making.

Cowan, M. and Lindsay, C. (1993), advocated that poverty contributes to urban decay
that is by helping to reinforce the shoddy and desolate urban landscape. High levels of
poverty contribute directly to higher drug usage and street gang activities. Both are
causes for suburbanization, as the middle class feel more and more unsafe living in the
city. The drug and gang activities often increase the level of crime, which contributes to
urban decay. As the level of crime increases, the property value of buildings in this area
decreases, leading to higher levels of building disrepair and eventual abandonment. For
instance the cases with more developed countries like Britain, studies show that the
government has paid a deaf ear to the needs and wants of the some communities and
this has resulted in the increase of deviate behaviour resulting in drug usage and street
gangs in Scotswood, Newcastle. This is as a result of government having favoured
some cities over others, and encourages the development of some areas over others.
London is a city that attracts lots of investment, hence it is important to maintain it more
that the other cities. Hence this indicates why urban decay has its teeth out as the built
environment losses it beauty.

Furthermore, the decline of the built environment is caused by the outmigration of

wealthier and more skilled people who leave a lesser qualified population to conduct the
day to day business. Often tied in with Suburbanization, this removes people who are
better off economically, leaving the area to those who are usually poorer, which
contributes to higher unemployment rates, a characteristic of urban decay. For example
In the USA this has become known as “White flight”, as the white middle class gradually
left the cities for suburban areas because of the perceived higher crime rates and
danger caused by African-American migration north toward cities after World War I,
hence urban decay occurring.

In a report released by Charles Hostovsky (2014), a professor of urban planning at

Catholic University in Washington, D.C., the speed of urban decay was disturbing since
the end of World War 1. The change or shift in market conditions and the withdrawal of
government support or the failure of the government to maintain or provide a sense of
belonging to the capitalists in industries causes urban decline in the built environment.
For instance in United Kingdom, areas such as Scotswood in Newcastle or large parts
of Middlesbrough. In the USA many of the heavy manufacturing industries were located
in the North of the country in cities such as Chicago and Detroit. This has become
known as the “Rust Belt” as globalization and out sourcing of many industries to low
wage Asian countries has decimated those industries. In cities like Detroit, entire
neighborhoods have been abandoned as high paying manufacturing jobs vanished and
the workers along with them. Rust belt to sun-belt migration to present has also
occurred, with people moving to warmer climates in the South of the USA.

More so racial discrimination contributes to urban decay that is it provides for high rates
of unemployment. African-Americans were most likely to be declined jobs and loans,
both of which would help their economic status as well as the health of their
neighborhoods. Discrimination, thus, promotes unemployment, which in turn promotes
poverty, street gangs and illegal drug-trafficking activities and other crimes.
Discrimination stifles opportunities which would normally be available to certain races
and in turn stifles the growth of a city by promoting urban decay. A similar case we can
pick South Africa as an example, that is if one is too look at how Cape Town or Durban
is developed and how Soweto is developed, it shows that they is a lot racial
discrimination in that country since Soweto is highly populated by blacks unlike Cape
town which has white people and Indians. A careful assessment can pin point the
Harare and Bulawayo case in Zimbabwe that is, Bulawayo has high levels of urban
decay compared to Harare since the area is not that developed than Harare but in this
case it’s about tribes, hence tribal issues for example the Gukurahunde incident. Hence
urban decay is caused racial discrimination.

The decline in the quality of housing also results in urban decline. The old pre-war
buildings get worse because of poor maintenance because the owners are unwilling to
spend money on maintenance or because the tenants cannot afford to spend money on
maintenance. The stock can also decline in quality if population densities become too
high. In, Dr Muzenda, Mucheke R, Masvingo residences they is poor quality housing
stock resulted in poor living conditions for residents.

However solutions such as urban revitalization brings the social and cultural milieu,
derelict land and obsolete buildings, urban spaces, local economies, infrastructure and
services back to the dynamics of urban life by integrating them physically, economically,
administratively, socially, juridical and politically to the city’s systems. Drakakis-Smith,
D.W. (1976), revitalization may assume different characters; one that promotes a
gradual process of improvements which can either pursue preservation measures
encompassing complete renewal or not or carry out a radical redevelopment of the area
by means of demolition and physical and economic restructuring. Also older houses and
buildings are refurbished or replaced. Modern attempts at renewal began in the late
19th century in developed nations, and experienced an intense phase in the late 1940s
under the rubric of reconstruction. The process has had a major impact on many urban
landscapes, and has played an important role in the history and demographics of cities
around the world.

Since the root cause of urban decay is land price inflation aggravated by an unfair tax
system, the solution becomes obvious. Change the tax system so that it works to
discourage the holding of land out of use and encourages regeneration. This can be
easily done by taxing the value of all sites, whether they have buildings on them or not –
a reform which is called Land Value Taxation. Land of the same type in the same area
would then attract the same level of taxation whether used or unused. Owners who
neglected land and left it unused would no longer be rewarded by a tax exemption.
Owners who cleared and decontaminated land and erected useful buildings on a
particular site would no longer be penalized by a system of taxation which imposes a
heavy charge for each improvement made.

The rehabilitation approach occupies a middle position. It is based on an urban renewal

effort characterized by a gradual process of physical/spatial, economic and social
transformation that responds to well-defined local needs and priorities. It preserves
social, cultural and physical features and the genuine characters of sites, buildings and
local economic development processes. At the same time it may launch redevelopment
initiatives which help to integrate them into the overall urban development process of
the city. Upgrading and regeneration are other jargons that are used to define urban
rehabilitation initiatives.

Urban redevelopment as a measure to deal with urban decline, this is when people
being re-housed in new suburbs so the inner city areas can be used instead for
commercial uses. Daniels, R. (1991), urban redevelopment is conceptually similar to
land readjustment, with the exception that it happens in existing urban areas and often
involves a rezoning by the government of a given area from a low-density, to higher-
density development. It is also accompanied by a provision of infrastructure
improvements (mass transit, such as metro lines) that can support such up-zoning. As
part of this process, a government assembles the individual private properties and
undertakes a new higher development plan and delivers the necessary infrastructure. At
the end, the government returns to each landowner a share of the overall new
development that is equivalent to their original land or property ownership. It retains a
share of the development that it then sells to recover the cost of the infrastructure
improvement.

Urban gentrification is a process of change in the social and economic condition of

urban neighborhoods where poorer original residents are replaced by newcomers from
middle class and professional groups. Urban gentrification brings change in an urban
area associated with the movement of more affluent individuals into a lower-class area.

By way of conclusion the impact urban decay are characterized by high unemployment
rates, depopulation, and abandonment of buildings which is as a result of poor urban
planning, poor political decision making, redlining, poverty, suburbanization and racial
discrimination. Although this raises concern in many’ mind, solutions such as urban
renewal and change in tax affairs as well as better decision making have been drown to
eradicate the urban decay problem.
Reference

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