RE-CITY: Reviving Shrinking Cities

Beyond 36 hours in Schwerin

by David Huntington

Today, the city of Schwerin is generally renowned for its fairy-tale castle, scenic waterscapes, and eclectic old town lined with narrow, cobblestoned streets, historic buildings, half-timbered houses, bustling markets, and a mélange of restaurants and cafes.

*Schwerin Palace, the city’s most famous landmark, is perched on a picturesque island and surrounded by Baroque gardens.*

There is, however, another side to Schwerin; one which isn’t featured in travel guides nor social media feeds. Namely, owing to its remarkable population growth while part of former East Germany, Schwerin is the site of several large-scale housing estates from the 1960s to 1980s. These primarily residential communities are located on the outskirts of the city centre and characterised by a fairly homogeneous urban fabric of medium- to high-rise prefabricated apartment blocks surrounded by generously-sized green spaces, wide streets, and an abundance of surface parking.

Such housing estates were constructed across the former East Germany as part of a national housing construction programme. State-regulated rents and amenities such as private bathrooms, hot water, and central heating made the apartments highly coveted.

While these communities were celebrated for their modern facilities and quality of life during the era of state socialism, in the years since the fall of the Berlin Wall they have increasingly become somewhat of a poster child for the socio-spatial perils of shocking institutional change and structural urban shrinkage.

The link between urban shrinkage and socio-spatial inequalities

Although short- to long-term phases of population and economic decline are hardly unique among former East German cities, Schwerin makes for an interesting study as it appears to be a case in point of how the conditions of shrinkage—namely, structural population decline triggered by economic, environmental, or socio-political stressors—and connected processes such as selective migration and housing vacancy can make cities especially vulnerable to worsening socio-spatial inequalities. More specifically, Schwerin’s path of socio-spatial change during and in the wake of shrinkage is marked by growing residential divides among different social groups, whereby the rich and poor, old and young, as well as natives and migrants are increasingly residing in certain areas of the city.

This is partly owing to the fact that waves of migration between Schwerin and other cities, and within Schwerin itself, during the 1990s and 2000s were largely selective in nature; it was above all those who could who moved away from less attractive neighbourhoods to their choice of inner-city quarters, existing and new suburban developments, or beyond.

So, while the relaxed housing market that coincided with Schwerin’s shrinkage led to increased residential mobility, it did not, contrary to what one might assume, facilitate social mixing. They rather kickstarted what has often been described in the literature as a sort of ‘brain drain.’ Simply put, this is because better-off households were better positioned to capitalise on this window of opportunity to improve their living conditions.

*Schwerin’s historic market square is the site of a farmer’s market every Wednesday and Friday.*

In other words, urban shrinkage affected the dynamics of socio-spatial change and acted as a catalyst for residential segregation: the separation, whether forced or voluntary, of different population groups according to, for example, demographic, socio-economic, or cultural characteristics, in different locations over a larger area.

Wicked problems

Worsening socio-spatial inequalities in Schwerin were confirmed in a study by the Berlin-based Social Science Center (WZB), which analysed levels and patterns of residential segregation of select socio-economically vulnerable groups in numerous German cities between 2005 and 2014. In addition to generally rising levels of segregation among many of the cities in question, the study found an invisible border often runs between reurbanised or modernised inner-city quarters and large prefabricated housing estates on the outskirts, especially in former East German cities^[1]. This is just the situation in Schwerin, where patterns of socio-economic differentiation have developed between two extremes. On the one hand, there are the historic inner-city districts, with a mix of architectural styles and walkable streets—often bustling with locals and tourists, rain or shine—but also a proliferation of luxury apartments in the premium price segment and increasing concentrations of better-off residents. On the other, there are large housing estates just beyond the historic centre, comprised of prefabricated buildings standing from the era of state socialism, which, despite ongoing modernisation and so-called integrated urban development planning efforts, have become increasingly overrepresented by socio-economically vulnerable households ranging from the unemployed, to social assistance beneficiaries, to migrants, to the elderly.

A graffiti writer takes urban wayfinding into their own hands, adding the words “segregation tour” above officially sanctioned street art indicating the direction of Schwerin’s historic city centre and castle.

Of course, the fact that Schwerin’s population has declined from a peak of more than 130,000 in 1988 to roughly 95,000 today is not the only factor at play. Several additional, intertwined structural forces, many of which are intrinsically related to population change, have figured into the city’s path and patterns of socio-economic segregation. Such forces include but are not limited to the greater region’s post-socialist economic transformation to a capitalist market; its post-industrial shift towards a high-tech, service, and tourism-based economy; welfare state reforms; broader demographic and lifestyle trends; changing international migratory patterns; and increasing exposure to neoliberalism and globalism, in addition to urban sprawl and suburbanisation.

Nevertheless, in Schwerin, it appears the aforementioned processes of urban shrinkage, combined with the city’s heterogeneous urban morphology—consisting of, broadly speaking, a medieval city centre, pockets of large socialist-era housing estates, and a scattering of more suburban areas—have played a noteworthy role in the city’s socio-spatial change and contemporary challenges with segregation.

Measuring residential segregation

Given the necessary raw data, a variety of statistical methods can be applied to analyse levels or patterns of segregation in cities. Oftentimes, however, such inequalities may be readily apparent by simply walking the streets. In Schwerin, these challenges are particularly noticeable in the adjacent districts of Großer Dreesch, Mueßer Holz, and Neu Zippendorf; collectively known as the Dreesch. Located about five kilometres south of the city centre, these primarily residential districts were constructed between 1976 and 1989 and almost exclusively consist of prefabricated five- to eleven-storey apartment blocks.

In the Dreesch, prefabricated mid- to high-rise buildings constructed between the 1960s and 1990 dominate the cityscape.
In the Dreesch, prefabricated mid- to high-rise buildings constructed between the 1960s and 1990 dominate the cityscape.
In the Dreesch, prefabricated mid- to high-rise buildings constructed between the 1960s and 1990 dominate the cityscape.

At the time of their completion, these apartments were highly sought after in light of their offerings, such as spacious living space, central heating, balconies, close proximity to shopping and schools, parks and nature, as well as convenient access to the city centre by personal or public transport. As a sign of the area’s popularity, some 62,000 residents—more than half of Schwerin’s population—called the Dreesch home in the 1980s.

Built in 1910, this former hotel and restaurant on the beachfront of Lake Schwerin shut its doors to guests in the early 2000s. While unauthorised parties kept cobwebs from collecting for a few years after it was abandoned, it has since become a thorn in the side of local officials, planners, and residents alike.

Today, fewer than 25,000 people live here. In terms of population composition, the area includes by far the largest shares of socio-economically disadvantaged groups, whether we are speaking of recipients of social assistance, unemployment insurance, or rates of children living below the poverty line. In recent years, the combined effect of high vacancy rates and relatively low rents alongside Germany’s record-breaking influx of refugees in 2015 and 2016 have led to previously unseen spatial concentrations of immigrants among these areas and corresponding increases in city-wide levels of socio-economic segregation.

Erected between 1960 and 1964 while Schwerin was still part of state socialist East Germany, this peculiarly shaped, 137-metre TV tower with an observation deck and restaurant served as a key meeting point for locals and visitors of the Dreesch for nearly a half-century. Since its closure to the public in 2017, many locals have actively called for it to be reopened, arguing such efforts would improve public perceptions of the area as well as entice visitors—*and perhaps even new residents*—*from near and afar.*

In addition to overrepresentations of socio-economically vulnerable households in these peripherally-located districts, segregation is also increasing in the other direction, insofar as shares of affluent households are growing among certain inner-city and suburban districts. While this may be due in part to above-average rents and property values in more desirable neighbourhoods, arguably even more significant is the spatial distribution of the city’s existing social housing, which is primarily clustered in parts of the city with an abundance of below-average rental options. The concern that social mixing hangs not on the absolute number of units, but instead on their location, has been raised by numerous local actors and was highlighted in a follow-up to the aforementioned study ^[2]. In fact, cities with relatively high shares of social housing clustered in peripheral or otherwise marginalised areas may be tempting the fate of residential segregation and all of its attendant social inequalities.

A vicious cycle of decline

Left unchecked, socio-economic segregation may fuel a range of negative consequences, including reduced levels of educational achievement among children and young adults, waning opportunities on the local labour market, and even declining voter turnout. Moreover, where concentrations of disadvantaged groups in marginalised areas are concerned, segregation can instigate stigmatisation, which in turn reinforces the challenge of combating segregation, not to mention further urban shrinkage.

Vacant apartment blocks in the vicinity of Berliner Platz, one of the Dreesch’s few public squares, have been the target of extensive demolition efforts in recent years.
Vacant apartment blocks in the vicinity of Berliner Platz, one of the Dreesch’s few public squares, have been the target of extensive demolition efforts in recent years.

Accordingly, a leading principle of urban planning in Germany and generally throughout Europe is socially mixed communities that afford all residents equitable access to life opportunities. Such communities not only contribute to social integration and stability, they also positively contribute to one’s health and overall well-being.

Bridging divides

Combating socio-spatial polarisation has traditionally remained first and foremost the responsibility of local politicians and governmental authorities. Alas, the deteriorated fiscal base that typically accompanies urban shrinkage leaves many cities unable to complete tasks like constructing public housing in more attractive areas, let alone maintain ailing infrastructure such as schools or waste management facilities. However, higher levels of government may also support local authorities to tackle segregation, through policies like providing funding opportunities for new social housing in coveted locations as well as the physical and socio-economic regeneration of marginalised communities.

Following the lead of many other German cities challenged by socio-spatial inequalities, Schwerin opened a new meeting centre, ‘Campus am Turm,’ in the district of Mueßer Holz in 2019. The centre houses the district office, a music school, adult education centre, and a handful of community organisations.

In order to reverse trends of increasing socio-spatial inequalities, Schwerin is advised to move beyond simply mitigating the consequences of segregation by way of active neighbourhood management programs, which, despite their potential benefits for residents of such communities, have increasingly come under fire for being makeshift solutions at best (and for reinforcing social inequalities at worst), and towards the implementation of more effective place-sensitive policies that take into account the multiple factors at play in deprived communities. Looking ahead, the introduction of requirements for the construction of public housing in the city centre and regulations on rent increases could be key avenues for a more socially mixed and thereby just city.

David Huntington is a PhD candidate in human geography at Adam Mickiewicz University and part of the EU Horizon 2020 project RE-CITY, “Reviving shrinking cities”. Combining his background in public policy and urban planning, his current research focuses on the nexus between structural shrinkage and socio-spatial inequalities.

^[1] See Helbig, M. & Jähnen, S. (2018). Wie brüchig ist die soziale Architektur unserer Städte? Trends und Analysen der Segregation in 74 deutschen Städten. Discussion Paper P 2018–001. Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin für Sozialforschung, Berlin.

^[2] See Helbig, M. & Jähnen, S. (2019). Wo findet „Integration“ statt? Die sozialräumliche Verteilung von Zuwanderern in den deutschen Städten zwischen 2014 und 2017. Discussion Paper P 2019–003. Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin für Sozialforschung, Berlin.

Perspective through paradoxes: a visit to Zwickau

by Ruiying Liu, ESR at the Technical University of Dortmund

Cities are collages of places, with not one but many places and genii loci (spirits of place) — a general rule for big cities, but especially essential to the East German city Zwickau, the destination of my fieldtrip. Although strictly it is no longer a big city (Großstadt) with the population long fallen under 100,000, it is still managed and developed with this self-perception. It boasts of a historic city centre, various large sport venues, large shopping venues, large culture venues, etc. But aside from the growing number of isolated facilities, I struggled to find a coherent urban environment where different layers cohere and create synergy among the many inconsistencies and paradoxes, contrasts and colliding visions packed into one city.

The city of Zwickau has many parallel dreams, like Robert-Schumann City and Automobilstadt. What makes the city cohere into a whole?

Zwickau is the Robert-Schumann city, and the historic centre is full of amazing classic buildings within easy reach of public transport (Pic 1). But there are no street musicians in public space. Maybe the city once shaped Schumann, but Schumann has not shaped the city, not how it is experienced and used in modern days. Zwickau is also a city of cars (Automobilstadt): birthplace of August Horch, home to the headquarters of Audi and currently the seat of Volkswagen Saxony. However, the famous car museum seems as little connected to the urban spaces as classic music. It is not related to the city centre, and around it, there are no lively public spaces or commercial environments. Furthermore, it is the car traffic that undermines the living quality in the inner city, where housing vacancy goes hand in hand with car traffic in the street (Pic 2).

Unlike professional facilities, sport opportunities in green space is part of the urban space where daily life is lived.

In terms of leisure facilities, one can almost call Zwickau a sport city. In recent years a streak of professional sport facilities like the new football stadium (above, top right) were built, because old ones have fallen out of date. But instead of professional facilities, which might become financially challenging to maintain just like before, sport opportunities in green space is less demanding to create and work in synergy with its surroundings (above, left). In terms of green space, the Schwanenteich Park is a proud symbol of the urbanity of the city, because it is a landscape park with a large lake (above, bottom right). But this appreciation for water is not expressed in public space anywhere else in the city. On the MuldeParadies, the riverfront, you cannot see the river, and the many streams in the city are all hidden behind thick bushes like ditches. The local assumption is that people fear natural water, because of the many flood disasters in the last few decades.

So what, if the apartments are on the cheaper side, as long as it fulfills the promise of the city — a social, high-quality environment with modern facilities — in ways suburban homes cannot?

Zwickau boasts of having a Soziale Stadt (Social City) programme. Indeed, the social vitality in the densely populated areas is inspiring to see: the green spaces created from demolition of vacant housing become playgrounds and landscape parks, supporting neighbourhood experience, family life, and social facilities (slideshow above). This shows that mass housing areas can evolve into a model of quality living. But in the city centre, this form of development is a thorn in the eyes, where several massive high-rises sit fast in the way to the riverside, blocking the old centre skyline. Once a symbol of egalitarian ideology and much-envied homes, now they are considered taunting figures overshadowing the beautiful historic buildings. Zwickau’s local initiative for a vision in 2050 presents a future where these blocks are finally gone or replaced by chic apartments and offices. But isn’t there beauty in how occupied and full of life they are? Here, the low and medium income households can live next to the best city centre facilities, pensioners can afford daily lunch at a restaurant and children can play together in beautiful green space in sight of their homes.

The city is moving forward economically, and young people moving up the income ladder and seeking to procure stability want better perspectives. But the reality is that the options for good housing and home ownership exist largely for whole-house-buyers. What if people do not want to live in the classical suburban houses with gardens and two cars? The challenge for local planners and developers is to enrich the options in between these two ends to attract younger generations.

Ironically, the car-dependent lifestyle is killing the inner city of the Automobilstadt. But reinventing the spirit of mobility is not as simple as a few charging stations.

Another future challenge is reinventing the image of Zwickau— “the city of cars” — to be something more environment-friendly and widely acceptable (Pic 3). Maybe “the city of mobility” as some citizens suggested? Indeed the spirit of cars is individual mobility, not the air pollution, the noise of trucks driving through the centre, the nuisance of drivers honking impatiently behind you. In big cities, car driving is technically impossible to be realised for everyone, so the collective vision might better be replaced with something where mobility can be achieved for everyone. Thus it has come to pass that the state funded model project (ZED), materialises, in respect of mobility, in a renting station for e-scooters for the elderly in a fast-ageing neighbourhood (Pic 4). But given the conditions of pedestrian infrastructure all over the city (not to mention the virtual absence of bike lanes), how do you ensure the safety for the elderly who will actually use these scooters for inner city trips?

It is often easy to forget that urban transformation depends on connecting things, stimulating synergy, creating coherent urban environments and reshaping the urban experience — especially in a city with so many parallels and contradictions.

Given its stock of cultural, sport, and shopping facilities, one could say Zwickau is a great city, with no reason of losing population at all… it has small inconveniences, inconsistencies, contradictions, here and there, nothing drastic. But therein lies the dangers for planning: they are easy to ignore because of their sheer pervasiveness, but in the long term they will constrain a city’s potential, and no matter how many patch-ups you make, they will not “incrementally” go away, because they are like problems with bones and vascular systems. These are the problems for long-term strategic public investments. But Zwickau’s record is investing in isolated facilities and projects — professional sports venues, residential projects, large cultural facilities — and afterwards, there is little energy left to connect things, to stimulate synergy, to create coherent urban environments and to reshape the urban experience according to changing social visions. This is inseparable from the fact that the city is handed state subsidies for isolated projects, but also related to the lack of collective consensus and design for the future, in order to strategically invest in larger-scale and long-term issues. Moving forward requires confronting past trajectories, especially appreciating the socioeconomic layers and their often contradicting spatial expressions. In a city with little population pressure, there is a good chance that development does not have to mean one form of living has to be sacrificed for other forms and thus political conflicts. It is the planners’ task to shape the urban environment in which they are related to each other and stimulate unity in diversity.

“Together, we go further”

Creating a neighbourhood solidarity system

Solène LeBorgne, RE-CITY ESR at the University of Amsterdam

Located at one of the extremities of the city centre, the Centre social Vertpré welcomes all who want to take part in its activities: sewing, cooking, game playing, informatics, singing, etc. Its small and intimate building, which was initially built to serve as a warehouse for the train company, has been adopted as a “second house” by some of its members, who can also just drop by for coffee or conversation.

I came to know the Vertpré community centre while I was conducting my fieldwork for a case study, as part of my PhD. My thesis focuses on the consequences of urban shrinkage in the daily life of the inhabitants, and in particular on how this phenomenon affects people’s place attachment and social capital. I am interested in the role of social networks – of relatives, friends, neighbours or acquaintances – and I try to understand whether belonging to a social network allows people to better cope with everyday difficulties, including those that could be caused, directly or not, by urban shrinkage. I contacted the team working at Vertpré in order to know more about their actions, as well as the specific characteristics and issues of the people who come there.

The playroom at Vertpré, copyright Blandine Bertrand.
Source: nevers.fr (https://www.nevers.fr/vivre-a-nevers/cohesion-sociale/les-centres-sociaux/le-centre-social-vertpre-medio)

I started spending time and interviewing people there in the few months that followed the first wave of Covid-19 in spring 2020, when the pandemic had momentarily slowed and the regulations eased. After two months of abrupt interruption to social life, several people were coming back to the community centre, while many were still too afraid to come back and remained home.

A lot of people expressed how difficult and depressing those two months of complete lockdown had been for them. In response to this, the community centre’s team had the idea of organising a discussion group to allow people to express their feelings and share their experience. Among the themes that emerged were loneliness, anxiety, and lack of information – or, on the contrary, being overwhelmed by negative news from the national media. Beyond the experience sharing though, the idea was to identify what people needed most, and maybe even the resources they had within themselves to meet those needs.

An outing with the community centre to a local history museum

This system of mutual help is entirely free of charge

Building on the outcomes of this discussion group, the team working at Vertpré came up with a project called “Ensemble on va plus loin” (Together, we go further). Inspired by actions implemented in other towns of the area, the idea is to invite people to express a need, or, alternatively, to offer something. For example: I need someone to drive me on an errand, or I can offer cat-sitting. The community centre’s director called it a proximity solidarity project, because it all works within a local social network. In concrete terms, the project takes the form of a board, displayed in a corridor of the social centre, divided into two columns. On the left, anyone can write the type of help he or she is seeking. On the right, people are invited to write what they have to offer, be it cat-sitting or knitting lessons. This system of mutual help is entirely free of charge: it is not an exchange of paid services. A Vertpré facilitator is responsible for putting people in touch with each other to ensure that this rule is respected.

During my fieldwork in Nevers and at Vertpré, I had the opportunity to interview several members of the community centre. As my interviews focused partly on solidarity and mutual help between relatives, friends, or neighbours, I had the opportunity to ask them about this project, which had just been launched and hadn’t really started yet. Most of the members were aware of the project, and thought it a good idea. However, none of them had engaged with it yet. In practise, none of the interviewees could find a personal use for it. They didn’t have any ideas about something they would be able to offer or to get.

Did it lack bottom-up input? It’s true that the project was mainly initiated by the team, in what they understood as a response to the needs they had identified. It was not led by the group of people who were supposed to benefit from it, and maybe as a result, these people had a hard time figuring out how they could use it. On the other hand, the discussion group clearly identified some issues that the participants had difficulties to address, but the latter were somehow at loss in thinking out solutions.

In my interviews, I found that some of the members of Vertpré relied on their relatives or on a small group of close friends when they really needed help with something. Often, they did not feel very comfortable at the idea of asking for help to people they didn’t know. Others prided themselves in being very self-reliant and never having to ask for help, organising everyday life in order to be fully autonomous and independent. Maybe the project started very slowly because the people who come to Vertpré, who are more isolated or fragile, come here primarily to socialise and meet other people, not to get practical help. Another reason could be that it takes a while to disturb individual routines and systems.

The Vertpré social centre in the city centre of Nevers

What is there to learn from this experience? That some projects take time. It might take a little while before everyone adopts it, especially when social life is so frequently interrupted and slowed down by many restrictions. But witnessing the birth of the project and the difficulties faced when it was launched, helps to better grasp the conditions for the success of such an initiative and the obstacles that are to be overcome. The key learning here might be that to ensure the success of such a project, one should start small, and slow, but also that it might be easier to get people to help with something than to have them ask for help.

To explore these ideas, I plan to compare how this project was thought up and implemented with the way informal solidarities are created and conducted in people’s daily lives. I will also try to identify the contextual and personal conditions that could lead to the two different outcomes, between the people who are more isolated and rely – willingly or not – only on themselves to face daily life needs and difficulties, and those who benefit from the help of a social network of friends, relatives or neighbours. All hypotheses to be further investigated…

Focus: impact of the pandemic on your work and research

Dr Kai Böhme, founder and director of Spatial Foresight, answered our questions on the impact of Covid19 on research. Spatial Foresight is a private consultancy and independent think tank in the area of European territorial policies and research, and one of the partner institutions of the RE-CITY project.

What was the impact of the Coronavirus pandemic on your institution or company?

The immediate impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic and the various policy measures taken were that we had to reorganise the way we work. This was however less challenging for us than for many of our clients and cooperation partners. As we work in a decentralised structure with a team spread out over offices in Luxembourg, Germany and France, the step towards everybody working from home – at least temporarily – was mainly a logistical one in terms of ensuring that people have screens and desks at home, i.e. could borrow those from the office.

In a second step, almost all of our assignments and studies needed to be re-planned. As we work with international analysis and policy support, our work involves numerous meetings, workshops, conferences and events in more than 30 countries. All this had to be re-planned – in cooperation with our clients and collaborators – towards digital meetings, adjusted timetables or even cancelled tasks. Once this was done, things went rather smoothly.

In a third step, we note a contraction and slowdown of the market we are operating in. This implies that additional efforts are needed to attract new assignments and studies. So far, we have been very lucky. We did not need to put any colleagues on short-time work or temporarily layoff staff, as some cooperation partners had to do.

This means from a practical point of view, things could be adjusted more or less easily. More challenging are the psychological effects of the pandemic among colleagues, cooperation partners and clients. In broad terms, we have seen a considerable decline in work efficiency in 2020, as compared to previous years.

What changes did you have to implement in your way of work?

The way we work has been affected in terms of changed office routines mainly for the colleagues in our offices in Luxembourg and France. Depending on national requirements, this involved periods of complete home offices and periods of shifts between home and in-office days, to ensure that the number of people in office at the same time correspond to national sanitary requirements etc.

As previously mentioned, interaction and exchange with cooperation partners and clients in more than 30 countries is part of our daily work. Until March 2020, this involved a lot of traveling. Now all this has changed to digital platforms. So beside more home office, the absence of travelling is the most notable change.

While the merits of videoconferencing are certainly welcome as they reduce excessive travelling, it also becomes clear that for some issues face-to-face meetings work better than videoconferencing. In some assignments, we see that the depth of policy processes is affected, as side meetings to solve conflicts or coin innovative solutions over a coffee are missing.

Internally we see also that the informal exchange between colleagues – over lunch or coffee or just in the corridor – is missing. This affects institutional learning, efficiency and to some degree it might even risk to lower the quality of our work.

“People start to understand better the relevance of thinking about the future.”

How did the pandemic affect the research focus of your institution or company?

The research focus of Spatial Foresight has been affected in at least two ways.

Firstly, researching and analysing the impact of the pandemic and especially the various lockdown measures on local and regional development across Europe has become a new topic. Partly it comes as add-on to existing studies and partly we have been assigned new studies on various facets of this by the European Commission, European Committee of the Regions, European Parliament or national players such as the Ministry for Spatial Planning in Luxembourg.

Secondly, our work on foresight, scenarios and wildcards receives more attention as people start to understand better the relevance of thinking about the future beyond ‘business as usual scenarios’ and ‘trend extrapolations’. In some circles we experience a new openness to think about different alternative futures and possible new realities post COVID-19.

What steps did you take to support the researchers under your supervision, including the Early Stage Researchers in the RE-City project?

I would hope that we treated and supported our Early Stage Researcher in same way as all other colleagues working in consultancy. We try to keep the motivation and energy levels up to the degree possible, and explore the changes the pandemic brought about to see what chances they might offer. As Winston Churchill supposedly said: “Never waste a good crisis.”

In that sense we encouraged our Early Stage Researcher to see the pandemic as an opportunity and follow through his idea to study the impacts of COVID-19 lockdown measures as part of the PhD research. Indeed, one might even argue, that the necessity to move quickly, if one wants to be among the first to analyse the impacts of COVID-19, accelerated some parts of the PhD research. This concerns e.g. the development of the methodology for policy impact assessment, and the test of this methodology for COVID-19 related lockdown policies.

“We are still too stuck in trying to replicate what we know from the past.”

In your opinion, how will the Coronavirus pandemic affect the organizational and research culture of your organization in the long term?

As for the medium-term future, I would assume that videoconferences are here to stay. This means that business trips may not return to the same degree as we knew them before 2020. Hopefully, this will also mean that our society learns how to better utilise the possibilities of digital communication, exploring new forms of interaction and digital workshops, which are not just attempts to mirror what we are used to from face-to-face meetings. In this way maybe even the losses of efficiency and institutional learning – mentioned above – can be overcome. We simply need to find new ways to work and cooperate and establish new realities. Currently we are still too stuck in trying to replicate what we know from the past.

At the same time, we experience already a contraction of the market with increasing competition for contracts. This means, everyone will need to show what she or he goes for, much more than in the last 10 years. In some way it is similar as to the situation directly after the financial crisis in 2008. Back then competition got also considerably tougher and required companies and people to adapt and innovate to stay ahead of the game. This is also an opportunity to change things and shape new realities.

Could you imagine any positive effect for shrinking cities from the impacts of the pandemic? Do you observe any new dynamic or trend that could favour shrinking cities in the medium-term?

Certainly, the pandemic also brings positive effects. It opens space for discussions about new realities that dare to challenge old standards and taboos. If this chance is taken, it might pave the way for better European integration – e.g. as the pandemic has shown shortcomings in labour laws concerning home offices in foreign countries, which are now addressed bilaterally by some EU Member States – and maybe also for a more sustainable development with a stronger focus on the place one is present in, and less swishing around with high environmental costs but little actual benefit for our society.

This might also hold potential for some shrinking cities. The pandemic might e.g. soften the hype on urban agglomerations , and increase the appreciation for ecosystem services delivered in less densely populated areas – as sustainable development and preserved ecosystems can help reducing risks for new pandemics in future.

FOCUS:

Impact of COVID on Research of RE-City’s Scientists in Charge

2020 may be behind us, but the pandemic continues to turn our lives upside down. In previous posts we have asked our PhD colleagues to tell us about how the pandemic has impacted their research. While trying to write a thesis in times of pandemic is a great challenge, PhDs are not the only ones who have to rethink their research activities and work lives.

We asked our supervisors to share their thoughts on how COVID has impacted their daily work. From teaching to personal, between faculty admin, daycare and thesis supervision, from southwestern Germany to the Netherlands: our interviewees this week were Prof. Karina Pallagst from TU Kaiserslautern (Germany) and Dr. Marco Bontje from the University of Amsterdam (Netherlands).

This is the first article in a series dedicated to how the pandemic is handled by experienced researchers.

What was the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on your institution?

Marco: As of mid-March, access to our campus in Amsterdam (UvA) was drastically reduced and everyone was encouraged to work and study at home as much as possible. Teaching moved largely online, and teaching on-site has become the exception.

Karina: In Germany, the pandemic changed the way TUK usually operates. In terms of teaching, classes had to go online within a short period of time, just as in the Netherlands. Concerning research, business trips to risk areas were no longer allowed. Administratively, many procedures went online as well so that people could work from their homes or take turns when it came to working on-site.

Marco: At UvA, too, research projects were impacted with especially plans for fieldwork being cancelled or postponed. But also regular meetings among colleagues had to be replaced by online versions if possible.

What changes did you have to implement in your way of work?

Karina: The pandemic requires a high level of flexibility from everyone. What is important to mention is that online meetings demand a lot more organization. However, the challenges encountered apply to the personal level, too. One such challenge was home schooling: the work schedule needs to be coordinated with the family schedule, which can of course be complicated at times.

Marco: Indeed! I have hardly seen the UvA campus since mid-March. What you see in the photo is where I worked since March and will probably still work most of the days in the coming months: my office at home. I agree with Karina that online teaching, if you are doing it for the first time, is very time- and energy-consuming. As a result, my work has become almost full-time teaching and teaching management, with unfortunately very little time left for research and writing. I have also not been outside of my home country since mid-March, which is very uncommon for me. As a geographer I like travelling of course. Hopefully more travels are possible in 2021!

How did the pandemic affect the research of your institution?

Marco: Most ongoing projects continued somehow, and our researchers kept developing new ideas in line with their expertise and specializations. But of course we also noticed that more and more calls for research proposals were focusing on possible impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. So, next to doing our best to keep ongoing research running, we are also trying to add some new projects about COVID-19 impact, as long as they fit well with what we are already good at.

Karina: For us, the research focus did not change to a large extent – ongoing projects still need to be carried out in line with the work plan. However, some scholars at TUK started individual smaller projects on the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, as well.

What steps did you take to support the researchers under your supervision, including the early stage researchers in the RE-CITY project?

Marco: We try to meet online as much as possible and to keep in touch as much as possible, though we are aware that this can never replace ‘meeting in real life’ of course. Yet we make use of what is available and possible. It is important to let the PhD students and early stage researchers feel they are still part of a group, a research team; not only in the RE-CITY project but also in our UvA research group Urban Geographies and our Department of Human Geography, Planning and International Development Studies.

Karina: On our side, we took safety measures and developed a hygiene plan for the office environment of course. But we also gave our PhDs the choice to either work from home, or at the office – depending on their preferences. In terms of their projects, we discussed in detail the organization and timing of secondments.

Marco: With regards to secondments, it is really a pity to see how the pandemic has affected the ESRs’ fieldwork and stays abroad with partner institutions. Unfortunately, we could hardly be a host for the ESRs that visited UvA in Spring 2020. They had to work remotely for most of the time instead of at our department. As a result, our interactions were mainly virtual.

Karina: Apart from the secondments, one big step for us as coordinators of the network was the transition of one ESR from one institution to another. Already challenging as process, it had to be in sync with safety measures and regulations for quarantine.

In your opinion, how will the coronavirus pandemic affect the organizational and research culture of your organization in the long term?

Karina: I believe that we will possibly see a greater flexibility within the work environment.

Marco: Yes, many people are likely to continue working from home more, and less at the office, with many meetings likely to continue taking place online. We will probably travel less, and if we do, less by plane and more by train. However, I do expect at least a part of our processes to return to what was ‘normal’ as soon as possible: meeting ‘real people’ instead of only seeing them on your screen will remain important!

Could you imagine any positive effect for shrinking cities from the impacts of the pandemic?

Karina: In my opinion this depends on the type of shrinking city; in some areas, a move to the countryside could be observed, as people were allowed to work from anywhere. This could be a gain for shrinking rural areas, but it is yet unclear if it will be a larger trend. However, the pandemic might hit those communities hard which have a low tax base – thus shrinking cities can be affected to a large extent.

Do you observe any new dynamic or trend that could favor shrinking cities in the medium term?

Marco: I agree with Karina about the fact that lower density areas, such as those found in shrinking cities, could become more attractive. People living in high-density growing cities may see shrinking ones and their affordable housing as an attractive alternative. Consequently, some cities and regions that until recently were used to continuous growth, like Amsterdam for example, may now realize what is like to be a shrinking city. This could increase the mutual understanding between growing and shrinking cities and regions.

[Disclaimer: The responses were lightly edited for length and/or clarity]

Secondment during pandemic: my Amsterdam experience

by Bozhidar Ivanov, early stage researcher at the Technical University of Kaiserslautern

My winter semester in TU Kaiserslautern ended with extreme exhaustion and a lingering feeling of insecurity due to the first cases of Covid-19 in Rhineland-Palatinate (Germany); therefore, I was really looking forward to moving to Amsterdam for my secondment. I had prepared a long list of locations and activities for my free time, together with the ever expanding to-do list for my PhD project. I was quite relieved to arrive in Amsterdam on a rainy afternoon at the end of February and to start my research visit in the University of Amsterdam as of March.

The UvA campus was turned into a workout location during the lockdown

At the end of the second week of my stay, the pandemic grasped the Netherlands firmly, and as I managed to run to the library on the last possible day to take a textbook on research design in urban planning (which saved my work afterwards), I began to realize that all my plans were now slowly being covered in a thick fog of uncertainty. I took refuge in my hotel room, which gradually became my survival camp for the next few months. Similar to many people around the world, my plans for an exciting stay in the Netherlands sank into a sea of worldwide statistics, news for lockdown measures and an overall sense of anxiety almost everyone I know experienced. As I was trying to realize what exactly was happening, I was reading news and following the situation in Spain, Germany, the Netherlands, Bulgaria and Italy and it took me just 5 days to become completely overwhelmed by the information and unable to work at all. At this point, I realized that the choice was up to me: I could either spend the upcoming 4 months under the overwhelming pressure of a world coming to a halt, or I could try to find peace in my work and build a productive ‘survival’ routine to keep me going.

I chose the latter. The lockdown in the Netherlands was honestly comfortable. We were allowed to go out for sports throughout the whole period, therefore I decided to incorporate regular physical activity as part of my routine (and to get used to the rather uncomfortable Dutch weather). In addition, I decided to cut down on the news flow, social media usage and statistics monitoring, leaving only two sources of information on the Dutch situation, so I knew what rules to follow. This managed to clear the fog of information and to free up mental capacity to focus on my work. As it happened, the beginning of my secondment coincided with a long list of tasks for my research which I had to tackle anyway, pandemic or not, so I focused on them and managed to catch up with most of what was planned. The Amsterdam sunset views from my room definitely helped.

The sunset views from Bozhidar’s room in Amsterdam

But as some plans were slowly realized, others were falling apart. Two upcoming conferences in the summer were cancelled; a fieldtrip from my university was cancelled; my trip to Bulgaria was cancelled, so I couldn’t see my family and friends for Easter; Eurovision in Rotterdam was cancelled; a massive EDM hardcore festival got cancelled, and I couldn’t visit even a single museum. I realized that I had to accept this new reality and be as flexible as possible. This has never been easy for me, but I tried and I think to a certain extent I succeeded – I fell in love with Amsterdam and found a new home up north.

Nieuwe Meer, part of Bozhidar’s running routine

I also realize that I got lucky with coming to Amsterdam just two weeks before the lockdown started, especially as compared to my colleagues whose secondment plans got severely affected by the pandemic. So I decided that if I was lucky enough to be safe there, I had to do something with the time I was given, and it was up to me to decide how to approach this crisis. I ended up treating the secondment as a sabbatical leave for which my survival formula was:

Focus on yourself and your work
Avoid news
Keep in touch with friends and family (long live video calls and postcards)
Accept unpredictability and uncertainty
Stay fit
Embrace adventure and explore

The strict work from home routine from Monday to Friday allowed me to utilize the weekends for ‘explore and discover’ trips around Amsterdam (my way of saying “Get lost in an unknown part of Amsterdam”). As a result, I could experience the city in a completely different way – emptied out and left only to the locals. I already found countless favourite places in Amsterdam. Here, I will highlight three interesting neighbourhoods that caught my attention – both as an urban researcher and as an explorer, enjoying the empty streets.

Starting with an overwhelmingly impressive place – IJburg. Built in a true Dutch fashion on artificially created islands, IJburg sports a fascinating planning pattern and architecture which welcome you from the ‘doorstep’: the masterpiece Nescio Bridge for cyclists and pedestrians.

IJburg is a fully functional suburban area with mixed residential buildings, parks, beaches, community and shopping center and transport connections to the city. Water is integrated in the street grid and, in a true Amsterdam tradition, some residents have direct access to the canals from their balconies.

Nescio Bridge and other views of IJburg

Another interesting area was Betondorp (Concrete Village). The neighbourhood of the legendary Dutch football player Johan Cruyff welcomes you with a huge mural dedicated to him. Betondorp has two distinctive parts – one with high-rise residential blocks mixed with single and double family houses and one with minimalist art-deco architecture, following a brutalist tradition with exposed concrete. In both of the places, the public spaces are well planned and balanced between different uses – green areas, playgrounds and transport.

Impressions from Betondorp

The final highlight would be Bijlmer, a neighborhood in Amsterdam Zuid-Oost. Although the borough of Zuid-Oost is currently gaining momentum as a new hip place, Bijlmer has a rough history. Previously, it was notorious for higher-than-average criminal activity and a lot of local conflicts. In 1992, the Bijlmer disaster (Bijlmerramp) occurred – a Boeing 747 crashed in one of the residential blocks. This triggered a huge renovation of the Bijlmer complex: the original hexagonal grid of high-rise residential blocks designed by Siegfried Nassuth were dismantled and more green space was opened for the remaining residents. This intervention gradually improved the housing conditions and the overall image of Bijlmer. I was impressed by the tranquility and open space available. What also remains in certain places is the original two-level traffic design – cars and public transport utilize elevated sections. I do have a soft spot for large residential complexes such as this one, so I couldn’t help but make parallels to the socialist complexes such as Grünau in Leipzig or Lyulin in Sofia, which are more familiar to me.

Insights from Bijlmer

Of course, these are not the only areas which impressed me in Amsterdam. In fact, Dutch urban design and planning is very distinctive and the feeling that everything was planned in the best possible way follows you almost everywhere. One of the most impressive parts for me is the integration of the water in planning – I think this skill is authentically Dutch and perhaps it makes sense as Dutch history shows one thing –embracing the water is possible.

Discovering the city under lockdown completely changes the perception. In fact, I felt more like a local than a tourist, roaming through those areas on my bike or just walking. I felt how the local people, as few as they were, reclaimed the space. Perhaps this is why as a result of the lockdown, a petition was started by Amsterdam residents to restrict the capacity of tourism and try to curb down the numbers. For me, coming to Amsterdam for the first time during the lockdown presented an excellent opportunity for urban exploration, which left me inspired and made me feel at home.

As simple as my routine sounds, it was not always easy. I also had periods when I was feeling down and couldn’t be productive. As everybody says, “these are special times”. But we have to keep on fighting and to try to utilize this crisis as an opportunity for a positive change.

Already back home in Kaiserslautern, I hope to keep my Dutch memories and inspiration in the long term.

REflections

RE-CITY network members on research, working from home, and societal changes during the COVID-19 pandemic

PhD-ing in Times of Corona

by Agnes Matoga, early stage researcher at the Technical University of Kaiserslautern

A couple of days ago I read a tweet that said something similar to: “You are not working from home. You are at your home during a crisis trying to work”. This is exactly the situation I am finding myself in, as I have been beating myself up for not being “productive” enough. The nature of doing a PhD in our field does not require us to stand in a lab, which could lead many to believe that it was easier for us to just shift from office to home office. Although this is partly true, as large parts of our work require nothing but a desk, and I feel very bad for those without access to their labs, let’s not forget that our lab is the city. How are we supposed to do fieldwork, talk to people, do observations when cities are in lock down? I have found myself thinking about this a lot, because the current situation puts my research on hold.

Having talked to my supervisor, and having agreed on staying flexible with the thesis – which in the end might turn out to be very theory-heavy – has given me a small relief. However, working from home has not become easier. To this date (ed. note: we were slow to publish this piece, which Agnes wrote for us back in early April!) I have been at home for three weeks, and each week has been different in terms of productivity and mental health.

Agnes’s ever-growing collection of houseplants helped keep her company at home (photo: Agnes Matoga)

I purposefully took the first week for myself to adjust to being at home for the entire day and thinking about how I could best implement work under these circumstances The second week my productivity has been at a high – bear in mind that “a high” during quarantine is totally different from a high level of productivity at the actual office. If I could bring myself to read a couple of papers a day, that was enough. During the third week I focused on doing admin work, completing random tasks, clearing up folders and so on.

Do I feel bad for not producing my best work? Yes, of course. But completing a puzzle or binging Disney+ have felt more comforting for my personal mental health in some moments of these weeks. I believe that setting small and realistic goals is the only way that I can deal with the current situation, reminding myself that this is not a normal state and nobody has taught us how to do our work during a crisis.

Staying in touch from a distance…Agnes (bottom right) and three RE-CITY colleagues on a zoom call about content analysis

My double insecurity as a half-way PhD and social science researcher

by Ruiying Liu, early stage researcher at the Technical University of Dortmund

Every time, the email from our dean begins with ‘the coronavirus has a firm grip on our country’. Indeed, it has not only the nation physically in grip, but mentally. News, conversation and posts are all tuned to the topic and anything else risks being out of place and neglected.

I begin to notice what is essential and what is missing to make a good life and a good society.

Oh dear. In times of and following crisis, long-term but less dramatic issues are often the first to be sacrificed in terms of public attention and resource allocation. My PhD research began with nothing to do with pandemic or disaster prevention, but already research discussions are all around me about what planning can do for this new challenge. The world is evolving too fast for a slow-paced PhD like me.

I keep thinking back on the concept of path-dependency — what already happened can shape the future, not through direct causality but through the changing of parameters. From the personal level, the time I spent in isolation during this long-awaited secondment to the University of Amsterdam will come back to haunt me as I race to complete my PhD. From the professional level, when economy is hit, the funding for social science research could go to the more urgent or efficient sectors. From the level of society, I pray that countries will be able to resist trying to make up for lost GDP by sacrificing support for environment and social progress. In short, of all the concerns that visit my mind, few are actually about the virus.

On the other hand, the days I lived in isolation, trying to re-establish social interaction, re-design my daily life, and re-connect with mass media, I become more mindful of the meanings of things that I used to perform as routines. I begin to notice what is essential and what is missing to make a good life and a good society. And from the proliferating discussions online (what else can you do in these times but express and listen a lot), I think others have noticed it too. Consumerism — where you keep consuming passively — offers little to make life enjoyable if you cannot roam around freely and interact with your environment productively. Individualism, the shadow upon social values and collective action, obscures the deep structures that divide and exploit societies. Reflections on the ways we have lived up till the fateful month of March 2020, I hope, could also shift the path of our collective future.

Walks are a good chance for reflection. Ruiying snapped this photo in Park Oeverlanden, near where she and Bozhidar spent their secondments in Amsterdam

So even as the crisis subsides, the real fight goes on. A month ago most people would believe the world probably would not change much when the crisis stops. However, it will not ‘stop’ like a switch; rather, it has triggered many other things — things that maybe if we try very hard, can be steered and shaped towards a brighter path.

Building blocks of research

Notes from the 7th Winter School on Research Methodology in social sciences, urban studies and spatial planning in Florence, Italy

How better to escape the rain and hail in Kaiserslautern at the end of January 2020 than by attending a three days long winter school in Florence? The winter school, which greeted me with 15°C and sun, was organized and supported by various Italian institutes (see https://researchmethodologyws.org/info) and attended by 120 PhD students from all over the world (literally) and a selection of great planning scholars.

Although the focus of the school was on research methodology, I feel like it covered much more. A lot of PhDs will be familiar with all of this, but let me summarize what I took from the experience.

Pre-production, production, and post-production
This might seem obvious, but it is especially important in the beginning of your PhD journey. The three blocks “Pre-Production”, “Production” and “Post-Production” are here to help structure your research design. The former refers to your research idea, your research questions and the design of your research process. It is the time where you can and should let ideas flow before you start focusing on the one tiny part you can delve into. Production is all about identifying the relevant and existing literature, collecting and analyzing your data, and writing. If you thought you’d be done at “writing”, you’re wrong, because now you’ve only arrived at the Post-Production state. This is where the magic is supposed to happen, where you’re building knowledge, and where you will be submitting your papers to journals to receive rejections, revisions, and acceptances. Most importantly, these three big blocks are not a ladder or clear line. You will probably be required to come back to your research questions at a later point and think them through again, rephrase them or expand your literature review with newer findings.

Pre-production: Heuristics
Heuristics refer to the process of coming up with a hypothesis or idea. Unfortunately, there is no method that can be applied to have good ideas, but there are suggestions that can be used:

don’t take discipline boundaries too rigidly; be open to the unknown or unexpected. As Pasteur said, “fortune favors the prepared mind”;
try to view problems from different angles;
look for something that is not simply true, but fertile and intriguing;
give space to serendipity: remain open to surprise and pay attention to accidents (some of the most important findings for society are due to accidents);
discuss with everyone and listen to everyone – not only experts!
transform problems into visual representations.

View the problem from all angles: Agnes (left) learning about making research-based documentaries at a RE-CITY workshop
Photo: RE-CITY team

Production: Authoring is more than writing
If you think your writing is ready for every situation, you’re probably wrong. Different purposes require different styles of writing, and not everyone is born with the skill of automatically adapting to the situation. It takes practice, especially when writing academic papers for scientific journals; some would say it’s a science in itself. Most importantly, writing is different to authoring. You write a CV, a motivation letter, a blog post, etc. But authoring takes writing to another level. You have to clearly and confidently state what your research is about and what it’s not, why it is important, and how you contribute to the discipline. Always ask yourself when writing: so what? By the end of your PhD you should be able to answer the question clearly, explaining the added value of the conducted research. Remember that writing is not just a means of communicating our results, but also of organizing and testing our work. Starting to write is as important as any other part of your PhD, because often realizations appear through the writing process. Or as Flannery O’Connor once said: “I write because I don’t know what I think until I read what I say”.

Post-production: The publishing jungle
All was good during the winter school until the lecture on publishing. We were told that if we want to succeed or even survive in the academic world, we would have to play the game of publishing in highly ranked journals until there is a new way of sharing and measuring knowledge and impact.
However, some tips were shared on how to approach the publishing jungle. Most importantly, if you want to waste your research, publish in conference proceedings. This is harsh, but it was stressed that conference proceedings do not count as scientific papers. The publishing sphere is broadly categorized by two variables: index and access. The former refers to the omnipresent “impact factor”, which is defined by a number; the higher the number, the more important the journal. This is not always true, and this system has been criticized a lot, but there is no other way to classify journals at the moment. In general, the international academic network regards two publishing houses most highly: Thomson Reuters and Elsevier. Both release a database: Web of Science and Scopus, respectively, where you can find articles and search for journals by impact factor. Thomson Reuters ranks journals by ISI Impact Factor, while Elsevier uses Cite Score. Both of them release a journal ranking: the ISI Journal Citation Report (Thomson Reuters) and the Scimago Journal Rankings (Elsevier). In short: if you want to be more competitive on the job market, publish in highly ranked journals from these houses.
Tip: Use Scopus to find articles, and use ISI to find a specific journal.

Blog post author Agnes Matoga shares her research with the RE-CITY project team in Porto, September 2019
Photo: Rene Fleschurz

However (!), it was stressed many times during the winter school not to take the impact factor too seriously. It is a number that is comprised of the amount of citations. Many highly ranked journals publish a lot of literature reviews, which are generally cited more, raising their impact factor.

Regarding access, the main distinction is between subscription and open access journals. The former refers to journals where the author does not pay to publish, but the reader pays for access. In contrast, in open access journals the reader does not pay for access, but some have an article processing charge for authors while others do not. However, beware of predatory open access journals which claim to be trustworthy, and will charge you a fee before you realize that the journal does not actually exist or at least is not ranked anywhere.

What I am taking home from this workshop

During the three days of the workshop, I simultaneously received a boost in motivation for my own PhD and had an existential crisis. This is probably a very subjective experience, but spending time with fellow PhD students, who are all going through a similar journey provides a certain understanding of each other. Explaining my research to a group of strangers and receiving feedback such as “you’re the first one I know who is doing research on such a topic” or “this sounds actually quite exciting” made me realize that, yes, my research is relevant and more people need to know about it. This makes me kind of happy and excited to continue with whatever I am doing. However, the moments of existential crises followed shortly after, when the mentors explained how academia really works. One of the very first questions on the first day was how many of us want to stay in academia. I’d say around 80% of the participants raised their hands only to be told right after, that realistically only 10-20% of us would actually succeed. Academia has always been the path that I wanted to take, but seeing how difficult and unjust this world actually is, made me question whether I really want to push through the mental breakdowns I see in my future with submitting papers, rejections, revisions, applying for grants and so on. It is a serious game and it is not always fair, however if I decide to play it, I realized I need to grow some thick skin.

Footnote/further resources:

Heesen and Kofi Bright (2019) even wrote a paper on this, which is open access and can be accessed here: https://doi.org/10.1093/bjps/axz029

Reflections on 2019: how is the PhD going?

After the first months of our PhD, we reached out to our fellow early-stage researchers to find out about their experience so far. Read on to find out more from six of the researchers across Europe!

“For me, the beginning of my PhD journey has been a period of significant personal transformation – in lifestyle, but also in mentality. Before I came to Germany, I had been craving for travel and inspiration and I finally reached a point where both became a significant part of my life. I constantly remind myself how lucky I am to have been given this opportunity to learn and expand my way of thinking by visiting amazing places and spending time with an inspiring and enriching group of new friends and colleagues which I found in the project and in Kaiserslautern, where I’m based. In terms of working, I had to reach back and reinvent my creative self so I can regularly find inspiration for the beginning of my PhD research. All this has contributed to a profound process of personal reflection and change which has resulted in better work-life balance, more physical activity (something which was widely insignificant for me before that), more inspiration and overall better quality of life. I feel lucky, inspired, thankful and motivated.”

Bozhidar Ivanov

“During the first six months of the ITN program, there has been a lot of change – I moved to across the Atlantic from the USA to Portugal, but I can still wave to my friends in New York from the beach! The program kicked off with a week-long workshop in Paris, giving me the opportunity to meet all the other members of the program. I am really grateful to be working with people from so many backgrounds with great ideas and most importantly a lot of camaraderie and support. As well as meeting the RE-CITY students, there has been a lot of time spent getting to know a wider research community via their written words, on page or screen. I look forward to continuing to shape my own research interests and beginning empirical work in the coming year.”

Olivia Lewis

Olivia’s desk at the University of Porto

“The first 6 months of the PhD have brought a lot of change, through moving to another country and city (like all Marie Curie researchers!). But for me, the biggest change has maybe been returning to academia after a long spell working in policy and practice, and adjusting to different ways of working. Although the PhD can be challenging at times, I have really enjoyed being able to focus on one topic in depth. It has been great going to new places in Europe and I am looking forward to our next training event in Leipzig.”

Victoria Pinoncély

“Starting this PhD has meant being given the opportunity to pursue a project I had initiated as a student, and was really committed to. I am finally working on the topic I’m passionate about, with the methods I appreciate, professionally and full time. Besides, pursuing this project in very good conditions (being part of a team!) makes every working day really enjoyable. I am really, really grateful for this new experience.

The hardest moments are when I’m working on something new and have no idea where to start, or when I realize that you can never really finish a task because you could always do more. On that kind of moment, I spend way too much time on Twitter. Sometimes I get completely stuck, I have no idea how to make sense of something, and then when I explain my dilemma to my supervisor it just clicks. Starting a PhD also means learning to acknowledge these moments for what they are: normal and necessary steps!”

Solène Le Borgne

Solène’s desk at the University of Amsterdam

“My first six months of PhD life as member of RE-CITY have been nothing but adventurous!
I moved from Hamburg, Germany, to Paris, France, where I learned what it means to live the metropolitan life. Months of reading on urbanism, social geography and planning have given me a new perspective on the city and the life in it. Learning French is challenging, but tackling each day in a foreign country, speaking a foreign language, has opened my eyes and made me even more sensitive to the challenges faced when starting anew abroad. What is best, is that I feel extremely lucky to be working with a supportive team of 13 PhDs who are motivated and – above all – kind. Working together on livability in shrinking cities is inspiring and I learn new things every day.
I am looking forward to progressing personally and professionally with the team and to the coming 2.5 years!”

Norma Schemschat

“The first 6 months of my PhD were crucial to understand what I’ve done wrong so far and what I should work on. PhD is an individual project, and it’s a lot to handle. Being a good researcher, who is creative and eager to know more is not enough to complete a PhD. You have to be a good project manager, who is organized, result-oriented and pragmatic in many ways. And that is the toughest part for me, that I plan to work on in the next months. After all, as J. Bolker writes in his book “the best dissertation is a done dissertation.”

Anastasiya Ansteeg

Asking our fellows for their feedback on the first part of their PhD journey, we learned that most of us are facing similar challenges. But the feedback also shows the great opportunities an MSCA fellowship can bring!

Are you a researcher or student reflecting on 2019? Reach out to us on Twitter @recity_ITN or on Facebook (Re-City ITN: Reviving shrinking cities) – we’d love to be in touch!

Urban Green Areas Revitalization and Social Capital

The case of “El Bosque del Diente” in the Metropolitan Area of Guadalajara

by Simone Di Pietro, ESR at the University of Guadalajara RE-CITY project, and Osvaldo González Cisneros, PhD student at University of Guadalajara

This post presents field work carried out with participant observation methodology, as part of the research project “Urban green spaces for sustainable community development” within the RE-CITY International Training Network. It briefly describes how social activism is a fundamental ingredient for the revitalization of the under-utilized territory, proposing a lesson that can also be considered in other shrinkage contexts.

On the morning of September 28^th, 2019, a network of groups and associations from the civil society of Guadalajara met in the “Bosque del Diente.” This area is located just 20 minutes north of the city center of Zapopan, which is part of the Guadalajara Metropolitan Area.

In the last three years, the Bosque del Diente has been subject to revitalization processes, after a period of abandonment in which invasions with heavy trucks, violence from organized crime, and waste dumping proliferated. The area of El Diente was declared a Protected Natural Area on March 6, 2008, under the category of municipal management of hydrological protection. The announcement included the area known as El Nixticuil Forest – San Esteban – El Diente. A lack of law enforcement led to the use of this area for delinquent actions, with the discovery of various bodies between 2009 and 2013.

El Diente. This particular form of rock gives its name to the urban forest.
Credit: Simone Di Pietro

Currently, urban activist groups are collaborating to rescue the area through sports activities such as climbing, trekking, and camping. However, strong real estate pressure in the immediate surroundings is currently threatening the Bosque del Diente.

On September 28^th, we went to meet and collaborate with two activist groups for society and nature: “Lucha Por Tus Sueños KATAPU” and “Protege y Conserva.” These groups described part of their work to us: thanks to the efforts of many volunteers, it has been possible to plant 1000 pines. These trees enrich the wooded ecosystem, which is also composed of a variety of oak trees locally known as “Panther”, one of the few endemic species left in the territory.

In a territory like Guadalajara, protecting and caring for a green area such as the Bosque del Diente is invaluable for the Tapatío people (inhabitants of Guadalajara). Preserving green space ensures a balance of industries and green areas within the urban structure.

Thanks to this citizen-led initiative, ecosystems that had been deteriorating are already improving. The case of the Bosque del Diente in Guadalajara is a good example of how a part of the population can organize to generate change in social perceptions of land use, take care of their own territory, build identity mechanisms, and defend nature from surrounding economic pressures. To that end, protection laws that enable institutions to collaborate are very important. Carlos, from the “Protege y Conserva” collective explained that the municipality had protected the Bosque del Diente through a natural reserve regulation, which currently prevents any form of construction. However, he felt that more solid protection of the area would require the use of federal laws.

To learn more from one of the community leaders, check out this interview with Carlos from the “Protege y Conserva” collective : https://youtu.be/oST8R_JJ4T4