���������¼�

Cities are constantly being built, unbuilt and rebuilt, at an increasingly rapid rate. City-dwellers all over the world will be very familiar with the experience of seeing a row of houses or old apartment block transformed to something much taller, wider, and bulkier. But the process of assembling the land that lays beneath these developments is much less familiar.��This process is the subject of a three-year����funded��research project,��‘Reassembling the City: understanding urban renewal through resident-led collective property sales’,��jointly undertaken by researchers at City Futures Research Centre ���������¼� and Macquarie University. The��project examines the phenomenon and process of neighbouring residents acting together to sell their properties in areas of urban renewal, illustrated by case study research in Sydney and Vancouver.��The project investigators include��Professor Simon Pinnegar,��Professor Hazel Easthope, and��Dr Laura Crommelin�����Ի�����from Macquarie University, supported by research associates��Dr Charlie Gillon�����Ի���.

Urban policy in recent years has encouraged densification of existing built up areas. ‘’ planning strategies have encouraged ‘activation’ around key��, in the context of high population growth and demand for new housing supply. At the same time, the����of housing has supercharged housing markets globally. The higher density development driven by these trends requires larger land parcels, which can be difficult to find in established urban areas.����were behind the first wave of site assembly, but recently a more bottom-up process appears to be gaining popularity. Owners of both detached properties and units in����are now finding that working with their neighbours to sell as a collective is����than selling their property alone.

Such a process raises several questions:��

• It brings the tensions between housing as an asset and housing as a home into sharp relief.��
• It blurs the boundaries between notions of individual and collective interests vis-à-vis property rights.��
• It challenges conventional understandings of top-down versus bottom-up processes of urban development and the role and nature of the growth coalitions reshaping contemporary cities.��

We know little about the extent to which collective sales are proactive or reactive – driven by the entrepreneurialism of owners versus pressures or obligations. The different types of collective sales, and their geographies, has received scant attention to date.

The project team will map collective sales that have taken place in Sydney and Vancouver over the past five years, and examine a number of case study sites in each city in greater detail.�� Research includes interviewing a range of stakeholders involved in servicing and enabling the collective sales process, as well as the residents involved and the relevant planning authorities. Feedback from neighbouring residents will also be invited.