Longitudinal Monitoring of Housing Renewal in the Urban Core: Reflections on the Experience of Glasgow's Merchant City

Abstract

This paper is broadly concerned with monitoring the development of markets for new and converted housing in city centres over the longer term, and with assessing the implications for housing renewal strategies. These themes are addressed through a case study of housing market trends in Glasgow's Merchant City, which is generally recognised as an important example of housing-led city-centre regeneration. The analysis places the Merchant City experience in context by comparing the relative performance of selected segments within the wider Glasgow housing market. The results indicate that the weakened performance of the Merchant City sub-market in the face of economic and housing market recession is part of a more general phenomenon affecting other competing inner-area segments. The findings also draw attention to the need for more detailed understanding of the linkages between economic forces, demographic trends, housing preferences and stock characteristics in evaluating the performance of local housing systems.