Urban Regeneration and Neighbourhood Approach in the Netherlands: past, present and future

Cities have been renewing almost as long as they have existed. Policies to improve parts of cities are more recent. This statement also holds true for the Netherlands. In this paper, we describe Dutch urban regeneration processes and neighbourhood approaches starting from the second world war. In the first decades after the war, the emphasis was on rehabilitation and modernization of city centres and new construction on the edges of the cities. The old neighbourhoods had to make way for the demands of modern times. A result was neglect of the old dwellings; after all, they would be demolished anyway. Urban policies changed in the early 1970s; the old neighbourhoods were no longer demolished but improved. These urban policies are now known as the first large-scale period of urban renewal. Gradually, the realization dawned that merely improving houses was insufficient; social and economic measures were also needed to improve the living conditions of residents in impoverished neighbourhoods. This inspired an integrated approach that would be titled the ‘Big City Policy’ in the late 1990s and 2000s; or the second period of urban renewal. In the early 2010s, however, this policy collapsed. The state withdrew, municipalities had no money to invest in impoverished neighbourhoods, housing associations were restricted, residents were powerless and the market showed little interest. The result was an increase in social problems, concentrated in certain neighbourhoods. Recently, a renewed focus on active neighbourhood policy is emerging. Has the third period of urban renewal arrived?