Urgency of Regeneration
The landscape of the built environment in Taipei city varies from place to place. In most of the places, buildings in various style—commercial buildings, walkup apartments, and terraced houses—are allied by the configuration of a city’s zoning framework, while the walkup apartment is the most predominant style in Taipei downtown. It was due to the need to provide sufficient accommodations after WWII that this architecture style appeared. It was so easy to build because of the advance of construction materials; it was in such a simple style that it was designed in a form followed after its function that it became dominant from the 1960s to 1970s. However, these aged apartments are gradually worn-out since they have been on duty for nearly 50 years. An urge for urban regeneration has appeared from the communities and became the topical issue among the government authorities; nevertheless, citizens now face difficulties and are unwilling to implement the regeneration. Mayor Ko even regarded it as a “national problem” (Lee, par 8). The difficulties of urban regeneration in Taipei city have two major reasons: the amending of land-control regulations and misleading notions regarding real estate commercialization.
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Residential areas in Wanhua district, Taipei city
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Land-Control Regulations
One reason for the difficulties of urban renewal is the advance of land-control regulations. In the 1980s, in order that the living quality of the urbanized area could be improved, the Building Act and the Regulations on Land Use Control were enacted. These regulations include the Floor Space Index (FSI) and Ground Space Index (GSI). The latter aims to ensure the setback of appropriate open spaces to allow wind and sunlight to reach families living inside; however, it significantly affects how people manage their assets. It has an effect on people’s will to propose the regeneration proposal, for there is a high probability that they are not able to obtain the same living area as they currently possessed. Before the 1980s, there was no GSI restriction that led to the full construction of a site; for instance, a four-story walkup apartment built in the 1960s may be equivalent to an FSI of 320% and a GSI of 80% under current regulations. However, to date, more than two-thirds of the residential blocks in downtown Taipei are under the land-use zoning of “third residence”, with an FSI of 225% and a GSI of 45%, thereby hindering most of the people implementing regeneration.
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| Is constructing high-rising buildings the only choice? (Image: buildings near Taipei main station) |
Commercialization of Real Estate Assets
Another reason for this problem is the misleading notions regarding real estate commercialization. People regard their land and house as “property” and anticipate that they could earn double after the renewal process; as a result, this becomes a seductive game for people to maximize their private interests. Dr. Hsu S.J., a professor of the Department of Land Economics at National Chengchi University, criticizes that Taiwan’s Urban Renewal Act is the product of neoliberalism and privatization ideas (par 8). In 2010, this phenomenon was worsened by a city mayor who promised that the property owners could exchange one ping for one ping when participating in urban regeneration projects, which means you can own the same FSI rate as half-century before. The catchy slogan is so deeply-rooted that it has turned out to be an unwritten rule for approximately ten years. This illusion has a huge effect on citizens’ imagination toward regeneration that prolongs the process either in interest distribution or in architecture design, for the stakeholders would ask for more share. The longer the residents could regenerate their houses, the more anxious the government could be; consequently, this leads to a vicious circle that city councilors keep giving pressure to the government, the administrative municipal keeps issuing excessive floor-area incentives for the landlords, and the landlords, on the other hand, keep waiting and anticipating for other better regeneration incentives.
Urban regeneration is a mechanism to retrofit city landscape and people’s living quality, especially for those who live in the walkup apartments in the highly-dense Taipei downtown. However, the difficulties are deepened when people are hesitating to participate in the regeneration projects due to the amending of land-control regulations, which were, ironically, meant to provide better spatial quality. The commercialization of real estate also turns the urban renewal mechanism into the approach of earning profits. Urban regeneration is supposed to be a road toward a great city, it involves the integrated cooperation of the residents, the government, profession agencies, and academic institutions, and it is more challenging than what we could have imagined.
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What kind of city life do we prefer? (Image: Zhongzhen district, Taipei city)
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