An Analysis of the Relationship Between Housing Foreclosures,Lending Practices,and Neighborhood Ecology: Evidence from a Distressed County

Residential foreclosures increased sharply during the 1990s and in the first years of the twenty-first century. These foreclosures have profound impacts on the households and neighborhoods involved. Although foreclosures occur everywhere, the geography of foreclosures displays a pattern tied to a metropolitan area's social, fiscal, and economic geography. We examine these correspondences as they exist within Summit County (Akron), Ohio, between 2001 and 2003. Foreclosures themselves often result from unfortunate financial events that can affect any household, but we found that the geography of foreclosures corresponds primarily to Summit County's racial distribution, above and beyond any correspondence with income levels and housing fiscal stress. There also exists a clear coincidence of foreclosures with subprime lending, itself associated with Summit County's racial patterns. Concentrations of foreclosures in particular neighborhoods can be tremendously harmful to the social and economic health of the neighborhood. These comparisons help us to better understand the neighborhood ecology of foreclosure rates and subprime lending.     

Some Spatial Implications Of A Massive Industrial Accident: The Case Of Nuclear Power Plants 1

The application of geographic concepts and techniques to solving human problems is gaining new strength as a dimension of American geography. The nature of this trend is being shaped by a concern for relevance and educational change. Adoption of this approach has many implications for the individual geographer, as well as for the discipline. Some possible negative and positive aspects of the trend are suggested.     

Pathways and Processes: Reviewing the Role of Young Adults in Urban Structure

Challenges arising from changing demographics, expensive housing, and precarious labor have prompted recent interest in the residential geographies of young adults. Yet, despite attention to young adults' diverse housing pathways, I argue that greater focus is needed on the place-based and spatial underpinnings and effects of particular housing pathways: Connections to urban processes of “youthification”—the concentration of young adults in dense neighborhoods—and “studentification”—whereby an area becomes dominated by university students—remain underdeveloped, as do linkages between these phenomena and gentrification. I explore these connections through a critical review of extant literature to show that the enactment of some pathways is associated with particular urban processes, which might foreclose certain pathways for other individuals. Finally, I identify three crucial areas of inquiry: (1) how youthification, studentification, and gentrification interact; (2) how these processes shape and are shaped by diverging individual housing pathways; and (3) how differences among young adults such as race, ethnicity, and gender intersect with age in the course of these processes.     

Book reviews

Books reviewed:
Hall, Peter. Cities in civilization. Culture, innovation, and urban order
Gottdiener, M., Collins, Claudia C. and Dickens, David R. Las Vegas: the social production of an all-American city
Duncan, James and Gregory Derek (eds) Writes of passage: reading travel writing     

地质雷达技术在和平饭店南楼基础检测中的应用

房屋质量检测中基础检测是最困难的部分，在上海和平饭店南楼基础木桩深度探测时首次应用地质雷达技术，取得了较为满意的结果，为将来房屋质量检测中基础探测开辟了新途径。     

交通通道对住宅空间扩展和居民住宅区位选择的作用——以北京市为例

随着我国住房制度的改革，房地产市场逐渐趋于发育，城市内部住宅空间结构发生了巨大变化。在实地调研、抽样问卷调查基础上，建立了北京住宅区数据库，然后利用GIS分析手段和统计分析方法重点研究了以下3个问题：(1)交通通道与住宅空间分布、扩展趋势；(2)交通通道与住宅价格和居民住宅空间选择；(3)交通条件与居民住宅区位选择行为等。     

The Girls' Home, Bangkok, Thailand: Developing Thoughts on Democracy

This paper describes an exercise with children in the implementation of housing rights. Based on the argued opinion that housing rights cannot be exercised without participation and that participation without knowledge is pretence, a Kids and Architecture programme was initiated with a group of 40 children — displaced from homes in the Klong Toey slum in Bangkok — at a girls' home run by the Human Development Foundation (HDF). The programme, developed in two phases and involving students from the King Mongkut's University of Technology Thonburi (KMUTT), School of Architecture, set about to teach these children some of the elements of architecture so that they could participate in the design of their own housing. From this experiment a number of conclusions are drawn about the implementation of housing rights and about the teaching of architecture, both to children and architecture students.     

CBO Performance in the Shelter Sector: A Study of La Piña and Lebrón,Santo Domingo,Dominican Republic

The current global housing policy, the enabling approach, emphasizes the need for governments to encourage community participation in the shelter sector. This research examines the role of the government and community-based organizations (CBOs) in the housing sector and analyzes how they interact. To determine whether governments and CBOs are participating in the shelter sector as advocated under the approach, this study examines the role of two CBOs engaged in upgrading shelter for the poor in Santo Domingo, the Dominican Republic. This research demonstrates that the enabling approach can be effective if the government is supportive and CBOs are engaged in the planning, decision-making, and implementation of the housing project. This study finds that cooperation between the implementing NGO, CBOs, and households is crucial for the success of the housing project. The study also demonstrates how the enabling policies employed in Santo Domingo, including low-cost labor and use of low-cost building materials, help overcome obstacles encountered under previous housing policies such as displacement and affordability issues.