Constructing a College Town: Displacement in a Student Housing Building Boom

Evelyn Hofmann (MArch candidate) and Nick Revington (PhD Planning candidate) collaborated on a photo essay last fall recently published on the Berkley Planning Journal’s blog The Urban Fringe.

Photo credit: Evelyn Hofmann

Substantial increases in enrollment at the two universities in Waterloo, Ontario, have contributed to a recent building boom in privately-developed, off-campus, purpose-built student apartments in an adjacent neighbourhood. While the formerly middle-class postwar suburban neighbourhood dominated by single-detached bungalows had previously been increasingly occupied by student renters, the municipality has since acted as an enabler, by rezoning much of the area to accommodate high-rise residential towers – in some cases up to 25 storeys. These drastic urban changes engender displacement in a number of forms across spatial scales ranging from the local to the transnational and at various temporal moments. These are the direct displacement of previous residents, the indirect loss of sense of place (displacement), the exclusionary displacement of non-student residents, and displacement associated with the transnational migration of students to Waterloo.

See the full article at The Urban Fringe.