Spatial SWOT Analysis: An Approach for Urban Regeneration

Abstract

Urban regeneration projects encompass a wide variety of interventions to improve the conditions and intensify the use of an existing urban area, which has degraded with continuous use, overuse, changing social context, land values, and markets. The dilapidation of building structures and aging infrastructure systems add to the degraded condition. Identification of the need for intervention with an in-depth study of the existing situation is the first step that leads to the framing of the strategic goals of the Urban Regeneration project. A SWOT analysis evaluates the internal strengths and weaknesses and the external threats and opportunities of the context in consideration. The internal analysis is used to identify characteristics inherent to the context and the external analysis is used to identify opportunities and threats that can be effectively utilized for enhancing the quality of the urban environment. Hence, SWOT analysis as a tool is employed to assess the capacity of the urban area to execute a plan or achieve its goals. The limitations have been identified, and modifications proposed to remodel the traditional tool with the mapping on the SPACE matrix in the context of Urban Regeneration. The result of the analysis determined the operational strategy to be adopted for the Urban Regeneration intervention. This research paper aims to (1) examine the efficiency of the SWOT tool concerning its applicability to Urban Regeneration Intervention (2) Identify the limitations of the existing practices as applicable to Urban Regeneration Projects (3) Propose a spatial SWOT Analysis mapped on a SPACE matrix with proposed strategies for the Urban Regeneration Intervention for the city of Hassan. The limitation of the work was that the area specific dynamic factors had not been considered.