Paper short abstract:

Although barrios are recognised as significant social spatial units within historic centres, urban renewal strategies are built upon imaginaries inspired by european examples that rely on spatial and social transformations. These processes need to be addressed by rethinking global south imaginaries.

Paper long abstract:

Following new urban visions and strategies within internationally promoted urban agendas to promote compact, sustainable and just cities, local governments in Mexico have sough to implement agendas and strategies that transform historic centres from deteriorated and underused places to urban hubs where mix-uses and urban renewal can be achieved. Examples of urban renewal strategies have been largely based upon perceived experiences and outcomes in the Global North, yet have been poorly analyzed in relation to context-specific responses to local situations and challenges. This has led to unreflexive implementations of urban renewal agendas and strategies within historic centres that depart from barrio-centred social spatial structures and propose new social and spatial dynamics. This process largely relates to implemented imagined urban visions that showcase a partial understanding based on the outcomes achieved in other places but which is shaping the urban imaginary for very different places and contexts. This paper aims to analyse the urban imaginaries for the historic centres of Mexico City and Guadalajara and the distance of these imaginaries from the context and needs within it to produce a theoretical understanding and contribution to global south urban imaginaries. As thes procosses have produced challenging local situations of social and urban transformations that were not forenseen. This paper is based on the findings of the PhD Thesis 'Frameworks for Urban Conservation: Social Equality Through Housing Tenure in Mexican Historic Cities: Cases of Mexico City and Guadalajara' by the author and completed in the Bartlett School of Planning, UCL in november 2021.