Shrinking Cities – Book

What are the difficulties for a city with declining socio-economic opportunities? The book „Shrinking Cities – Strategies and Methodologies for Increasing the Attractiveness of Shrinking Cities”, published by TERC, explores the experiences of shrinking cities in Central Europe and the specific paths they have taken. The book provides methodologies that respond to specific urban developments, urban planning situations and challenges.

The book is particularly useful for urban professionals. It is intended to provide them orientations, planning principles and strategies to follow when their municipality is in a phase of socio-economic decline. The chapters draw on international literature to introduce the ideas of shrinking cities into the education and practice of architects, landscape architects and urban planners in Hungary, and to familiarise them with the shrinking city issue, which is now a fundamental principle in many parts of the world.

The Shrinking Cities book was launched by the authors on 24 March 2022 at the Centre for Contemporary Architecture (KÉK). Prior to the official launch, a workshop with gamified tools was held to simulate a meeting of the stakeholders and urban actors of a hungarian town. The public presentation ended with a discussion on the difficulties of the domestic urban structure, the challenges of recent urban developments and the different layers of shrinking urban characters.

Published by TERC Ltd, 2021.
Authors of the book: György Alföldi / Bálint Balázs / Dániel Balizs / Olívia Kurucz / Csilla Sárkány
Editor: György Alföldi
Editors: Csaba Jelinek / Zoltán Bajtai /Judit Dobosné Gerzsenyi
Book design: Olívia Kurucz

The Shrinking Cities book is available to order from the website of TERC publishing.

Book photo: Bálint Benkő
Book photo concept: Studio VAN