Gentrified Lisbon

The word “gentrification” was the most frequently used word during our week in Lisbon. We saw the impact of gentrification in everything: buildings, parks, shops, streets, people. We were absorbing the surroundings of Lisbon’s charm and transforming it into information to truly understand how much gentrified Lisbon is.

We were getting lost in three neighborhoods: Avenida de Liberdade, Baixa and Cais do Sodré. Our purpose was to find some signals that surprised us or just caught our attention. We based our research on: photo research, observations, street conversations and nethunting but we also supported it with reports and articles.

Our hypothesis about our neighborhoods was that they’re being re-gentrified but in a slower pace than other neighborhoods, due to high land costs and abandonment of spaces from economic pressures (i.e. COVID and 2010 crisis, aging population), which make the transition less desirable.

We have documented everything and below you can see what we have gathered over only one week.

Of course we didn’t forget to define the tribes, patterns, cycles or trends:

RESULT OF ANALYSIS

We confirmed that our neighborhoods are being re-gentrified at a slower pace than other areas. The spaces such as the avenue and big squares are present, but they are not being used for locals, and mostly are occupied by tourists or transients. Missing more spaces like cafes, dog parks and gyms, and affordable housing.

Causing high prices and displacement reflected in abandonment, and the need of investment to change their characteristics. Which cannot be solved by public funds only due to the economic situation of the country, so foregin investments are needed.

At the very end we summarized the current and future scenarios for Lisbon: