Shrinking Patterns in Estonia

Contributors, Data, Densities, Formats, Middle Density, Politics and economics, SPIN Unit, Territory and mobility, Topics, Urban Paradigms.

Cities, Consumption, Data, Density, Depopulation, Economics, Estonia, Europe, Mapping, Population, Shrinking cities, Social dynamics, Sustainability, Tallinn, Transformation, Urban planning, Vacancy, Visualization.

Depopulation has a tangible effect on the built environment of cities and regions across Europe. Once vacancy becomes socially unsustainable, a decision has to be taken whether to invest or leave the affected building stock. To invest in or divest from shrinking cities is the difficult question we’ve been asking local policy makers. Divesting because depopulation is the tangible outcome of no demand for inhabiting a city. Investing because the demand is low where the investment is low. With this text, we lay the foundation for expanding the debate and share a few learning points from the data-rich case of Estonia.