[TheKidster]

Very interesting example of govt. social engineering and it's unintended results.

[WesternCulture]

"Very interesting example of govt. social engineering and it's unintended results."

Yes it is.

Apart from the role of the politicians in this case, it's also strange how this architecture was once "beautiful" to a majority of Western architects.

A big, gray, concrete box is nothing but a big, gray, concrete box.

I lived in such a house for one year, namely my first year in life, 1969-1970. Then my family moved to a nice place to live. Much to the disappointment to politicians and architects involved, most other Swedish families in our situation did likewise after having lived for a short time in these kind of areas. Then the Italians, Yugoslavs and the Greeks arrived. By today, most of them have made good money from working for Swedish industry or running small, family owned, private businesses which have allowed them to buy houses/attractive condos elsewhere. The Swedish concrete "ghettos" are safer than one might think, although a rather large degree of petty crime exists. The most infamous such area in Sweden is Rosengård in Malmö. Large parts of Malmö is very nice though. There are several articles about Malmö here on FR I've noticed (search them by using "Malmo" as keyword if you're interested).

[GeorgefromGeorgia]

As usual, when government interferes with the areas that should be left to private business, it either fails or inefficiently uses resources. In the USA cities built huge housing projects that became hell holes, gang ridden centers of crime and poverty. Better let private firms build that people want to live in or purchase. Communities were destroyed in the 60s with urban renewal.