Concentrations of poverty in urban neighborhoods are generally unwanted, because of all kinds of presumed negative consequences for the social mobility and the quality of life of the residents. Because of these negative associations, policies in Western European countries are often aimed at breaking up these poverty concentrations by mixing the population composition through changing the housing stock.    However, whether these policies are successful remains to be seen. We asked residents of urban restructuring areas in six Dutch cities about the consequences of mixing policies. The number of residents who perceive improvements in the neighborhood in the past few years is substantially outnumbered by the residents who report a decline in neighborhood quality. However, many residents have high hopes for their neighborhood’s future.

This finding indicates that social mixing policies have not matched the policy-makers’ expectations yet –but may do so in the course of time. In Western European cities, urban restructuring policies have become prominent in the last decade (Murie et al. 2003; Bolt 2009). Such policies mostly take place in neighborhoods with a concentration of relatively inexpensive rental dwellings. These neighborhoods do not function well, at least not in the eyes of the policy-makers. The neighborhoods are therefore subject to sometimes radical policies of demolition, refurbishing and renovation. Demolition is accompanied by the construction of new dwellings that are generally more expensive than those they replace. The new dwellings are almost always in the owner-occupied sector or in the relatively high-priced segments of the rented sector; these dwellings are more attractive for the middle classes than the existing stock of cheap social-or public-rented accommodation.