Towards Rural Regeneration in a Post-Agricultural and Post-Ideological Era

Abstract

We have identified a change in rural towns these days. They are transforming from agricultural towns to settlements of a rural quality of life and scenic resources, threatened by densification and development processes. This article aims to outline tools for future rural renewal, focusing on rural areas and emphasizing the village center. We use existing physical analysis tools for urban renewal and apply them on rural regeneration, using an ideological type of rural development area, the moshav, and adapting the tools to two typical physical/geometrical models for moshavs : concentric and linear. Our effort will focus on qualitative and quantitative values for renewal, with a special emphasis on examining ideological rural settlements, which were motivated by agriculture and cultivating the family lot, and resulted in the establishment of rural settlements organized and governed by state institutions, while the original visions have changed, as have the original ideas. In this article, we will review the cooperative and agricultural ideology that founded and nourished the establishment of the rural settlements, as well as how the towns are currently developing, where smaller and smaller percentages of the residents work in agriculture. Lots meant for agriculture are sold to the highest bidder, and people who are not part of the community build houses there, changing the settlement’s character and visibility. Considering these threats, the tools outlined in this article for rural renewal will meet the need for maintaining the agricultural-rural character and its humble nature, as well as for densification and attracting additional employment.