Gentrification has become increasingly prevalent and important for cities, especially those that are growing in population and population density. As cities develop over the years, populations occasionally move out of the city to the suburbs or to more rural areas. After people move out of the city, other, poorer populations move into the areas- now with lower rents and upkeep costs. As time goes on, people who initially moved out want to return to the city and renovate and gentrify neighborhoods. It is easy to see how gentrification changes cities while it is happening, but how easy is it to see gentrification before it starts?
For decades, city planners have tried to set up a kind of 'warning system' to help ensure current residents for the future. Recently, this system has started to become a reality. By using data to show how changes occur in cities, or at a smaller scale neighborhoods, city planners can see how changes in price and influxes in population will influence future gentrification. City planners also use census data, specifically the American Community Survey, to evaluate what kind of economic and racial changes occur in cities prior to the 'official' start of gentrification. It is difficult to completely determine change, however, since it the survey is only a fraction of the actual city/neighborhood population. Being able to point out potential gentrification may spur investment and development in declining areas and neighborhoods.
Using data to help predict gentrification can help city planners develop a plan to help current residents stay in their current neighborhoods. By seeing what kinds of companies and businesses start in neighborhoods, city planners can begin to understand where gentrification may start. City planners also use housing prices to determine where and when gentrification will start.
My mother lives in Columbus, specifically in Old Towne East (OTE). OTE has started to gentrify, and my mother is living through it. She frequently tells me how her building, an old carriage house converted into two apartments, is becoming surrounded by new businesses and renovated structures. I have also talked to some of the residents of OTE who have lived there for decades, and they have told me how the neighborhood, and others surrounding OTE had started the gentrification process a few years ago, and how it is currently affecting them.
http://www.npr.org/sections/13.7/2017/08/29/546980178/what-does-it-take-to-see-gentrification-before-it-happens
More information on using data to help identify the gentrification: https://www.urban.org/research/publication/what-if-cities-used-data-drive-inclusive-neighborhood-change
It is an interesting concept to develop these key "warning systems" to identity the early onset of gentrification in neighborhoods, especially with the phenomenon becoming seemingly more insidious as the decades go on. Using data definitely is a concrete way in which to raise a sort of quantitative consciousness to the early stages of the process. But, as was hinted in the NPR article, the use of big data has shortcomings in developing a perfectly accurate picture of early gentrification, and instead highlighted a different approach that subtly tracks "human mobility" within neighborhoods. I had been reading a few articles on gentrification over the weekend that reminded me of this post. An older one, written by Neil Smith, argued that even while the more recent waves of resurgent 1990s- and 2000s-era gentrification are caused more by economic and financial global forces, seeing gentrification solely through the lens of economics (and therefore housing prices and hard data) is much too narrow of a focus. While these variables can attest to quantitative neighborhood change, they don't tell the whole story, especially if we are to engage in more nuanced factors of *social* restructuring. The other, a more recent article from a planning journal, hinted at the concept of "human mobility" and how this may be a better tactic. The article focused on old LGBT liberation groups who had formed solid residences in neighborhoods such as Midtown and Decatur in Atlanta during the '60s and '70s. By the 1990s, when global finance and the resurgence of the white middle class came back to these central Atlanta neighborhoods, some of the LGBT residents were priced out of their communities. But, many of the older LGBT residents, although poorer than their new white middle class neighbors, felt too strong of a social identity to their prominent gayborhoods, and so never moved even though they their economic livelihoods decreased tremendously. Additionally, the gays and lesbians who had moved out to the suburbs reported to the authors that they still find themselves going back to areas like Midtown and Decatur a few days of week to simply be back in the LGBT atmosphere. How would human mobility tracking articulate this phenomenon? It's a cool concept. It will interesting to see how planners and city officials may possibly develop the big data tracking methods in the near future.
ReplyDeleteAudrey,
ReplyDeleteI do agree with you that the gentrification has a significant impact to both direct and indirect displacement of the poor people and it became a common sense as time goes by. As Stacey Sutton explain the impact of gentrification in her TEDx Talks, both public and private sectors are often not interested in investing in low income neighborhood. However, properties value became inflated and displacement on the poor people were prevailed when higher income people move to those area. This reminds me of the land invasion in Cambodia.
Since Cambodia embraced itself to free market economy, there is a warm welcome to foreign investment and exchange trade. The land law in Cambodia has experienced a renaissance by granting Economic Land Concessions (ELCs) and Social Land Concessions (CLCs) aiming to improve the development and livelihood of citizen. However, ELCs and SLCs have neither brought any agricultural productivities nor economic growth to the country as stated in their purposes. Conversely, this law has brought rampant land conflicts limiting the people to access natural resources, rather becomes violence against its citizens with total impunity, benefiting only the political elites and foreign business interests. The breach of the law leads to corruption and weakest law practice, which threatens the long-term development of the country result with disputes and violation of human rights leading to the violation of the rights through right for adequate housing, security of tenure and be subject to force evictions. A 2014 press release made by a group of human rights, LICADHO strongly emphasized the concern that more than half a million of Cambodians including more than 2,246 families across the country have been affected by violent land conflicts. This has put the Cambodian people become more vulnerable and marginalized. With this discussion about Cambodian case of land grabbing, it does point out the role of the state and land scape planner is very significant to decide which site is legal or illegal as the discussion we had in class last day.
Audrey,
ReplyDeleteI agree with the sentiment of your post. Like anyone in our social geographies class, I want to eliminate the possibility of gentrification. Detecting gentrification before it occurs sounds marvelous at face value. However, I believe I disagree with you on the drivers of gentrification. As you mentioned in your post, "As time goes on, people who initially moved out want to return to the city and renovate and gentrify neighborhoods." While this urban to rural to urban cycle of human migration is fact, I would not place the blame for gentrification on those interested in returning to the city to reside. The perspective that young, white "hipsters" are making a conscious consumer choice to live in neighborhoods currently housing minority and working class populations and hence are at fault for gentrification ignores the role developers and owners of capital play in the process. Neil Smith, mentioned in Hayley's comment, states: "By contrast, the owners of capital intent on gentrifying and developing a neighborhood have a lot more 'consumer choice' about which neighborhoods they want to devour, and the kind of housing and other facilities they produce for the rest of us to consume." There is immense money to be made for real estate companies and developers through reinventing the urban landscape, replacing affordable housing with luxury condos and quaint coffee shops. These capitalists provide the opportunity for wealthier, white individuals to move into desirable neighborhoods and push previous residents out. I believe this trend can even be seen in the movie "Flag Wars" if one looks close enough. The real estate agent was not portrayed wonderfully in the film. However, the fault for the gentrification of that particular neighborhood in Columbus seemed to be placed on the gay men moving in. The real estate agent was the one to purchase the homes at low costs to market to gay men as perfect, quirky homes for renovation. I remember being distinctly appalled during a scene at a backyard get together where the real estate agent referred to the gay men as "fags" and commented how much money it made her that these men were interested in coming into such a declining neighborhood. City governments benefit from gentrification as property values and hence property taxes increase. City governments are often complicit in gentrification by allowing and promoting redevelopment under the guise of "urban renewal." I am skeptical that the ability to use data to track the flows of economic activity and human migration would change the reality of gentrification. As long as there is money to be made for both the city government and private developers in gentrifying an area of city, there is little to prevent them from doing so. In high school, my dream job was to become an urban planner. Yet now, after discovering the reality of the ties between urban governance and capital, I could not feel at ease being a planner. Not even the most conscientious planner could eliminate gentrification in a city.