Urbanism
Gentrification isn’t inevitable − it can hinge on how residents view their neighborhood
Elizabeth Korver-Glenn, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Sarah Mayorga, Brandeis University
Gentrification has become a familiar story in cities across the United States. The story line typically goes this way: Middle- and upper-income people start moving into a lower-income or poor neighborhood. Housing prices rise in response, and longtime residents and businesses are driven out.
As the U.S. population becomes increasingly urban, gentrification can seem inevitable. However, scholars have found that it’s actually pretty rare.
For example, a study by the nonprofit National Community Reinvestment Coalition that examined neighborhood change from 2000 through 2013 found that most low- and moderate-income neighborhoods across the United States did not gentrify during that period. Just seven cities – New York, Los Angeles, Washington, Philadelphia, Baltimore, San Diego and Chicago – accounted for almost half of all neighborhood gentrification nationwide.
Why is gentrification less common than many people fear? In our book, “A Good Reputation: How Residents Fight for an American Barrio,” we argue that conflicts over neighborhood reputation are an important factor.
We examined disputes among residents of Northside, a predominantly Latino neighborhood, or barrio, in Houston, over how their neighborhood was perceived. We found that those who thought outsiders stigmatized the barrio, or who stigmatized it themselves, avoided engaging with the neighborhood, its institutions and its residents. This group supported measures that would facilitate gentrification, such as monitoring local bars to file nuisance complaints.
By contrast, those who perceived the barrio as a welcome, desirable space worked to cultivate the neighborhood’s institutions and connect its people, pushing back against attempts to gentrify the area.
Gentrification isn’t linear or automatic
Common understandings of gentrification and urban development often frame these urban processes as natural, linear and even inevitable for low-income neighborhoods. The argument goes that once you see a new Starbucks, or a light rail station in the case of Northside, gentrification is sure to follow.
Based on our research, however, we argue that when politicians, developers and even residents themselves attempt to develop or redevelop marginalized urban neighborhoods, they spur neighborhood conflicts that, in turn, can greatly influence the redevelopment process.
Northside is one such neighborhood. Located just north of downtown Houston, it has been majority Latino for more than 60 years. It has also been a high-poverty area, with 23% to 38% of its residents living beneath the federal poverty line over this time period.
About one-third of its residents are foreign-born, many of them originating from Mexico or Central America. But most Latino Northsiders are second-, third- or later-generation Mexican Americans or Latino Americans.
The neighborhood consists mainly of single-family homes on small, densely packed urban lots. Some streets have sidewalks and covered drainage systems, while others have open ditches and lack sidewalks. Although the METRO red line train travels along the barrio’s western border and a few busy thoroughfares crisscross the neighborhood, much of the area has a small-town, quiet, residential feel.
Conflicting approaches
As we describe in our book, we found two widespread and conflicting views of Northside among its residents. Interestingly, these views did not easily map onto individual characteristics, such as racial identity or class. People would sometimes change their viewpoints depending on the conflict in question.
One group wanted to cleanse the barrio of what its members saw as negative features, transform the area and prepare the way for gentrification to occur. The other group was intent on celebrating the barrio as it already was and on preserving its character and supporting its residents.
Residents who wanted to remake Northside often believed that it had too many features that they felt were associated with Black or low-income people, such as public housing, cantinas or bars, and services for people without homes. For example, one woman we spoke with cited neighborhood cantinas and housing shelters as evidence that Northside was dangerous.
These Northsiders wanted to purge and clean the neighborhood to improve what they perceived as its marred image. They sought to remove facilities, such as a Salvation Army shelter, which they believed attracted undesirable people; called for increased police presence in the neighborhood; and avoided local places such as parks and grocery stores, often driving to other neighborhoods instead.
They also attempted to curate what they viewed as respectable behavior, through steps such as installing video cameras and calling on residents to report neighbors whom they believed were dumping trash or failing to neuter and spay their pets.
In contrast, other residents believed that their neighborhood was a welcoming and desirable place. They were proud of its parks, churches, public schools and Mexican restaurants, and they spoke of pivotal moments in Northside’s past to argue for its desirability in the present. One such event was an uprising at Moody Park in 1978 that spurred reforms in the Houston police department and capital improvements to the park.
These residents hosted parties, exercised at local parks and volunteered with public schools and Catholic parishes. Many regularly participated in neighborhood development and nonprofit meetings, and they objected when other speakers cast Northside as a stigmatized place and its residents as the cause of barrio ills.
They also defended Northside against what they saw as threats to its quality of life. As one example, residents sued the owners of White Oak Music Hall, a 5-acre, three-stage concert venue that opened in 2016 on the western edge of the neighborhood. Plaintiffs argued that loud music was interrupting their children’s sleep and decreasing their property values. They won important concessions in a 2018 settlement, including caps on the number of outdoor concerts, installation of sound-monitoring equipment and limits on the number and duration of concerts on school nights.
A different kind of gentrification story
Ultimately, we found that Northside did not gentrify because the conflict between these disparate views of the neighborhood blocked or slowed large-scale redevelopment. Some residents’ attempts to protect and preserve the barrio interrupted developers’ plans – for example, by using Houston’s Code of Ordinances to block the subdivision of existing lots. Other actions, such as the lawsuit against White Oak Music Hall, checked developers’ influence in the area.
Although residents’ efforts to prevent redevelopment did not constitute a full-blown, organized social movement, people who valued Northside as it was successfully challenged the idea that it was a dangerous and unattractive place that needed to be remade, and they worked to preserve the place they called home.
Other researchers have examined similar struggles in cities including Boston, Los Angeles and Chicago. We think that paying attention to these conflicts in cities of all sizes can provide a deeper understanding of why gentrification succeeds – or, more commonly, why it fails.
Elizabeth Korver-Glenn, Assistant Professor of Sociology, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Sarah Mayorga, Professor of Sociology, Brandeis University
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
The Bridge is a section of the STM Daily News Blog meant for diversity, offering real news stories about bona fide community efforts to perpetuate a greater good. The purpose of The Bridge is to connect the divides that separate us, fostering understanding and empathy among different groups. By highlighting positive initiatives and inspirational actions, The Bridge aims to create a sense of unity and shared purpose. This section brings to light stories of individuals and organizations working tirelessly to promote inclusivity, equality, and mutual respect. Through these narratives, readers are encouraged to appreciate the richness of diverse perspectives and to participate actively in building stronger, more cohesive communities.
https://stmdailynews.com/category/the-bridge
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For graffiti artists, abandoned skyscrapers in Miami and Los Angeles become a canvas for regular people to be seen and heard
In 2023-2024, graffiti artists tagged abandoned skyscrapers in Los Angeles and Miami, highlighting financial and political issues through their large, visible artworks.
Colette Gaiter, University of Delaware
The three qualities that matter most in real estate also matter the most to graffiti artists: location, location, location.
In Miami and Los Angeles, cities that contain some of the most expensive real estate in the U.S., graffiti artists have recently made sure their voices can be heard and seen, even from the sky.
In what’s known as “graffiti bombing,” artists in both cities swiftly and extensively tagged downtown skyscrapers that had been abandoned. The efforts took place over the course of a few nights in December 2023 and late January 2024, with the results generating a mix of admiration and condemnation.
As someone who has researched the intersection of graffiti and activism, I see these works as major milestones – and not just because the artists’ tags are perhaps more prominent than they’ve ever been, high above street level and visible from blocks away.
They also get to the heart of how money and politics can make individuals feel powerless – and how art can reclaim some of that power.
Two cities, two graffiti bombings
Since late 2019, Los Angeles’ billion-dollar Oceanwide Plaza – a mixed-use residential and retail complex consisting of three towers – has stood unfinished. The Beijing-based developer was unable to pay contractors, and ongoing financing challenges forced the company to put the project on pause. It’s located in one of the priciest parts of the city, right across the street from Crypto.com Arena, where the 2024 Grammy Awards were held.
Hundreds of taggers were involved in the Los Angeles graffiti bombing. It may never be publicly known how the idea was formed and by whom. But it seemed to have been inspired by a similar project that took place in Miami during Art Basel, the city’s annual international art fair.
In November 2023, the city of Miami announced that a permit to demolish One Bayfront Plaza site, an abandoned former VITAS Healthcare building, had been filed.
Miami is known for its elaborate spray-painted murals. There’s also a rich tradition of graffiti in the city. So Miami was a natural gathering place for graffiti artists during Art Basel in December 2023, and One Bayfront Plaza became the canvas for taggers from around the world.
Over the course of a few days, graffiti artists – some of whom rappelled down the side of the building – tagged the brutalist, concrete structure with colorful bubble letters spelling their graffiti names: “EDBOX,” “SAUTE” and “1UP,” and hundreds more.
The response to the Miami bombing was more awe than outrage, perhaps because the building will soon be torn down. It elicited comparisons to 5Pointz, a collection of former factory buildings in the Queens borough of New York City that was covered with graffiti and became a landmark before being demolished in 2014.
Meaning and motivation
In the early 2000s, when I started researching street graffiti, I learned that there are different names for different graffiti types.
“Tags” are pseudonyms written in marker, sometimes with flourishes. “Fill-ins” or “throw-ups” are quickly painted fat letters or bubble letters, usually outlined. “Pieces” involve more colorful, complicated and stylized spray-painted letters.
The tradition of painting ornate graffiti names made me think of Paul Cézanne, who painted the same bowl of fruit over and over. The carefully chosen names and their letters become the subject that writers use to practice their craft.
But I also wanted to know why people graffitied.
Many graffiti writers tagged spaces to declare their existence, especially in a place like New York City, where it is easy to feel invisible. Some writers who became well known in the early 1970s, like Taki 183, scrawled their names and street numbers all over the city.
During my research, I spoke with one New York graffiti artist whose work had garnered a lot of attention in the 1980s. He explained that his writing had no concrete political messages.
“But,” he added, “the act of writing graffiti is always political.”
Another graffiti artist I interviewed, “PEN1,” stood with me on a street in lower Manhattan, pointing out one of his many works. It was a fill-in – huge letters near the top of a three- or four-story building, very visible from the street.
“Those people have paid so much money to put their message up there,” he said, pointing to nearby billboards, “and I get to put my name up there for free.”
Through my project, which I ended up titling “Unofficial Communication,” I came to understand that writing graffiti on walls, billboards and subway cars was a way of disrupting ideas of private ownership in public, outdoor spaces.
It involved three different sets of players. There were the taggers, who represented people defying the status quo. There were the public and private owners of the spaces. And there was the municipal government, which regularly cleaned graffiti from outdoor surfaces and tried to arrest taggers.
In cities across the U.S., then and now, it’s easy to see whose interests are the priority, whose mistakes governments are willing to overlook, and which people they aggressively police and penalize.
Loud and clear
The names painted on the Los Angeles skyscrapers are the faster and easier-to-complete fill-ins, since time is at a premium and the artists risk arrest.
These vertical graffiti bombing projects on failed skyscrapers, deliberately or not, call attention to the millions of dollars that are absorbed by taxpayers when private developers make bad investments.
Because the names painted on the buildings are fill-ins, they’re not especially artistic. But they did, in fact, make a political statement.
A former graffiti artist who goes by “ACTUAL” told The Washington Post that he’d come out of retirement to contribute to the Los Angeles project.
“The money invested in [the buildings] could have done so much for this city,” he added.
Some of the graffiti artists in Los Angeles were arrested, and the Los Angeles City Council is demanding that the owners of Oceanwide Plaza remove the graffiti, described as the work of “criminals” acting “recklessly.”
Meanwhile, the developers of buildings that have sat, unfinished, for years, in the middle of a housing crisis, have broken no laws.
Some reckless acts, apparently, are more criminal than others.
Colette Gaiter, Professor of Art and Design, University of Delaware
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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Los Angeles, a city renowned for its bustling streets and iconic freeways, is taking significant steps towards revolutionizing public transit in the San Fernando Valley. In a major development, the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (Metro) has been awarded an $893 million grant from the U.S. Department of Transportation. This substantial funding will propel the construction of the new 6.7-mile East San Fernando Valley Light Rail Transit Project, signifying a monumental advancement in public transportation infrastructure.
A Vision for a Connected Valley
The upcoming light rail line promises to transform public transit in one of the Valley’s busiest corridors—Van Nuys Boulevard. Marking a significant return, it’s the first local stop, commuter rail service to grace Van Nuys Boulevard in over seven decades, with the last Pacific Electric “San Fernando Valley Line” urban electric railway serving the area until 1952.
This new light rail initiative is not merely a transportation project; it’s a bridge to greater connectivity. It will seamlessly integrate with an array of existing and planned regional transit services, including Metrolink, Amtrak, and various Metro lines. For the residents of Van Nuys, Panorama City, Arleta, and Pacoima—many of whom rely heavily on public transportation—this project isn’t just about transit upgrades; it’s about accessing broader opportunities across the region.
Federal Support and Local Impact
Thanks to the collective efforts of local leaders, including Senator Alex Padilla and Congressman Tony Cárdenas, and the backing of the Biden-Harris Administration, this project has secured the necessary federal support under the Full Funding Grant Agreement (FFGA) governed by the Federal Transit Administration’s Expedited Project Delivery Pilot Program. This program is designed to fast-track significant capital projects, ensuring quicker improvements and enhancements to public transport infrastructures.
Metro Board Chair and LA County Supervisor Janice Hahn highlighted the transformative potential of this project, emphasizing it as a direct, rapid transit connection to the expanding Metro system that would profoundly benefit the community. Echoing this sentiment, L.A. Mayor and Metro Board Member Karen Bass noted the collaborative efforts that have made this significant step toward reality possible, bringing closer a future of enhanced transit connectivity.
Cultural Sensitivity and Community Engagement
Metro has introduced an innovative element to this project—a Cultural Competency requirement in the project contract. This requirement is a tailored strategy aimed at appreciating and engaging the diverse cultural landscape of the San Fernando Valley. As explained by Jacquelyn Dupont-Walker, Metro Board 2nd Vice Chair, this plan ensures comprehensive community engagement, allowing residents, local businesses, and community groups to stay informed and involved throughout the project’s development.
What’s Next?
Construction activities, including advanced utility adjustment work and minor street improvements along Van Nuys Boulevard, are set to commence later this year. With 11 new light rail stations planned, the project is scheduled to open in 2031 and is expected to create over 18,000 direct and indirect jobs. This endeavor is not just about enhancing transport but is also a strategic move towards economic stimulation and job creation in the region.
A Brighter Future for the Valley
The East San Fernando Valley Light Rail Transit Project stands as a beacon of progress for the Valley, representing a major shift towards sustainable and efficient public transportation. With this significant federal investment, Metro is poised to deliver a project that not only meets today’s mobility demands but also fosters a more equitable, connected, and sustainable future for all residents of the San Fernando Valley.
For more updates on this transformative project, stay tuned to Metro’s official communication channels.
Visit Metro’s project page for more details.
Read the press release from LA Metro:
Source: LA Metro
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Hollywood Boulevard Safety and Mobility Project: Enhancing Community Through CicLAvia
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Jay L. Zagorsky, Boston University
With the Olympic torch extinguished in Paris, all eyes are turning to Los Angeles for the 2028 Olympics.
The host city has promised that the next Summer Games will be “car-free.”
For people who know Los Angeles, this seems overly optimistic. The car remains king in LA, despite growing public transit options.
When LA hosted the Games in 1932, it had an extensive public transportation system, with buses and an extensive network of electric streetcars. Today, the trolleys are long gone; riders say city buses don’t come on schedule, and bus stops are dirty. What happened?
This question fascinates me because I am a business professor who studies why society abandons and then sometimes returns to certain technologies, such as vinyl records, landline phones and metal coins. The demise of electric streetcars in Los Angeles and attempts to bring them back today vividly demonstrate the costs and challenges of such revivals. https://www.youtube.com/embed/9X78ZqGyc5o?wmode=transparent&start=0 The 2028 Olympic Games will be held in existing sports venues around Los Angeles and are expected to host 15,000 athletes and over 1 million spectators.
Riding the Red and Yellow Cars
Transportation is a critical priority in any city, but especially so in Los Angeles, which has been a sprawling metropolis from the start.
In the early 1900s, railroad magnate Henry Huntington, who owned vast tracts of land around LA, started subdividing his holdings into small plots and building homes. In order to attract buyers, he also built a trolley system that whisked residents from outlying areas to jobs and shopping downtown.
By the 1930s, Los Angeles had a vibrant public transportation network, with over 1,000 miles of electric streetcar routes, operated by two companies: Pacific Electric Railway, with its “Red Cars,” and Los Angeles Railway, with its “Yellow Cars.”
The system wasn’t perfect by any means. Many people felt that streetcars were inconvenient and also unhealthy when they were jammed with riders. Moreover, streetcars were slow because they had to share the road with automobiles. As auto usage climbed and roads became congested, travel times increased.
Nonetheless, many Angelenos rode the streetcars – especially during World War II, when gasoline was rationed and automobile plants shifted to producing military vehicles. https://www.youtube.com/embed/AwKv3_WwD4o?wmode=transparent&start=0 In 1910, Los Angeles had a widely used local rail network, with over 1,200 miles (1,930 kilometers) of track. What happened?
Demise of public transit
The end of the war marked the end of the line for streetcars. The war effort had transformed oil, tire and car companies into behemoths, and these industries needed new buyers for goods from the massive factories they had built for military production. Civilians and returning soldiers were tired of rationing and war privations, and they wanted to spend money on goods such as cars.
After years of heavy usage during the war, Los Angeles’ streetcar system needed an expensive capital upgrade. But in the mid-1940s, most of the system was sold to a company called National City Lines, which was partly owned by the carmaker General Motors, the oil companies Standard Oil of California and Phillips Petroleum, and the Firestone tire company.
These powerful forces had no incentive to maintain or improve the old electric streetcar system. National City ripped up tracks and replaced the streetcars with buses that were built by General Motors, used Firestone tires and ran on gasoline.
There is a long-running academic debate over whether self-serving corporate interests purposely killed LA’s streetcar system. Some researchers argue that the system would have died on its own, like many other streetcar networks around the world.
The controversy even spilled over into pop culture in the 1988 movie “Who Framed Roger Rabbit,” which came down firmly on the conspiracy side.
What’s undisputed is that, starting in the mid-1940s, powerful social forces transformed Los Angeles so that commuters had only two choices: drive or take a public bus. As a result, LA became so choked with traffic that it often took hours to cross the city.
In 1990, the Los Angeles Times reported that people were putting refrigerators, desks and televisions in their cars to cope with getting stuck in horrendous traffic. A swath of movies, from “Falling Down” to “Clueless” to “La La Land,” have featured the next-level challenge of driving in LA.
Traffic was also a concern when LA hosted the 1984 Summer Games, but the Games went off smoothly. Organizers convinced over 1 million people to ride buses, and they got many trucks to drive during off-peak hours. The 2028 games, however, will have roughly 50% more athletes competing, which means thousands more coaches, family, friends and spectators. So simply dusting off plans from 40 years ago won’t work.
Olympic transportation plans
Today, Los Angeles is slowly rebuilding a more robust public transportation system. In addition to buses, it now has four light-rail lines – the new name for electric streetcars – and two subways. Many follow the same routes that electric trolleys once traveled. Rebuilding this network is costing the public billions, since the old system was completely dismantled.
Three key improvements are planned for the Olympics. First, LA’s airport terminals will be connected to the rail system. Second, the Los Angeles organizing committee is planning heavily on using buses to move people. It will do this by reassigning some lanes away from cars and making them available for 3,000 more buses, which will be borrowed from other locales.
Finally, there are plans to permanently increase bicycle lanes around the city. However, one major initiative, a bike path along the Los Angeles River, is still under an environmental review that may not be completed by 2028.
Car-free for 17 days
I expect that organizers will pull off a car-free Olympics, simply by making driving and parking conditions so awful during the Games that people are forced to take public transportation to sports venues around the city. After the Games end, however, most of LA is likely to quickly revert to its car-centric ways.
As Casey Wasserman, chair of the LA 2028 organizing committee, recently put it: “The unique thing about Olympic Games is for 17 days you can fix a lot of problems when you can set the rules – for traffic, for fans, for commerce – than you do on a normal day in Los Angeles.”
This article has been updated to indicate that Los Angeles has four light-rail lines.
Jay L. Zagorsky, Associate Professor of Markets, Public Policy and Law, Boston University
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
The Bridge is a section of the STM Daily News Blog meant for diversity, offering real news stories about bona fide community efforts to perpetuate a greater good. The purpose of The Bridge is to connect the divides that separate us, fostering understanding and empathy among different groups. By highlighting positive initiatives and inspirational actions, The Bridge aims to create a sense of unity and shared purpose. This section brings to light stories of individuals and organizations working tirelessly to promote inclusivity, equality, and mutual respect. Through these narratives, readers are encouraged to appreciate the richness of diverse perspectives and to participate actively in building stronger, more cohesive communities.
https://stmdailynews.com/category/the-bridge
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