Areas from the "urban revival" era that didn't make it or declined?

[llamaorama]

I was just thinking, its the year 2020. 1990 was 30 years ago. In 1990, the very first modern urban revival or new urbanist developments had started in cities like Portland and Minneapolis. It was a nadir for many inner cities but the new dawn was just over the horizon.

30 years before 1990 was the year 1960. A lot of things built in 1960 were looking kind of shabby in 1990, like some of the early post war suburbs that got hit by white flight and their dead malls. Urban renewal and Le Corb style stuff came in with a bang, and was being imploded by the end of that 30 year period.

30 years before 1960, it was 1930. 1930, cities were radically different. In 1960, downtowns were crashing and burning and cities were clearning out whole areas of stuff that was alive in 1930.

So...

Is it just me or has this rapid rate of change, this churn, kind of slowed down in American cities? Yes I realize that certain things affecting our surroundings like the decline of brick and mortal retail has occured, but that has been more of a slow change.

For the most part, there are few neighborhoods in my city that were being built in 1990 that are now bad in 2020. There are basically no major buildings built in 1990 that are being torn down in 2020. All major changes since 1990 in this city seem to be on a positive trajectory, not a negative one.

Can anyone think of a modern urban district, or previously gentrified urban area, or a really significant landmark from the last 30 years which has gone in a bad direction? Have their been any new urbanist style master planned communities which are now section 8 housing?

[xzmattzx]

The Village of Eastlake in Wilmington was touted as a development that would bring dignity and respect to residents. Grants were given out to allow people to own their first homes. Other homes were rented at below-market rates. These houses were built in the late 2000s. You can see it here (https://www.google.com/maps/@39.7496478,-75.5297236,3a,75y,328.69h,91.63t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1s_beoNnx9AHWPucyh_CcrVA!2e0!6s%2F%2Fgeo1.ggpht.com%2Fcbk%3Fpanoid%3D_beoNnx9AHWPucyh_CcrVA%26output%3Dthumbnail%26cb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile.gps%26thumb%3D2%26w%3D203%26h%3D100%26yaw%3D31.150091%26pitch%3D0%26thumbfov%3D100!7i13312!8i6656?hl=en), and I have some pictures of the area when the houses were first finished.

Unfortunately, it didn't help as much as people were hoping. Crime is still a big problem. Some people are not keeping up their houses. Gang activity is prevalent. So this is not seen as a big success. I remember reading an article about it a couple years ago, after wondering how things were going there.

[llamaorama]

Sounds like a housing project.

I was thinking along the lines of something that was private and supposed to be cool or the next big thing. Like malls and new suburbs from the 1960s that were dumps 30 years later.

[mhays]

There are plenty of retail-oriented developments that just didn't work out, either from the start or lately as the internets have diminished retail. Think festival marketplaces and urban malls in cities like Jacksonville and San Diego.

I was already a nerd for this stuff in 1990. The biggest difference is my level of expectations. I used to expect every new building or two to have a big effect on its neighborhood...it turns out the effects are usually very incremental. The change I once expected from 500 apartments might actually take 2,000.

[craigs]

Yeah, urban malls. They were being built all through the 1990s, and a great many of them are dead or dying today. Brick and mortar retail is a mess.

That said, most of the housing and office projects built in US central cities, circa 1990, are probably still functioning as intended, if a bit dated looking.

[pdxtex]

Just from browsing real estate online, I'd say some boom and bust places out west haven't faired the best. I've seen some pretty ratty 90s listings in phx, vegas and inner desert California. That being said, I'd say Vegas is about to have its Portland moment based on what's happening downtown and north of the strip.

[Pedestrian]

If by "areas", you count neighborhoods, I'd call attention to San Francisco's Fillmore District.

In the post-war era, the city designated the Fillmore, which some had previously called "the Harlem of the West" as a redevelopment project area:

https://hoodline.imgix.net/uploads/story/image/15213/WA1947projectarea.jpg?auto=format

Previously, the area had looked like this:

https://uniim1.shutterfly.com/ng/services/mediarender/THISLIFE/001023489329/media/64988264882/large/1580804558/enhance
Above 2 images: https://hoodline.com/2016/01/how-urban-renewal-destroyed-the-fillmore-in-order-to-save-it

So the bulldozers went to work:

https://hoodline.imgix.net/uploads/story/image/15259/798px-WA_vacant_lot1.jpg?auto=format
https://hoodline.com/2016/01/how-urban-renewal-tried-to-rebuild-the-fillmore

And physically, the neighborhood was largely rebuilt:

https://s.hdnux.com/photos/10/74/26/2344382/7/480x480.jpg
https://www.google.com/search?rls=en&q=SF+Fillmore+renewal+images&tbm=isch&source=univ&client=safari&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwja2Lf1urfnAhXEu54KHQ_WCYwQsAR6BAgKEAE&biw=1397&bih=804#imgrc=9fsf3Ym93x69hM:

But many of the newly built storefronts have had repeated business failures. Eventually, in the 1990s, the city designated the area a "jazz preservation district" in order to try to restore some of the pre-"redevelopment" jazz clubs and nightlife. That too has been pretty much a failure. Upon closing his club, one business owner wrote the Mayor:

In the early 1990’s, Mayor Frank Jordan, responding to a groundswell of discontent from the African American business community that the Western Addition A-2 Redevelopment Project (“A-2”) had decimated the few African American businesses along Fillmore Street, established the Fillmore /Western Addition Economic Development Task Force ( “Task Force”) to work collaboratively with the San Francisco Redevelopment Agency to devise a program to salvage some semblance of a commercial life for African American businesses in the Fillmore corridor (Fillmore from Geary Boulevard to Turk Street). The Task Force—a genuinely dedicated, intelligent, and energetic group—labored tirelessly with the Redevelopment Agency staff and Commission to formulate a plan and program to create a framework for African American entrepreneurship on Fillmore Street. From this collaborative effort, the Old Fillmore Jazz Preservation District (“Jazz Preservation District”) was created; it was proclaimed with much fanfare as an official policy program of the City and County of San Francisco.

Having successfully owned and operated a business/entertainment enterprise on the corner of California and Divisadero Street for several years that corresponded to the theme of the proposed Jazz Preservation District, I was approached by the Redevelopment Agency to participate in the revitalization effort on Fillmore Street. In October 1999, I opened Rasselas at 1534 Fillmore Street. For several years mine was the lone commercial establishment in the Jazz Preservation District. From the outset, the enthusiasm, support and encouragement from the Task Force was not matched by some key Redevelopment Agency staff.

Many times, I felt as if certain Agency staff wanted me to fail. Once I opened Rasselas there was, in my opinion, a demonstrable lack of energy and interest by the Agency staff to follow through on important policies and programs that were essential for the success of the Jazz Preservation District as well as my own business. In a report to the Agency Commission in 1995 then Executive Director Clifford Graves, stated that the success and sustainability of the Jazz Preservation District required, among other things, that recruitment of theme and supporting tenants is essential and that “financing sources” and “financing methods” associated with the unique environment of lower Fillmore Street must be devised; this call to pro-active and creative support from the City and County of San Francisco was never materialized in my opinion. To this day, I never felt a shared sense of interest with the Agency staff. Further, in my view, the Successor Agency staff has done little to promote and advance the ambitious goals of the Jazz Preservation District concept.
https://insidescoopsf.sfgate.com/blog/2013/08/19/rasselas-jazz-club-closes-as-its-owner-calls-upon-mayor-lee-to-salvage-jazz-preservation-district-vision/

But to this day, the area's businesses seem tenuous and the area is something of a backwater rather than a center of vibrant African-American life. Overall, San Francisco itself has been so successful and housing in such short supply that the residential buildings in this neighborhood are filled just as buildings all over the city are. But the main shopping street still has a slightly seedy feel and not much to attract anyone from outside the neighborhood (which distinguishes it from most of the other neighborhood "high streets" in town or even the same street farther to the north outside the area that was "redeveloped") except one of the few buildings NOT bulldozed, the Fillmore Auditorium which still host popular music events.

[Centropolis]

st. louis has seemingly infinite examples of areas that had momentum and then slowed, stalled or backslid.

like 15 years ago while in college i almost bought a house here in the oldest corner of north st. louis for 15k or something. there was a flurry of activity, and while the neighborhood is stable didn't see the kind of breakneck appreciation i was expecting as there are so many different areas of st. louis that are in that early revitalization mode and there are only so many people investing. the attention sort of wanders around and leaves some places behind.

these parts of north st. louis always felt like the one of the best remnants of st. louis' mid-atlantic je ne sais quoi.

however, with a 2 billion dollar DOD project on its doorstep it is likely to see another wave of attention.

https://live.staticflickr.com/8050/8084598180_ea00e31bbe_b.jpg
https://live.staticflickr.com/8050/8084598180_ea00e31bbe_b.jpg

https://bloximages.newyork1.vip.townnews.com/stltoday.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/5/d2/5d29380a-4a61-577d-a92c-f89b192e70d3/4ec69f846d10e.image.jpg
stltoday.com

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/8d/OldNorthSTL-085.jpg
wikipedia.com
https://media2.fdncms.com/riverfronttimes/imager/u/original/3137114/9487982273_4572da8478_z.jpg
wikipedia.com

https://live.staticflickr.com/3630/4559546604_7bbd2ac2d6_z.jpg
https://live.staticflickr.com/3630/4559546604_7bbd2ac2d6_z.jpg

https://www.urbanohio.com/photo/_data/i/galleries/Other_Places/United_States/Missouri/Saint_Louis/Neighborhoods/Old_North_St._Louis/10STL11-me.jpg
https://www.urbanohio.com

https://www.builtstlouis.net/northside/images/blairmont/blairmont02.jpg
builtstlouis.com

https://images.fineartamerica.com/images/artworkimages/mediumlarge/1/old-north-st-louis-scott-rackers.jpg
fineartamerica.com

[eschaton]

There are tons of examples of commercial developments meant to revive cities from the 1990s which failed. A lot of cities were still stuck in the mindset that they needed to build amenities to attract suburbanites to dine and shop, rather than rebuild their neighborhoods. Many of those developments languished, if not failed entirely.

However, I can't off the top of my head think of any cases of failed gentrification. Once a neighborhood begins to recover, it basically proceeds in a straight line to yuppie central.

[Centropolis]

interestingly a native milwaukeean (?) turned st. louisan turned chicagoan (i think) turned me on to this special corner of north st. louis (pictured above) many years ago with his CLASSIC early 00s urbex site https://www.builtstlouis.net/

[IrishIllini]

Had St. Louis held up better following the Depression it’d be one of the most beautiful cities in the country. Same goes for Cincinnati, Cleveland, Detroit, and Pittsburgh after WWII.

[Crawford]

However, I can't off the top of my head think of any cases of failed gentrification. Once a neighborhood begins to recover, it basically proceeds in a straight line to yuppie central.

I think this is generally true, but oversimplified. Neighborhoods backslide during economic downturns. Often gentrification is called out far too early. There are early 1970's NY Times articles on nascent gentrifers in Brownstone Brooklyn, so only about a quarter century too early, and Brooklyn hadn't even reached its nadir.

Also neighborhood desirability waxes and wanes. The far eastern UES was considered very trendy in the 60's-70's, then very stodgy in the next few decades, now popular again due to opening of Second Avenue Subway.

[Centropolis]

Had St. Louis held up better following the Depression it’d be one of the most beautiful cities in the country. Same goes for Cincinnati, Cleveland, Detroit, and Pittsburgh after WWII.

i'm not sure about Pittsburgh but St. Louis was one of the earliest (if not earliest, excepting Pittsburgh I imagine which is arguably not midwestern per say) midwestern cities to decline, and was doing so while Detroit was in full swing boom.

[Steely Dan]

i'm not sure about Pittsburgh but St. Louis was one of the earliest (if not earliest, excepting Pittsburgh I imagine which is arguably not midwestern per say) midwestern cities to decline, and was doing so while Detroit was in full swing boom.

both st. louis and detroit set their all-time population highs in 1950, from which point both cities started to decline precipitously.

granted, st. louis' growth was considerably more muted than detroit's white hot growth in the 1900- 1950 period, but it was still growing throughout that entire period (with a very minor -0.7% decline in the 30s because of the depression, which slow-rolled just about all large established cities in the nation).

[Cirrus]

+1 to the comment about festival marketplaces and downtown malls. I think one of the key lessons of the last 30 years is that retail is inherently fickle.

Baltimore Inner Harbor, Jacksonville Landing, Norfolk Waterside, Providence Place mall, Granville Island... none what they were circa the 1990s. Some, like Columbus City Center mall, are flat out gone.

[eschaton]

i'm not sure about Pittsburgh but St. Louis was one of the earliest (if not earliest, excepting Pittsburgh I imagine which is arguably not midwestern per say) midwestern cities to decline, and was doing so while Detroit was in full swing boom.

Pittsburgh is not part of the midwest. However, it's true that stagnation set in a lot earlier in Pittsburgh than elsewhere. It's the main reason why Pittsburgh didn't end up with a large black population like other rust belt metros. The period of rapid employment growth basically ended around 1920 - right when immigration restrictions kicked in - meaning we didn't need to have southern blacks and hillbillies in order to keep the mills fully staffed (local population was enough).

[iheartthed]

i'm not sure about Pittsburgh but St. Louis was one of the earliest (if not earliest, excepting Pittsburgh I imagine which is arguably not midwestern per say) midwestern cities to decline, and was doing so while Detroit was in full swing boom.

Actually, St. Louis's population trajectory looks a lot like Boston's from about 1860 until 1980. That's when the socioeconomic factors distinguishing East Coast cities from the Rust Belt really seemed to take hold.

[Centropolis]

both st. louis and detroit set their all-time population highs in 1950, from which point both cities started to decline precipitously.

granted, st. louis' growth was considerably more muted than detroit's white hot growth in the 1900- 1950 period, but it was still growing throughout that entire period (with a very minor -0.7% decline in the 30s because of the depression, which slow-rolled just about all large established cities in the nation).

I recommend watching the Pruitt Igoe Myth. While its true that the population of metro st. louis continued to expand it had a much older victorian core economy than detroit that was sputtering by the early 20th century even as waves of desperate migrants moved in. (its A LOT closer to the greater delta which st. louis actually shares a state with and a massive area of rural economic ruin in the early 20th century as the ozarks were being abandoned en mass after the thin topsoil washed away. st. louis lumber companies concurrently moved in and clear cut the entire thing for pennies on the dollar. there's massive tracts of essentially abandoned land even today)

https://i.vimeocdn.com/video/115358815.webp?mw=1100&mh=603&q=70
https://i.vimeocdn.com/video/115358815.webp?mw=1100&mh=603&q=70

[Steely Dan]

^ so you're saying that st. louis was declining while it was still growing in population?

i'm not sure i totally follow you, but whatever.

st. louis certainly grew much slower than detroit in the early 20th century, so if you're just just trying to make a relative argument, then i can certainly see that.

[Centropolis]

^ so you're saying that st. louis was declining while it was still growing in population?

i'm not sure i totally follow you, but whatever.

st. louis certainly grew much slower than detroit in the early 20th century, so if you're just just trying to make a relative argument, then i can certainly see that.

yes, i guess its not as common in the u.s. but its entirely possible for a city to be in economic decline while also growing in population. having an *extremely* poor hinterland that was in agricultural/economic /ecological collapse like the ozarks (chicago really wasn't proximate to an agricultural collapse like this on such a scale) as well as the delta-like great migration areas of the bootheel/western arkansas being fairly close was a major population contributing factor. i would venture to guess that people who couldn't afford to go on to the great lakes often stopped at st. louis.

https://daysgoneby.me/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Typical-Ozark-backwoods-scene-a-corn-patch-in-rocky-soil.-Meramec-Forest-project-area.-Near-Salem-Missouri-by-Carl-Mydans-May-1936-e1415304535788.jpg
https://daysgoneby.me

(an attempted crop of corn outside of st. louis on a rock strewn field)

[Crawford]

Most northern cities were probably in relative decline by the onset of the Great Depression. There was already significant suburbanization of wealth and corporate might prior to WW2, while almost all nonsubsidized city proper development stopped around 1930. 1929 was probably the apex of urban America.

[Steely Dan]

Most northern cities were probably in relative decline by the onset of the Great Depression. There was already significant suburbanization of wealth and corporate might prior to WW2, while almost all nonsubsidized city proper development stopped around 1930.


not true at all for chicago. shit-tons of bungalows and 3-flats and 4+1's and residential highrises were still being built within city limits throughout the 40s, 50s, 60s, and 70s.

today, 36% of the city of chicago's total housing units were built between 1940 and 1980.

[Crawford]

not true at all for chicago. shit-tons of bungalows and 3-flats and 4+1's and residential highrises were still being built within city limits throughout the 50s, 60s, and 70s.

I meant until the postwar era. There was a massive urban construction slowdown from like 1930-1950.

[Steely Dan]

^ the '30s definitely saw a massive slowdown in urban construction, what with the great depression and all. and then you had the war, but by the mid-40s, with all those returning vets, home construction within the city of chicago picked-up IMMEDIATELY. chicago saw the construction of 110,000 new housing units between 1940 and 1949.

both of my parents grew up in bog standard chicago brick georgians (https://www.google.com/maps/@42.005276,-87.8101436,3a,49.1y,332.33h,90.65t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sipakGHof9y_dDEA8YgTeIg!2e0!7i16384!8i8192) built in the 40s in outskirt city neighborhoods, the children of vets who came home from the war and immediately got to work on home buying and family-making.

[jtown,man]

Man...why can't all the people moving to Austin and Nashville head to St Louis? That city is BEGGING for some action.

[Centropolis]

Man...why can't all the people moving to Austin and Nashville head to St Louis? That city is BEGGING for some action.

my sister in law did exactly that, and my wife lived in metro nashville through high school so it sort of counts, lol.

nashville is starting to outstrip its own appeal in the sense of the livability factors that are supposed to make living in smaller cities appealing. not sure if that is translating into "overflow" this direction quite yet.

[Pedestrian]

Man...why can't all the people moving to Austin and Nashville head to St Louis? That city is BEGGING for some action.

Well, because:

Tennessee on its way to becoming a bona fide no-income-tax state in 2021 (https://www.timesfreepress.com/news/edge/story/2019/feb/01/hall-income-tax-ending-2021/487137/)

and Texas already is.

Whereas

Missouri’s . . . given its residents a complicated 10-bracket tax system that leaves the majority of state residents paying the state’s highest personal income tax rate.
https://www.creditkarma.com/tax/i/filing-missouri-state-taxes/

[Centropolis]

Well, because:

Tennessee on its way to becoming a bona fide no-income-tax state in 2021 (https://www.timesfreepress.com/news/edge/story/2019/feb/01/hall-income-tax-ending-2021/487137/)

and Texas already is.

Whereas


https://www.creditkarma.com/tax/i/filing-missouri-state-taxes/

nonetheless, missouri doesnt really have that high of a tax burden, theres still a decent trickle of retirees to southwest missouri. "rural" tennessee and georgia is becoming too crowded for a certain kind of libertarian type. nashville housing prices and traffic are ridiculous.

[jtown,man]

Well, because:

Tennessee on its way to becoming a bona fide no-income-tax state in 2021 (https://www.timesfreepress.com/news/edge/story/2019/feb/01/hall-income-tax-ending-2021/487137/)

and Texas already is.

Whereas


https://www.creditkarma.com/tax/i/filing-missouri-state-taxes/

Yeah, I mean having no income tax helps a lot. Tennessee also not having extremely high property taxes help too. But like what's already been mentioned, its not like Missouri is NYS...it's not an extremely high taxed state.

[Pedestrian]

nashville housing prices and traffic are ridiculous.

To a San Franciscan, "ridiculous" is relative.

[jtown,man]

To a San Franciscan, "ridiculous" is relative.

Yeah, but nothing about SF is "normal" to the vast majority of Americans.

[JAYNYC]

+1 to the comment about festival marketplaces and downtown malls. I think one of the key lessons of the last 30 years is that retail is inherently fickle.

Baltimore Inner Harbor, Jacksonville Landing, Norfolk Waterside, Providence Place mall, Granville Island... none what they were circa the 1990s. Some, like Columbus City Center mall, are flat out gone.

Rivercenter Mall in downtown San Antonio is perhaps the best (worst?) example of this.

[dave8721]

Rivercenter Mall in downtown San Antonio is perhaps the best (worst?) example of this.

I parked at that place last month, i'm sure i got some kind of second hand meth poisoning from the youth passed out all around.

Some other cities that built them, Fort Lauderdale built the Las Olas Riverfront shopping complex in 1998 and it already closed and has been replaced by apartment towers. Jacksonville built "Jacksonville Landing". Miami built Bayside in 1987 and it still gets reasonably crowded with tourists, especially Cruise goers.

[Centropolis]

To a San Franciscan, "ridiculous" is relative.

I sat in worse traffic in Nashville last year and spent a month in the Bay area in the fall. California drivers are fairly chill in heavy traffic and know how to keep slowly moving whereas in Tennessee flip out, run shoulders, panic brake a lot and traffic just seems harder to deal with. On the flip side, you can find reasonably priced housing in metro Nashville but are completely hosed in the Bay area unless you sleep in your truck a couple days a week and live in Sac like my boss in the Bay area...

[Cirrus]

its entirely possible for a city to be in economic decline while also growing in population.
The opposite is certainly true. Remember about 2005, when all the east coast cities were clearly healthy and booming, but still losing population? It was because poor households with more people living in them were being replaced by wealthier households with fewer people.

[Centropolis]

The opposite is certainly true. Remember about 2005, when all the east coast cities were clearly healthy and booming, but still losing population? It was because poor households with more people living in them were being replaced by wealthier households with fewer people.

yeah, and this happens at a micro scale in almost every gentrifying urban neighborhood in the u.s. excepting warehouse districts/cbds and places like midtown detroit or something with tons of physical gaps.

[eschaton]

yeah, and this happens at a micro scale in almost every gentrifying urban neighborhood in the u.s. excepting warehouse districts/cbds and places like midtown detroit or something with tons of physical gaps.

Yeah, basically the "first phase" of gentrification causes a population decline as household size declines and chopped-up houses are restored. Then once real estate values recover enough filling in vacant lots becomes profitable, and the population starts to rise.

[goat314]

yeah, and this happens at a micro scale in almost every gentrifying urban neighborhood in the u.s. excepting warehouse districts/cbds and places like midtown detroit or something with tons of physical gaps.

I've wondered if St. Louis has reached that phase yet. I think it's kind of a mix between gentrification and continued black flight causing population loss in the city. Probably another 10-20 years until population stabilization.

[BigDipper 80]

Dayton was home to the "Santa Clara Arts District", which probably lasted for around ten years before completely collapsing. There's virtually nothing left of the gentrification attempt of the early 90s, while many of Dayton's other historic districts renovated around the same time continue to thrive.

https://daytonvistas.com/the-santa-clara-business-district-history-and-preservation/

[Centropolis]

I've wondered if St. Louis has reached that phase yet. I think it's kind of a mix between gentrification and continued black flight causing population loss in the city. Probably another 10-20 years until population stabilization.

i havent looked at the numbers in a while but im almost certain it has. essentially 100% intact neighborhoods with rampant 2-flat to 1 conversions, etc.

[edale]

Dayton was home to the "Santa Clara Arts District", which probably lasted for around ten years before completely collapsing. There's virtually nothing left of the gentrification attempt of the early 90s, while many of Dayton's other historic districts renovated around the same time continue to thrive.

https://daytonvistas.com/the-santa-clara-business-district-history-and-preservation/

Just poked around the W 3rd Wright-Dunbar business district on streetview, and "thrive" seems to be a generous description. The block or two that is standing is nice; doesn't look to have a ton of businesses or even functional upper stories, but a nice, tight intact strip. When you go beyond the little strip in all directions, though, it's totally depressing. Huge swaths of urban prairie to the east, west, and north of the little business district. The historic neighborhood to the south looks pretty nice, but it too is surrounded by prairie. I hate to see how far Dayton has fallen. Is there any momentum coming to this area, or any hope for some new construction? I know the Oregon District and area near the ballpark are doing really well right now and seeing a ton of new investment. I hope west of the river can similarly see some love soon.

Aerial: https://www.google.com/maps/place/Dayton,+OH/@39.7559404,-84.2137454,736m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x884080d5aedd1403:0xa640e392f20e4ce4!8m2!3d39.7589478!4d-84.1916069

Street view: https://www.google.com/maps/@39.7559042,-84.2137195,3a,75y,74.35h,90.24t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s2Vi2sr9byCFMV_7dVuPwAA!2e0!7i16384!8i8192

[Steely Dan]

yeah, and this happens at a micro scale in almost every gentrifying urban neighborhood in the u.s.

that's certainly the conventional wisdom, but i don't think the evidence always bears that out.

take a look at chicago's lincoln park, it's been gentrifying for 40 years now, and other than a flat decade in the '00s, it's been slowly increasing in population the entire time.

1980 - 57,146

1990 - 61,092

2000 - 64,323

2010 - 64,116

2016 - 67,260 (estimate)

source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lincoln_Park,_Chicago

[BigDipper 80]

Just poked around the W 3rd Wright-Dunbar business district on streetview, and "thrive" seems to be a generous description. The block or two that is standing is nice; doesn't look to have a ton of businesses or even functional upper stories, but a nice, tight intact strip. When you go beyond the little strip in all directions, though, it's totally depressing. Huge swaths of urban prairie to the east, west, and north of the little business district. The historic neighborhood to the south looks pretty nice, but it too is surrounded by prairie. I hate to see how far Dayton has fallen. Is there any momentum coming to this area, or any hope for some new construction? I know the Oregon District and area near the ballpark are doing really well right now and seeing a ton of new investment. I hope west of the river can similarly see some love soon.

Aerial: https://www.google.com/maps/place/Dayton,+OH/@39.7559404,-84.2137454,736m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x884080d5aedd1403:0xa640e392f20e4ce4!8m2!3d39.7589478!4d-84.1916069

Street view: https://www.google.com/maps/@39.7559042,-84.2137195,3a,75y,74.35h,90.24t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s2Vi2sr9byCFMV_7dVuPwAA!2e0!7i16384!8i8192

I can speak to this since I live in the neighborhood in question. A lot of the reason why things look like they do is because three separate neighborhood boundaries that all meet in the business district. Wright-Dunbar (south of Third, east of Broadway) is really the only one with an active neighborhood council. So we're out applying for grants and working on beautification projects and have a better dialogue with City Hall, which our adjacent neighborhoods don't have. In Wright-Dunbar itself, home values have been steadily ticking up over the past few years, and almost every vacant home either has new owners or is in the process of being made habitable. There are a number of new housing projects in the works, both as single-family homes on the greenfields and multi-family units along Third (some of the buildings already have apartments in them, namely those west of Williams). We really only have one restaurant currently, but having a pharmacy and two bank branches is a nice perk, and more commercial space should be coming online in a couple of vacant buildings in the next year or so. People are starting to express more interest in the area as the other inner-ring historic districts get pricier, but things probably won't really start heating up until the Third Street bridge is finished in 2022. But the community is working to plant the seeds now so that once that access point is re-opened, the area will be that much more desirable.

[CaliNative]

The revitalization of the Gaslamp district and the adjacent ballpark/East Village in San Diego has been a success, although nearby Horton Plaza failed like many shopping malls and is being repurposed as a mixed use/office park. Some progress is being made in getting the homeless into shelters and housing, although the numbers are still alarming.

[SIGSEGV]

that's certainly the conventional wisdom, but i don't think the evidence always bears that out.

take a look at chicago's lincoln park, it's been gentrifying for 40 years now, and other than a flat decade in the '00s, it's been slowly increasing in population the entire time.

1980 - 57,146

1990 - 61,092

2000 - 64,323

2010 - 64,116

2016 - 67,260 (estimate)

source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lincoln_Park,_Chicago


When did Lincoln Park start gentrifying? The population was 102k in 1950.

[pip]

It was in the bottom quarter of neighborhoods in per capita income in 1950 and 1960. Median income in Lincoln Park didn’t get higher than median income in the city as a whole until 1980. And the population during those time periods plummeted.

Lincoln Park was probably the first neighborhood outside of the Near North Side to gentrify. I would guess the 1980's was when Lincoln Park started to take off.

[Steely Dan]

Yeah, I think most people would say that Lincoln Park started properly gentrifying in the 80s.

My parents were young adults in the 70s, and while LP was one of the hotter neighborhoods for nightlife at the time, they've both told me that it was fairly seedy in spots back then.

[hammersklavier]

yes, i guess its not as common in the u.s. but its entirely possible for a city to be in economic decline while also growing in population.
It isn't at all uncommon for cities to face migration waves that outstrip their economic capacity; this most frequently happens when their hinterland is being abandoned, regardless of whether or not the city is capable of sustaining the hinterland's population. (This is known as "push factors" in urban studies circles.)

The causes of hinterland abandonment are complex and can range wildly. While agricultural failure is one possible cause, another, more common, cause is restructuring of the agricultural economy -- usually involving large-scale tenant evictions. Perhaps the best-known example of this are the Scottish Highland (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highland_Clearances) and Lowland clearances, (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lowland_Clearances) which drove thousands upon thousands of former crofters to Glasgow in particular, an influx the city was economically unable to cope with. Even to this day, Glasgow remains one of Western Europe's poorer major cities with the region suffering an unusually low life expectancy (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glasgow_effect) relative to the UK, Europe, and the developed world a a whole. Similarly, push factors seem to have also controlled urbanization in cities like Dublin or Naples, and are the primary causor of the mushrooming of South Africa's townships and of informal housing all around the world ... Push migration tends to lead to large but poor cities.

It's unusual in the US because the almost-totally-unrestricted immigration that dominated the Victorian and fin-de-siècle eras came to an end in the 1920s, and, even though America's major urban economies had begun to slow down by the end of the period, pull factors also dominated the Great Migration. But for the cities that began to economically slow down first, there was a period when push factors could outweigh pull factors, and St. Louis' unique position made it one of the relatively few cities in the country where this would be indisputably true. (I wonder whether Memphis being another logical push city from Ozark abandonment and Delta land clearances is at root of its stagnancy.)

[Centropolis]

It isn't at all uncommon for cities to face migration waves that outstrip their economic capacity; this most frequently happens when their hinterland is being abandoned, regardless of whether or not the city is capable of sustaining the hinterland's population. (This is known as "push factors" in urban studies circles.)

The causes of hinterland abandonment are complex and can range wildly. While agricultural failure is one possible cause, another, more common, cause is restructuring of the agricultural economy -- usually involving large-scale tenant evictions. Perhaps the best-known example of this are the Scottish Highland (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highland_Clearances) and Lowland clearances, (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lowland_Clearances) which drove thousands upon thousands of former crofters to Glasgow in particular, an influx the city was economically unable to cope with. Even to this day, Glasgow remains one of Western Europe's poorer major cities with the region suffering an unusually low life expectancy (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glasgow_effect) relative to the UK, Europe, and the developed world a a whole. Similarly, push factors seem to have also controlled urbanization in cities like Dublin or Naples, and are the primary causor of the mushrooming of South Africa's townships and of informal housing all around the world ... Push migration tends to lead to large but poor cities.

It's unusual in the US because the almost-totally-unrestricted immigration that dominated the Victorian and fin-de-siècle eras came to an end in the 1920s, and, even though America's major urban economies had begun to slow down by the end of the period, pull factors also dominated the Great Migration. But for the cities that began to economically slow down first, there was a period when push factors could outweigh pull factors, and St. Louis' unique position made it one of the relatively few cities in the country where this would be indisputably true. (I wonder whether Memphis being another logical push city from Ozark abandonment and Delta land clearances is at root of its stagnancy.)

re: memphis i imagine this could the the case. my mother first moved to memphis from the “greater” delta (i consider the entire lowlands up into missouri where they still grow cotton and rice the “delta”) but departed for a variety of reasons i imagine on to st. louis.