Quote:
Originally Posted by ue
While not quite as pronounced as in the States, I think you could make an argument for racially-motivated flight exacerbating suburbanization trends in Winnipeg, Thunder Bay, and to some extent Edmonton. There's an oft-overlooked racial lens through which we can look at spatial realities of certain groups.
For example, in Winnipeg, with capital flight to suburbs after WWII, central areas became more dilapidated and due to racist business owners and landlords, Indigenous peoples who were often coerced into moving to Winnipeg from up north dealt with de facto segregation. Businesses would not serve and landlords would not rent to Indigenous people south of Portage, for example. It's less obvious but does still happen to this day, especially on the landlord side. Only the most dilapidated corners of the city were where Indigenous residents could live in and the presence of poor and racialized people in the inner city further caused flight of middle and upper income white capital.
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Hot take: I don't think people are so much concerned with the ethnicity of residents as they are with the violence and crime happening in certain inner city neighbourhoods regardless of the ethnicity of those responsible.
Imagine a North End or Central area with crime rates in line with what you'd see in a quiet suburb like, say, Westwood. Interest in those areas would explode.
I know a guy who lives on Sherbrook who has the means to live just about anywhere he wants in Winnipeg. But he is a genuinely good hearted, community first kind of guy so he stays in his home that he bought for the price of a used car 20 years ago. However, the unbelievable stories I have heard from him... he puts up with far, far more hassles than anyone would want to deal with on a regular basis. A lot of those incidents involve Indigenous people, but TBH I don't think he'd feel any better about it if they involved white people exclusively. Getting stabbed is getting stabbed, regardless of the skin colour of the person holding the knife.
EDIT: I thought I should add as a postscript... you are somewhat new to Winnipeg and you may not know this, but the serious decline of some inner city neighbourhoods is a relatively new phenomenon. The North End was pretty much a regular working class neighbourhood up until about 30-odd years ago. Rough around the edges sure, but still a place where you could raise a family. I know this because I had quite a few relatives in the area. My parents lived close to Selkirk and Salter right up until just before I was born. But once street gangs became a thing, it really changed the feel of the area and it became a much more menacing place.
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