Gentrification In Urban Areas

Gentrification is damaging neighborhoods because it forcibly displaces the lower income residents on the streets to make room for luxurious more expensive apartments. The term gentrification means to conform to middle-class taste, which is exactly what is happening to places like the Mission District, Placita Olvera Street, East Los Angeles, and many more urban areas. Not only are our neighborhoods being gentrified, but also so is our food.

In the constantly changing economy of cities, the growth of city housing is oftentimes neglected. In “Cities Mobilize to Help Those Threatened by Gentrification” Timothy Williams recounts how gentrification has evolved over the years. Mentioning how cities have changed in order to appease the younger professionals, Williams shows how the city itself is in jeopardy due to the tax increases. Slowly loosing their faithful residents as well as historic culture cities face a big deal. Williams gives quotes from faithful residents, “…long time homeowners are victims of the success story”, (Williams 346). In “Cities Mobilize to Help Those Threatened by Gentrification”, Williams uses his credible quotes and modern statistics to generate the reader’s emotions, with desire to change how city officials go about gentrification in culturally infused cities.

“I took a trip to Oakland, California and fell in love with the area. We stayed at an Air B&B for the three days of our stay and the house was absolutely beautiful, it looked like my dream home. Despite all the glitz and glamour around us we noticed a large amount of homelessness compared to Columbus. We found out that this property is not someone’s home but a house used strictly as an Air B&B. When you hear something like that and see the amount of homelessness it makes you wonder how many of these homes are strictly for show? So after researching I found out, the reason for the rampant homelessness can be attributed to large increases in rent. Even worse, the cause for the increase is due to Silicon Valley” (Kasongo, 2017). Unfortunately, rent increasing virtually overnight is the reality of many low-income families. This situation is called gentrification and is felt throughout the world, from the Midwest, East coast or even Western Europe, no region is immune to this process. Gentrification in the Midwest is extensive and wide causing the displacement of many low-income minority residents which can lead to even bigger issues.

A study by The Urban Institute describes gentrification as “a process whereby higher-income households move into low income neighborhoods, escalating the area’s property values to the point that displacement occurs.” Gentrification generally takes place in deteriorating urban or rural areas. The purpose of gentrification is to take struggling neighborhoods and stabilize them by increasing property value. Naturally the system isn’t perfect, as it has the side effect of displacement, which can cause some people to have to move to a different location, but overall gentrification is much more beneficial than destructive on a large scale. All neighborhoods have to be improved eventually. Gentrification is simply the most effective way of doing it. Although there are some negatives associated with Gentrification, in the long run it succeeds in creating a better place for people to live, and the pros far outweigh the cons.

When cities begin their journey of being gentrified, many locals become displaced. Displacement is when locals are uprooted from their homes, due to outside factors, and forced to move elsewhere. According to the Urban Displacement Project conducted by U.C. Berkeley, “Gentrification results from both flows of capital and people. The extent to which gentrification is linked to racial transition differs across neighborhood contexts... Displacement takes many different forms—direct and indirect, physical or economic, and exclusionary—and may result from either investment or disinvestment” (U.C. Berkeley). Many people are coming into San Francisco’s Bay Area because of how diverse each element is. However, according to Census numbers, between 1990 and 2010, 35.7% of San Francisco’s black population dwindled (Bliss). 35.7% of the black community within San Francisco suffered from displacement. An additional 53% of low-income households in the Bay Area are at risk for displacement and gentrification (U.C. Berkeley). This has definitely left a dent within the diversity reputation held up by the Bay Area. When such a strong large part of people leave, The City will experience a shift in culture and community. Whether, it is the real estate, the food, the different cultures, the Bay Area has always been known for being different. Perhaps, this is why so many outsiders are coming in and buying up every piece of land they can. Whether their intentions were to purchase land and

Despite many Latino’s being entrepreneurs and owning manufacturing companies, construction firms, restaurants, and real estate. Latino communities still seem to be suffering because of the lack of wealth generation. Many Hispanics have called Humboldt Park home for many years but recently that has been changing over the years. Humboldt Park used to be a primarily Hispanic neighborhood and because of the lack of wealth generation along with other factors the neighborhood has been going through gentrification. Gentrification is the arrival of wealthier people in an existing urban district which results in an increase in rents and property values, and changes in the district's character and culture. The term is often used negatively, suggesting

Gentrification is the process of renovating and improving a neighborhood so that it can be more appealing to the middle-class taste and is negatively affecting many neighborhoods all over New York City. The gentrification of low-income neighborhoods can bring down a neighborhood and is responsible for the displacement of families who can’t afford to live in the gentrified area anymore due to the price of rent being dramatically increased. Landlords tend to raise rent to cast out low income renters and make room for higher-income renters who are looking to move into the neighborhood. Some of the lower class residents who are basically forced out of their homes tend to move in with relatives, search for a place to go in one of the city’s remaining cheap areas, and can even go homeless if they have no family, friends, or anywhere to go.

The gentrification and displacement debate is more controversial than ever in Oakland, California. You can see it everywhere from the outskirts of West Oakland to Lake Merritt, and all throughout East Oakland. There is no denying its strong prevalence throughout the city and the reverberation of both negative and positive effects it brings with it. Oakland was once notorious for violence and its high crime rates and now it has become an up-and-coming hot spot for newly affluent and mostly white residents while pushing out low-income African American and Latino residents.

In addition, gentrification has several ways of being creeping into our neighborhood but at the end the outcomes have been quite similar. Our society has always viewed neighborhoods were minorities live in as being the ghettos, slums, or ‘hoods of America. When many of us come across an urbanized area we generally assume violence, drug trafficking, and overall social pathologies strive these places. Once we hear these “ghetto’s” are under going gentrification, we have a sense of relief and we feel there is hope for these communities. Gentrification may seem a blessing to an urban community by many, but if it were to be closely examine it we would find out it isn’t. Although the process has solved many economic issues within cities by providing employment opportunities, increases in property tax revenues and has diminished violence, the aftermath is far worse. (Freeman) Gentrification has increased the

Gentrification brings positive long term effects to communities and cities nationwide. Direct results of gentrification for both the residents and the city are the economical growth, local job opportunities created and a higher tax base available. (Stacey Sutton, Urbanly planning Scholar, defined gentrification as): Gentrification is the process of higher status people renovating lower class urban neighborhoods to satisfy middle-higher class standards (Sutton, 2015). In the process of gentrification throughout the United States, it is positively impacting the economy in more ways than one. One benefit of gentrification is the economical growth residents benefit from.

We looked at a variety of ways to help alleviate this cost. Since one of the main issues causing high living costs in the Bay Area is shortage of housing one of the possible solutions could be building more housing. Possible problems here are that San Francisco itself is not too big of a city and in most cities of this type in the world the population density is increased by building tall buildings –

Many large cities are experiencing skyrocketing rental/housing price because of the excessive demand and more importantly, the scarcity of land. San Francisco, as one of the most important financial centers in the world, is facing a serious dilemma due to its inflated rental/housing prices; people’s dissatisfaction over the government grow as they are excluded from the access to proper housing. San Francisco has the highest rents of any large city in the United States, which makes people, especially from low and medium income group, hard to acquire housing near their workplaces and force to commute from other regions of Bay area into the city. In other words, the high housing prices are pushing people as well as the productive industry out of the city. While people are accusing the government of being responsible for the failure of housing since it underestimates the rate of population growth, which leads to a shortage in the housing market. However, statistic shows that San Francisco actually built more than 30 percent more housing units per capita than New York City and Los Angeles in 2014. (Henry Grabar, 2015) It is because such shortage is artificially created by the policy makers to constraint land use, hence, increasing the supply of housing does not efficiently decrease the housing. The fundamental cause of this imbalanced housing market is the poor allocation of land use.

Another effect is that service providers' clientele and staff leave the gentrified area in search of affordable housing. For example, in San Francisco, many low-income constituents have left the gentrified area known as the Mission. In response to their migrating client base, service providers have begun to establish offices elsewhere. In addition, non-profit organizations often cannot pay employees enough income to live in the gentrified area because of the price increase (Alejandrino 28). So as a result, many long-time employees are leaving non-profits in the gentrified area, which is definitely hurting these businesses.

Gentrification is a problem that is occurring in many communities. The city of Boyle Heights in East Los Angeles is one of the communities that the citizens of the community are notice new apartments build, galleries owner by rich people, and high prices for apartment the people are not able to afford to live there. Because the renewal of neighborhood environments that transform and attract middle and upper-class households and investors, creating problems for those who cannot afford rises of rents. According to O’Regan, “some of the biggest concerns about gentrification-potential displacement and increased rent burdens-are driven by rent or housing cost increases” (152). The only way to

Corporations are taking over the urban landscape. In previous years, many upper and middle class families fled to the suburbs to escape the everyday hustle of city life. However, in recent years, city living has become glamorized and thus the movement back into the city has increased. Once blighted inner-city neighborhoods are being taken over and revitalized by corporate leaders in hopes to redesign and yuppify these areas. As more money is put into the area, the higher the market value goes up and as a result, many local residents can no longer afford to live there. While these residents are pushed out, a more ‘desirable’ group of residents move in and thus, take over. This process, known as gentrification, is occurring in many cities all across the nation. In the past, displaced residents could possibly move to another area that was not undergoing this process. However, as we are seeing in Chicago, it is nearing impossibility to move to an area within the city that will not