During the “Baby Boomer” era, following WWII, America underwent one of the largest demographic shifts and population growths in history. Huge amounts of home construction on the outskirts of America’s largest cities, known as “levittowns” became the new staple of the American dream, with the houses sporting two car garages, and white picket fences. These low density, predominantly middle class residential districts, were America’s first true suburbs. These suburbs were constructed mainly in response to the new postwar consumerism that enveloped the parents of the baby boomers. With the new economy, affordable housing, and most families becoming single income dependent, families grew bigger and bigger. The 1947 passing of the bill that lead to the interstate highway system, only added fuel to the fire of suburbanization. With the new interstate highway system, more affordable and fuel efficient automobiles, and the government aiding in the financing of new suburban homes, the choice seemed elementary. All of these factors pushing to the suburban movement, only spurred the baby boomers on, and between 1940-50, there was an 835% percent increase in living births with nearly 4 million children being born every year. In 1940, 19.5% of the United States population lived in what would be considered to be suburban areas outside of large metropolitan areas, however, by 1960; the number was pushing nearly 40%. The postwar suburbanization of America during the baby boomer
The gentrification process can be seen through the demographic and physical changes of the South Parkdale neighborhood. Gentrification is “the invasion of working-class areas by the upper- and middle-classes, who upgrade shabby, modest housing into elegant residences, resulting in the displacement of all, or most of the original working-class occupiers”. (Lyons, 1996) South Parkdale is a neighborhood in downtown Toronto that faces problems of gentrification. This problem has been ongoing since the nineteen fifty’s’.
When you hear about the city Detroit do you ever think of it as a city that needs to be gentrified? Gentrification is the process in which renovating or improving a house or district so that it accepts to middle-class taste. Gentrifying the city of Detroit is a great thing because the city needs to show improvement, develop into a better place, and it needs to increase its population numbers from a low rate to a more advanced rate.
During the 1990s, a decrease in the employment sectors many black middle class families moved out into Baltimore County. The cost of housing made it difficult to sustain the cost of living. In 2014, the number of Whites within Baltimore had the highest number in migration. However, within the white population a better advantage of resources were available such as loans, jobs, entertainment, education, and technology making it easier to live within Baltimore. Gentrification has pushed Blacks with low income to move out while the White population continues to move into Baltimore because of the access to better quality of life. Many within this type of White population have higher education, are able to save and plan to start families, and moved due to housing related purposes.
In Walking and The Suburbanization Psyche, by Rebecca Solnit, the author argues that modern society’s continued decline in walking will toll away from our connections to the body, world, and imagination. Rebecca Solnit blames the advancements in technology and suburbanization stating that they are leading causes as to why walking is done less in modern society. Suburbanized society stands to lose not only the ability to socialize and create connections with the environment around them including nature, but the creativeness that makes humans unique; giving the world a sense of individuality. The advancements in technology have also made suburban population lazy due to everything being convenient whereas, walking can help with that. The
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.
how it has faded tremendously from the historic sense of Chicago being a city of strong
The large, inexpensive buildings were transformed into creative spaces and studios for the artists and the revitalization of Liberty Village began. The low rent attracted artists who wanted to spend more time on art and less time earning money. Toronto business owners noticed the development in the area and purchased property- confident that in the near future the value would dramatically increase- therefore yielding a profit. In the early 2000s, large scale development began and residents of the warehouses were evicted in order to renovate the warehouses and generate condos. This marked the transition of the land use of the Liberty Village area from industrial to residential.
Crabgrass Frontier: The Suburbanization of the United States is a book by Kenneth T. Jackson on the migration of many, primarily white, Americans to the suburbs during the mid-twentieth century and how many blacks were robbed of the opportunity to move elsewhere as well. From the chapter we read, we learn about the ways blacks were suppressed to worse parts of cities and how corporations and our government kept blacks from moving into different or better neighborhoods. The author argues that the lasting effects of the government have put a seal of approval on the racial discrimination in the housing market and these actions were picked up by private interests to deny mortgages to people, as they would say, based on geographical location of the property. Over the course of the book, Jackson gives evidence to how federal housing policies affected where Americans lived and how our government used it 's power to socially control racial minorities.
How exactly does a neighborhood become gentrified? First, analyze the word. According to Dictionary.com, gentrification is defined as, “the buying and renovation of houses and stores in deteriorated urban neighborhoods by upper- or middle-income families or individuals, thus improving property values but often displacing low-income families and small businesses” (“Gentrification | Define Gentrification at Dictionary.com”). Usually, the terminology has a negative connotation associated with the meaning. Considering that the phrase links affluent residents, mostly white, to capitalizing on inexpensive real estate located within the ghetto. This was recognized in Bed-Stuy during the mid-nineties. Furthermore, the newcomers are eventually praised
According to Elizabeth Kneebone, author of “Confronting Suburban Poverty in America”, the growth of suburban poverty is partly due to the dark economic situations that forced people beneath “the line” and by migration. She added that most low-wage jobs in America are in the suburbs, and that people mistakenly believe that more services are offered in the suburbs than in the cities. Looking at the fast-growing poor population in the suburbs, this phenomenon has become a community situation where anyone is susceptible of. Furthermore, it indicates that there needs to be a synergistic, universal change to better the situation (the government and organizations should change as well).
The news article I chose is titled Songbirds Divorce, Flee, and Fail to Reproduce Due to Suburban Sprawl written by Michelle Ma (2017). This news article is about one of the potential effects of suburban sprawl. Suburban sprawl is defined as the expansion of the human population away from the urban areas. Many people argue that sprawl has many negative effects on the environment such as taking agricultural lands and forests and turning them into an industrial warehouse that causes additional pollution. The negative effect on the environment in relation to this article is the displacement of wildlife that could lead to extinction.
According to Census data, 35% of people who live in the Urban Suburbs have at least Rural undergraduate degree. Tailing close behind are the big cities, with about 32% having a bachelor degree. Rural America however lags far behind with less than 20% having earned a bachelor degree (Press 2014). In 2017, The New York Times reported, that 29% of rural college-age teens were enrolled in college in comparison to 47% of urban college -age teens (Denby, 2018). There is no denying that rural America is consistently underrepresented in participation of higher education compared to their urban counterparts. In this paper, I will argue that that there is a clear opportunity gap that influences rural students in
Through the creation of suburban neighborhoods middle class families have been able to achieve upward mobility. With the creation of suburban neighborhoods in the 1950’s it gave families the opportunities to go out and buy their little piece of the American Dream. The time of poverty from the Great Depression was over as was the second World War and then it was a time that the American Dream was well within reach. However with this outward expansion, for those who could not afford to leave, it also brought about a higher crime rate, as well as lower educational standards in the people living in the inner cities. Today suburban neighborhoods can be seen to have many different stereotypes in the media as well. Suburbia, when it was born
With an increase in urbanization, more people are moving to the industrial cities in pursuit of alternative lifestyle and jobs. Life in city and suburbs can be compared and contrasted with various aspects in mind since they share quite some details in as much as they are vastly different. Firstly, the transportation is more accessible in the city as compared to the suburb where there are no apt transport networks as compared to the city, among the transport mode in the city are subways, busses, trams and ferries. These provide easy, fast and cheap means of getting around in the city in as much as the streets are crowded. This is in contrast to the suburbs since owning a car is mandatory since such public transport systems are not available. When the costs of insurance, fuel expenses and time of commuting are added up then transport in suburbs is seen to be expensive when compared to that in the city. The easy transport in the city does not come all rosy since the city is also flooded with traffic jams due to congestion and this can render transport slow. This is contrast with suburb life where there is no traffic and hence with no congestion traveling in suburbs is more peaceful (Boulter, 2005).