Urban Essay

For those only weakly committed to city living, particularly middle-class people who have serious difficulty with social diversity and who have clear housing alternatives, the "problem-free" suburbs become tempting. After an incident such as a car break-in or a bicycle theft, a "last straw" can make them leave. (249)

There has been a recent phenomenon throughout the United States of gentrification. As older parts of neighborhoods are occupied by new tenants with money, the neighborhood changes and loses its old character. Those who might have lived in those neighborhoods their entire lives are pushed out as rents begin to skyrocket and the surroundings begin to change. This has happened in many neighborhoods. One of the most well known is San Francisco, where technology companies have brought in new software engineers that have caused local rents to skyrocket and people to move out of the area. However, just as importantly has been the influx of new money to Brooklyn, where local neighborhood changes have forced people from their homes, traditional music to be replaced, and old businesses to go bankrupt.

When a neighborhood is gentrified it will not only change the image of it, but also the services available there (Al-Kodmany 2011, 62-63). In other words, gentrification does not only have an impact on the physical aspect of the land, but also the resources that lie there. During the 90s, the Near West Side neighborhood located near Loop, an up-scale neighborhood, sought drastic changes within the area. The changes in racial demographics in the Near West Side indicated that the health risks that affected minorities dropped in the past decade (1992-2002) (Al-Kodmany 2011,

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.

Webster’s Dictionary defines gentrification as “the process of renewal and rebuilding accompanying the influx of middle-class or affluent people into deteriorating areas that often displaces poorer residents.” This sounds frightening to lower class citizens. However, Justin Davidson, author of “Is Gentrification All That Bad?” claims “Gentrification doesn’t need to be something that one group inflicts on another; often it’s a result of aspirations everybody shares.” Gentrification does not need to be the rich pushing the poor out. It can be the rich and the poor working together to make their city a wealthier and safer place to live. Gentrification improves communities by allowing more economic growth for all.

Overrapid urbanization brought undesirable byproducts such as slums, feeble street lighting, bad policing, and poor garbage disposal

During the past few years, gentrification has been on an uprise.“Nearly 20 percent of neighborhoods with lower incomes and home values have experienced gentrification since 2000, compared to only 9 percent during the 1990s.” Gentrification is happening in areas that supposedly need a change, such as the low-income neighborhoods in New York City, Minneapolis, Seattle and Washington, D.C.Factors such as uniqueness, accessibility, the energy of the neighborhood and reasonably priced homes attract gentrifiers. It has altered many cities in the country. Gentrification can be defined as the procedure of reestablishment and remaking due to the flood of prosperous individuals into falling apart and low-income areas that frequently displaces poorer

With everyone’s love and desires in the heart of this city, we cannot expand because it is necessary to locate ourselves in a spot that is enjoyable to us. Distance is a big problem for us because our families thrive on the suburban lifestyle because it caters to a frugal lifestyle that can better suit us for the future. Also, we are relatively wealthy in our perspectives because we can afford to feed our kids, house our family, and provide everything necessary for a family to live

Urbanization is inevitable, whether we want it or not. Opposers are constantly bickering about the political and moral consequences of gentrification. This topic is indeed mind boggling and complex. However, there is a need to observe this multi-faceted phenomenon in a different angle. Change is the force of diversity, safety and

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

Viewing the complex matter of gentrification succinctly, it helps to uncover how multifaceted it is; in that gentrification involves the oppression, marginalization, displacement of vulnerable populations, particularly, the poor, and the black who are often already negatively impacted by the effects of classism, and racism. Gentrification threatens to erode the communities and livelihood maintained by these set of people because their displacement becomes a precondition for the total transformation of the area.

According to Dictionary.com, “gentrification is the process of renovating houses and stores in urban neighborhoods to fit the middle or upper-income families, raising property value, but often displacing low-income families.” Gentrification has been an idea since the 1960s and had an effect on countless cities and neighborhood communities. Gentrification was first used by Ruth Glass in her book London: Aspect of Change in 1964, she noted that ¨gentrification can progress rapidly until all or most of the original working-class occupiers are displaced, and the whole social character of the district is changed.” Nonetheless, gentrification has helped revive many cities and revolutionize them, especially with technological

Los Angeles was the first product off the assembly line of American urban planning. Turned on in the late 19th century, the city-making machine was fueled by an immense immigration of people who sought to create a new type of city out of the previously quaint pueblo. They also strove to craft the first major city developed primarily by Americans and outside of European archetypes. As a result, Los Angles is not only incredibly diverse, but also nearly impossible to define. Since it is a product of the American machine, understanding the community of Los Angeles becomes vital to understanding the United States. But to fully comprehend the present Los Angeles, one must look at the process that created it. Specifically, Los Angeles was

On the whole the perception of the inner-city areas has the image of poverty and overcrowding which faces many cities across Britain today in whatever proportion. The first as such it the Economic which inner-city areas have long suffered due to lack of investment especially after the 1940's when a lot of money was put into New Towns. Many of

The wealthiest often would have the most space in the city, while the class directly below them would be cramped within the city yet separate from the wealthiest of them all. This cramped lifestyle was not very pleasing to majority of the population, yet many chose to live there because of necessity. The outsides of the city walls, known as the suburbia, housed the people that could not afford life inside the city. Despite poor dwellings in the suburban areas, people still praised and wrote about the pleasant suburban life, as they could escape the atrocious, cramped and uncomfortable city. The sprawling of the urban population became more apparent in London a few centuries after the fall of the Roman Empire, where people now had money to build or buy houses outside the city limits. These areas were much cleaner and quieter than the main city, similar to the characteristics of cities in Rome. (Bruegmann)