One interesting pattern in large American cities is that the south sides of cities that are located below a city's central core are almost always blue collar, working class areas.
South Boston. South Philly. South Baltimore. Southeast DC. The South Side of Chicago. Southwest Atlanta. South side of Houston. Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans. South Central Los Angeles.
Not that is not to say there are no nice southern sections of cities are that sections of cities north of their downtowns may not be as working class as southern sections. But in many cases the south sides of cities are not only infamous in their own right but they can also define the working class character of the entire city. South Boston and Southies have been prominently shown in recent big budget films like The Town and The Departed. Philadelphia is inextricably linked to South Philly because of cheesesteaks and Rocky. The South Side of Chicago, Lower Ninth and South Central dominate the working class images of their respective cities on a national scale.
For port cities, it's easier to connect the dots on why the southern sections of cities became large working class communities. These cities were often located on rivers and waterways that forced cheap working class labor to live on the cheapest land (as well as unwanted ethnic groups as well. You might have heard America was a little racisty back then), which was often swamps and marshy land that were located just below major ports and factories. South Boston, South Philadelphia, Southeast DC and the Lower Ninth Ward in New Orleans were literally built on swamp land. The cramped conditions of these cities original working class helped foster the image of their city's working class to this day. Chicago's famous south side which is bordered by lake Michigan was also built on swamp land but did not develop around port factories. Chicago's South Side was developed around the Union Stockyards, the city's meat-packing district and the Pullman railroad company.
But for the other major cities in the South and West the connection to why the south side of their major cities are working class are not as clear. Did cities in the South and West which developed into major cities only within the 20th century just repeat the development of older cities because of precedent? I don't know but I find it very peculiar.
No matter the case, here's my shout out to the American city South Side:
Common ft Kanye West - Southside
Showing posts with label Washington D.C.. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Washington D.C.. Show all posts
Monday, May 2, 2011
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
A Planner's reality: Segregation in America
Salon.com recently posted a great slideshow of the most segregated cities in America. The post had a map of the racial breakdown of each city as well as an explanation of the history of segregation in each city. Check out the slideshow in this link.
What's interesting is that even in some of the most segregated cities, there is a new trend of young affluent white suburbanites moving into back into the core of cities and working class and middle class city black populations moving into inner-rung suburbs. While this new trend is causing some existing places to become more diverse as one population slides into a new neighborhood as the group is leaving, what's fascinating is that the new trend is still reinforcing the old trend of segregation. The shifts in population among races are not quite coexisting with each other as they are displacing one another.
And this displacement is causing a lot of ugly fights between new and existing populations throughout urban America. In Philadelphia and Washington D.C., historically black neighborhoods are trying to protect their community's identity from white and now black gentrifiers and in suburban Detroit, elite black suburbs or worried about the waves of working class blacks from inner-city Detroit moving into their communities.
These new tensions are now issues that planners now have to listen to and address. These tensions are no longer just a sensitive issue for the inner-city but now affect suburban planners as well. In my jurisdiction, my office worked on an historic black community (historic in culture but not in the building preservation sense) that began as a segregated community and had faced decades of discrimination. Their struggles in overcoming these obstacles helped cement the community's identity and it was very important that we preserve and honor that community's history. But from a strictly planning sense, none of their history of segregation was going to greatly affect how we planned and designed their future housing developments and open spaces. We could not ignore their history but we could not plan around their history either without a historical landmark or building. There was a disconnect between the community and the planners. To the community, their history was the number one concern. For the planners, designing safe spaces was our number one concern.
This disconnect between preserving the people's history in a community over the preservation of buildings is one of city planning's biggest challenges and up to now one of it's biggest failures. As a whole, city planners do not know how to at least help a community on the wrong side of gentrification. As city planners we almost always side with the gentrifiers because our number one goal is to create better designed spaces and buildings. The influx of gentrification helps remove and redevelop empty debris filled lots, rehabilitates vacant buildings and brings commercial vitality back into neighborhoods. Who wouldn't want that?
Newcomers into gentrified inner-city neighborhoods are often dismayed when they find out that it is the existing long term residents who do not want the positive changes of gentrification. The standard answer for newcomers to existing long-term residents is that they should be thanking them for improving their neighborhoods. The issue for long-term residents is not that they want to live in sub-standard conditions but they are seeking a permanent stake in their community in which they felt they established. Whether that neighborhood is an affluent community or a poor community, long term residents feel that it is their neighborhood in large part because of the history of segregation. A lot of older black inner-city neighborhoods were purposefully segregated and became the only neighborhoods blacks could live in within a metropolitan region.
Despite their struggles these older black communities formed identities that were important not only to the psyche of blacks that lived in that community but to urban black America as a whole...for that time. Over time, these communities have often lost their identities as segregation slowly ended and middle class blacks moved out, leaving some of the working class blacks who couldn't afford to leave feel abandoned. But even with all that said there is still some high reverence for some of these communities no matter how poverty stricken or crime riddled they have become. While saying you are from Harlem or the Southside of Chicago or the 9th Ward of New Orleans may be looked down upon by some, for some in urban black America it is still a source of pride.
And this source of pride, which is wrapped around decades of segregation, self-empowerment, decline and then decades of poverty is what gentrification threatens to end. These communities have seen the life cycles of the black community within those cities and while they may be dying, those that still live in those communities do not want to see it end. So how do we as planners preserve that sense of pride? We all know that cities and neighborhoods go through changes, death and rebirth. Do we interfere with the natural life cycle of neighborhoods? Or is it important to maintain the cultural identity of a place like Harlem from becoming just another nice gentrified neighborhood?
What are your thoughts? Thanks for reading!
What's interesting is that even in some of the most segregated cities, there is a new trend of young affluent white suburbanites moving into back into the core of cities and working class and middle class city black populations moving into inner-rung suburbs. While this new trend is causing some existing places to become more diverse as one population slides into a new neighborhood as the group is leaving, what's fascinating is that the new trend is still reinforcing the old trend of segregation. The shifts in population among races are not quite coexisting with each other as they are displacing one another.
And this displacement is causing a lot of ugly fights between new and existing populations throughout urban America. In Philadelphia and Washington D.C., historically black neighborhoods are trying to protect their community's identity from white and now black gentrifiers and in suburban Detroit, elite black suburbs or worried about the waves of working class blacks from inner-city Detroit moving into their communities.
These new tensions are now issues that planners now have to listen to and address. These tensions are no longer just a sensitive issue for the inner-city but now affect suburban planners as well. In my jurisdiction, my office worked on an historic black community (historic in culture but not in the building preservation sense) that began as a segregated community and had faced decades of discrimination. Their struggles in overcoming these obstacles helped cement the community's identity and it was very important that we preserve and honor that community's history. But from a strictly planning sense, none of their history of segregation was going to greatly affect how we planned and designed their future housing developments and open spaces. We could not ignore their history but we could not plan around their history either without a historical landmark or building. There was a disconnect between the community and the planners. To the community, their history was the number one concern. For the planners, designing safe spaces was our number one concern.
This disconnect between preserving the people's history in a community over the preservation of buildings is one of city planning's biggest challenges and up to now one of it's biggest failures. As a whole, city planners do not know how to at least help a community on the wrong side of gentrification. As city planners we almost always side with the gentrifiers because our number one goal is to create better designed spaces and buildings. The influx of gentrification helps remove and redevelop empty debris filled lots, rehabilitates vacant buildings and brings commercial vitality back into neighborhoods. Who wouldn't want that?
Newcomers into gentrified inner-city neighborhoods are often dismayed when they find out that it is the existing long term residents who do not want the positive changes of gentrification. The standard answer for newcomers to existing long-term residents is that they should be thanking them for improving their neighborhoods. The issue for long-term residents is not that they want to live in sub-standard conditions but they are seeking a permanent stake in their community in which they felt they established. Whether that neighborhood is an affluent community or a poor community, long term residents feel that it is their neighborhood in large part because of the history of segregation. A lot of older black inner-city neighborhoods were purposefully segregated and became the only neighborhoods blacks could live in within a metropolitan region.
Despite their struggles these older black communities formed identities that were important not only to the psyche of blacks that lived in that community but to urban black America as a whole...for that time. Over time, these communities have often lost their identities as segregation slowly ended and middle class blacks moved out, leaving some of the working class blacks who couldn't afford to leave feel abandoned. But even with all that said there is still some high reverence for some of these communities no matter how poverty stricken or crime riddled they have become. While saying you are from Harlem or the Southside of Chicago or the 9th Ward of New Orleans may be looked down upon by some, for some in urban black America it is still a source of pride.
And this source of pride, which is wrapped around decades of segregation, self-empowerment, decline and then decades of poverty is what gentrification threatens to end. These communities have seen the life cycles of the black community within those cities and while they may be dying, those that still live in those communities do not want to see it end. So how do we as planners preserve that sense of pride? We all know that cities and neighborhoods go through changes, death and rebirth. Do we interfere with the natural life cycle of neighborhoods? Or is it important to maintain the cultural identity of a place like Harlem from becoming just another nice gentrified neighborhood?
What are your thoughts? Thanks for reading!
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Community vs the Individual
As a planner, I always focus on making plans that will impact the greatest amount of people possible. The wants, wishes and maybe even the rights of an individual or a single property owner maybe purposefully overlooked for providing for the needs of a whole community. In community planning, our decisions for a neighborhood or a community affect everyone and almost make it impossible for someone who disagrees to opt out and choose not to be apart of our plans. What maybe difficult for the single goose maybe great for the collective gander. And this philosophy holds true for many forms of local government, ranging from police service, environmental protection, traffic engineering to public works.
Even if you live in a community where you think the collective services are poor, you can opt out that public service. You can’t police your own neighborhood or provide your own water service if you do not like your public services. Even if you and a few of your select neighbors pulled together and provided a better more efficient service for your properties, it would just further destabilize the public service and create a highly inequitable system for those who depend on public services the most. Local governments would never be in favor of explicitly providing superior services to a few and low standard services to the many within the same community. Except when it comes to public schools.
In many major cities, public schools are the greatest barrier to full-scale revival of neighborhoods. While young professionals can revitalize a core or a downtown most cities seek young families to help revitalize struggling neighborhoods. What prevents young families from living in cities is the state of education. For decades families living in cities had to face the state of a struggling city public school system or pay exorbitant amounts for private schools. Families who already had children in the city public school system were dissatisfied and were also seeking an educational alternative.
Charter schools and the revamping of magnet schools became the alternative to many young families. Charter schools started to become popular in a few major cities in the 1990s and today they have become a national phenomenon in major cities. In Washington D.C. more than one-third of non-private school students goes to a public charter school. The performance of charter schools overall had produced mixed results. Some charter schools are clearly better than others. Most reports state that students in charter schools do slightly to moderately better than their peers in public schools.
But this post is not about whether public or charter schools are better its about the individual choice of a parent of a student to pull themselves out of a collective community service. While every student should have access to the best public educational services available, what are the consequences for allowing individual choice? The biggest consequence is that the best students, the students with the most talent, the A & B students are often pulled of public schools and offered or placed into a better performing public charter school or magnet school. Students of dedicated parents who are seeking the education for their children are also more likely to place their kids into charter schools or push their kids academically into magnet schools.
When you have the brightest and best students pulled out of a community school, at beast you are left with the B to C students as the highest level or role models for achievement. When you remove the A and B students out of a community school, you also remove a model in which students can strive to be and compete with. If the best a class has to offer is a C student who maybe just as bright as an A student but doesn’t do all their work on time, then that model student could negatively influence other students who may believe that student is reaching the highest level of achievement.
The same pattern of students emulating each other holds true for parents as well. When the most dedicated parents, the ones who are most likely to be apart of the PTA, are not apart of their community school then the school loses vital leadership and organization. Parental involvement has become a problem in city schools and community schools need not only help but just need for parents to just show up. When you have parental leaders in your community but they are not involved in the community school then the schools ad most importantly the students suffer.
Unfortunately there has been more and more talk politically of providing more and more charter schools and almost outright abandoning city public schools for those who could not afford to go anywhere else. In cities, we treat public education almost like we treat the city bus. Only those who could not afford anything else use public services. And just like transportation, we are no better off collectively shunning public service. But also just like public transportation, our solution to improve service has to benefit everyone and not just for those who have the choice to use it for convenience but also for those who depend on it. If we do not work collectively to make public community schools better holistically then they will continue to be dropout factories.
Fixing public schools will take an immeasurable amount of hard work and time. But just like all other community services, the community has to share with the successes and failures of those services together and not individually. Communities rise and fall together but if we change the outcomes for some people in a community and not for others is that really a community? If two neighbors live in a community and have similar amenities but one has running water and the other does not, do they share the same living conditions? Is that community equitable? If another two neighbors live in that community but one neighbor gets mugged frequently while the other lives at peace, is that equitable? And if one neighbor’s kid is a straight A student at a charter school with all the educational resources available as their disposal while the neighbor’s kid goes to a school without textbooks, is that equitable? These neighbors would live in a community that would produce two totally different outcomes under the same living conditions. And the fear is that these differences would create invisible divisions within communities that would no longer have the previous separations of race, class or culture.
Even if you live in a community where you think the collective services are poor, you can opt out that public service. You can’t police your own neighborhood or provide your own water service if you do not like your public services. Even if you and a few of your select neighbors pulled together and provided a better more efficient service for your properties, it would just further destabilize the public service and create a highly inequitable system for those who depend on public services the most. Local governments would never be in favor of explicitly providing superior services to a few and low standard services to the many within the same community. Except when it comes to public schools.
In many major cities, public schools are the greatest barrier to full-scale revival of neighborhoods. While young professionals can revitalize a core or a downtown most cities seek young families to help revitalize struggling neighborhoods. What prevents young families from living in cities is the state of education. For decades families living in cities had to face the state of a struggling city public school system or pay exorbitant amounts for private schools. Families who already had children in the city public school system were dissatisfied and were also seeking an educational alternative.
Charter schools and the revamping of magnet schools became the alternative to many young families. Charter schools started to become popular in a few major cities in the 1990s and today they have become a national phenomenon in major cities. In Washington D.C. more than one-third of non-private school students goes to a public charter school. The performance of charter schools overall had produced mixed results. Some charter schools are clearly better than others. Most reports state that students in charter schools do slightly to moderately better than their peers in public schools.
But this post is not about whether public or charter schools are better its about the individual choice of a parent of a student to pull themselves out of a collective community service. While every student should have access to the best public educational services available, what are the consequences for allowing individual choice? The biggest consequence is that the best students, the students with the most talent, the A & B students are often pulled of public schools and offered or placed into a better performing public charter school or magnet school. Students of dedicated parents who are seeking the education for their children are also more likely to place their kids into charter schools or push their kids academically into magnet schools.
When you have the brightest and best students pulled out of a community school, at beast you are left with the B to C students as the highest level or role models for achievement. When you remove the A and B students out of a community school, you also remove a model in which students can strive to be and compete with. If the best a class has to offer is a C student who maybe just as bright as an A student but doesn’t do all their work on time, then that model student could negatively influence other students who may believe that student is reaching the highest level of achievement.
The same pattern of students emulating each other holds true for parents as well. When the most dedicated parents, the ones who are most likely to be apart of the PTA, are not apart of their community school then the school loses vital leadership and organization. Parental involvement has become a problem in city schools and community schools need not only help but just need for parents to just show up. When you have parental leaders in your community but they are not involved in the community school then the schools ad most importantly the students suffer.
Unfortunately there has been more and more talk politically of providing more and more charter schools and almost outright abandoning city public schools for those who could not afford to go anywhere else. In cities, we treat public education almost like we treat the city bus. Only those who could not afford anything else use public services. And just like transportation, we are no better off collectively shunning public service. But also just like public transportation, our solution to improve service has to benefit everyone and not just for those who have the choice to use it for convenience but also for those who depend on it. If we do not work collectively to make public community schools better holistically then they will continue to be dropout factories.
Fixing public schools will take an immeasurable amount of hard work and time. But just like all other community services, the community has to share with the successes and failures of those services together and not individually. Communities rise and fall together but if we change the outcomes for some people in a community and not for others is that really a community? If two neighbors live in a community and have similar amenities but one has running water and the other does not, do they share the same living conditions? Is that community equitable? If another two neighbors live in that community but one neighbor gets mugged frequently while the other lives at peace, is that equitable? And if one neighbor’s kid is a straight A student at a charter school with all the educational resources available as their disposal while the neighbor’s kid goes to a school without textbooks, is that equitable? These neighbors would live in a community that would produce two totally different outcomes under the same living conditions. And the fear is that these differences would create invisible divisions within communities that would no longer have the previous separations of race, class or culture.
Sunday, February 28, 2010
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
Your Not so Friendly Neighborhood Garden Apartment
Growing up on the east coast in the 1980’s and 1990’s there were always clear distinctions of good neighborhoods from not so great neighborhoods or as we call them in planning, “neighborhoods in transition.” There were always tell-tale signs to let you know when you had crossed that invisible boundary of a transitional neighborhood. You would notice that properties were not as consistently maintained, houses looked slightly worn, debris on the street and people just hanging around.
There are situations there are neighborhoods with the same architectural styles and materials that appear to be of similar conditions from afar but when you get up close you can tell there is a socio-economic divide between the two neighborhoods. So from my young purview, the more socio-economic problems a neighborhood had, the worse the neighborhood looked.
While that theory for the most part held true for the world I knew, I was always shocked that my theory of attractive neighborhoods equaled good neighborhoods did not hold true in other parts of the country…especially in California. During the 1990’s, California artists had inserted themselves into hip hop culture in a major way. There were countless videos, movies and documentaries showing the ‘hoods of Southern California. What was shocking was that while some of the SoCal ‘hoods had shown obvious signs of distress, other ‘hoods had manicured lawns, palm trees and either well maintained single family homes or garden apartments.
For the life of me at that time, I could not understand how a well-maintained neighborhood could have the same problems as a poverty stricken neighborhood. As I got older and traveled more, I noticed that there were similar occurrences in southern cities with garden style apartments that functioned as the ‘hood. What I came to understand later is that the lack of opportunity combined with an expensive housing market can create social distress to neighborhoods with attractive housing.
For example a nice garden style apartment, which may have housed single headed households, couples and young families may now house an entire family and a few extended relatives. So on the outside everything may appear to be well but on the inside, everyone maybe struggling just to get by. What is becoming more common in the Baltimore area, are apartment communities that surround high-income retail rich suburbs with large suburban malls becoming transitional communities with significant signs of distress. In these instances, it is not uncommon for multiple families to pull together and move to these expensive suburban apartments to get away from possibly crime-ridden apartments in the city.
But for the most part, Baltimore never had a problem with families having to cram into expensive housing and apartments to make ends meet. Up until ten years ago, the housing in Baltimore was fairly cheap, especially in comparison to area cities like Washington D.C., Annapolis and Philadelphia. A person or a family did not have to make that much to live in a decent neighborhood. But to quote the Notorious B.I.G., “things done changed.” The housing boom had nearly doubled the value and pricing of many Baltimore area communities. Apartment communities that had once charged $500 monthly rent in the early 2000’s were charging almost $800 or more in rent before the recession. While the recession has brought some of those housing prices down, the jobs that were needed to pay those rents have been receding as well.
.
Which means, Baltimore is no longer affordable. In fact there are many area communities that can now compete with D.C.’s inflated housing market…unfortunately though they lack D.C. social amenities. So the housing boom and the recession has now created an expensive housing market with a lack of opportunity…just like in the ‘hoods of Southern California in the 1990’s. Which also means that my once youthful theory that an attractive neighborhood cannot have the same problems as the ‘hood is no longer true in Baltimore or maybe anywhere for that matter. Across the Baltimore metropolitan region I know of dozens of attractive looking apartment communities that you would not want to live there for too long…and they all have manicured lawns.
There are situations there are neighborhoods with the same architectural styles and materials that appear to be of similar conditions from afar but when you get up close you can tell there is a socio-economic divide between the two neighborhoods. So from my young purview, the more socio-economic problems a neighborhood had, the worse the neighborhood looked.
While that theory for the most part held true for the world I knew, I was always shocked that my theory of attractive neighborhoods equaled good neighborhoods did not hold true in other parts of the country…especially in California. During the 1990’s, California artists had inserted themselves into hip hop culture in a major way. There were countless videos, movies and documentaries showing the ‘hoods of Southern California. What was shocking was that while some of the SoCal ‘hoods had shown obvious signs of distress, other ‘hoods had manicured lawns, palm trees and either well maintained single family homes or garden apartments.
For the life of me at that time, I could not understand how a well-maintained neighborhood could have the same problems as a poverty stricken neighborhood. As I got older and traveled more, I noticed that there were similar occurrences in southern cities with garden style apartments that functioned as the ‘hood. What I came to understand later is that the lack of opportunity combined with an expensive housing market can create social distress to neighborhoods with attractive housing.
For example a nice garden style apartment, which may have housed single headed households, couples and young families may now house an entire family and a few extended relatives. So on the outside everything may appear to be well but on the inside, everyone maybe struggling just to get by. What is becoming more common in the Baltimore area, are apartment communities that surround high-income retail rich suburbs with large suburban malls becoming transitional communities with significant signs of distress. In these instances, it is not uncommon for multiple families to pull together and move to these expensive suburban apartments to get away from possibly crime-ridden apartments in the city.
But for the most part, Baltimore never had a problem with families having to cram into expensive housing and apartments to make ends meet. Up until ten years ago, the housing in Baltimore was fairly cheap, especially in comparison to area cities like Washington D.C., Annapolis and Philadelphia. A person or a family did not have to make that much to live in a decent neighborhood. But to quote the Notorious B.I.G., “things done changed.” The housing boom had nearly doubled the value and pricing of many Baltimore area communities. Apartment communities that had once charged $500 monthly rent in the early 2000’s were charging almost $800 or more in rent before the recession. While the recession has brought some of those housing prices down, the jobs that were needed to pay those rents have been receding as well.
.
Which means, Baltimore is no longer affordable. In fact there are many area communities that can now compete with D.C.’s inflated housing market…unfortunately though they lack D.C. social amenities. So the housing boom and the recession has now created an expensive housing market with a lack of opportunity…just like in the ‘hoods of Southern California in the 1990’s. Which also means that my once youthful theory that an attractive neighborhood cannot have the same problems as the ‘hood is no longer true in Baltimore or maybe anywhere for that matter. Across the Baltimore metropolitan region I know of dozens of attractive looking apartment communities that you would not want to live there for too long…and they all have manicured lawns.
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
Harlem: Gentrification or Addition?
The New York Times ran a great article about how Greater Harlem in New York City is no longer majority black. For those who do not know, Harlem was the long cultural epicenter for black folks throughout the 20th century. Not only was Harlem the home to many world renowned black writers, artists, musicians and intellectuals, the Harlem Renaissance helped defined the black experience in America in the 1920's and beyond.
Like most historic cultural ethnic enclaves, Harlem fell on hard times particularly after desegregation and urban renewal policies. The traditional base of black folks had eroded by the 1970's. The well-to-do and the middle class black populations were no longer forced to live in the crowded conditions of Harlem and moved onto better housing in and outside the city. What was left of Harlem in the 1970's was a poor urban community with a rich and long cultural and historical legacy.
Harlem was not the only culturally significant black community that fell on hard times, similar patterns of vacancy occurred in the Shaw-Howard University neighborhoods in Washington D.C., and the Pennsylvania Avenue corridor in Baltimore. The article reports that:
"Because so much of the community was devastated by demolition for urban renewal, arson and abandonment beginning in the 1960s, many newcomers have not so much dislodged existing residents as succeeded them. In the 1970s alone, the black population of central Harlem declined by more than 30 percent.
'This place was vacated,' said Howard Dodson, director of Harlem’s Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. 'Gentrification is about displacement.'"
There are many urban communities today that have incredibly vacancy rates of over 10-20%. Many of these communities are now feeling development pressure after 30-40 years or more of abandonment in some cases. A lot of people in these urban communities fear gentrification but in cases like Harlem where there are so many vacancies, should residents feel threatened by the newcomers if no one is being displaced?
What are you thoughts?
Like most historic cultural ethnic enclaves, Harlem fell on hard times particularly after desegregation and urban renewal policies. The traditional base of black folks had eroded by the 1970's. The well-to-do and the middle class black populations were no longer forced to live in the crowded conditions of Harlem and moved onto better housing in and outside the city. What was left of Harlem in the 1970's was a poor urban community with a rich and long cultural and historical legacy.
Harlem was not the only culturally significant black community that fell on hard times, similar patterns of vacancy occurred in the Shaw-Howard University neighborhoods in Washington D.C., and the Pennsylvania Avenue corridor in Baltimore. The article reports that:
"Because so much of the community was devastated by demolition for urban renewal, arson and abandonment beginning in the 1960s, many newcomers have not so much dislodged existing residents as succeeded them. In the 1970s alone, the black population of central Harlem declined by more than 30 percent.
'This place was vacated,' said Howard Dodson, director of Harlem’s Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. 'Gentrification is about displacement.'"
There are many urban communities today that have incredibly vacancy rates of over 10-20%. Many of these communities are now feeling development pressure after 30-40 years or more of abandonment in some cases. A lot of people in these urban communities fear gentrification but in cases like Harlem where there are so many vacancies, should residents feel threatened by the newcomers if no one is being displaced?
What are you thoughts?
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Big City Attitudes
The stereotypes that you often hear are that small towns are friendly and that big city are rude, unfriendly places. I don’t know if that stereotype is still true in some places or if it was ever true but here on the east coast it’s almost impossible to gauge the small town from the suburb or ex-urb of the big cities. The east coast at times feels like just one giant metropolitan area especially from D.C. in the south to north of New York City in Hartford. The “small towns” that are in between these cities are often never more than 45 minutes to a city beltway or an hour from a city line and they are probably now filled with people who are now making an hour commute of more from the city.
So with this spatial mismatch of people the idea of a true small town to me is lost…or maybe it’s just lost along the I-95 corridor. As a community planner, I know of whole inner-city communities (usually ethnic-nationality or single industry communities) that literally picked up and moved into an outer ring suburb and then picked up and moved again to a further ex-urb. While those communities may have been long separated from their inner-city roots, they certainly maintained their inner-city characteristics, which are both good and not so pleasant at times. Like most northeastern and Midwest cities, there has been a purging of all types of communities leaving the city for it’s suburbs which now blurs the imaginary line of city and suburb leaving little distinction between the two in some parts.
Now when my family first moved to the Baltimore suburbs in the mid 1980’s, there were definitely some “Leave-it to Beaver” type neighborhoods. The neighborhoods where you would drive by and everyone would just smile and wave at random strangers. While appearance wise, those neighborhoods are still around; the people in them are definitely not around anymore. In fact there are very few of those “Leave it to Beaver” type neighborhoods around anymore, even in the ex-urbs. The stereotypical “big city attitude” is found everywhere throughout the east coast and most prevalent in the Mid Atlantic.
But what’s most ironic about “big city attitude” myth is that the nicest people I have met on a day to day basis, whether it be a neighbor or a random stranger are the people actually living inside the big cities. For all the flack that New York City and Philadelphia get for being rude, inhospitable, uncouth places, I have received the warmest greetings from total strangers in these big cities then I ever have in the suburbs of Baltimore and D.C. While it’s true the people living in bigger cities maybe more direct and aggressive, I bet you will be treated more kindly by strangers in Midtown Manhattan of Center City, Philadelphia then you would in downtown Baltimore or D.C.
What’s your opinion on this? Anyone else have any similar or different experiences?
So with this spatial mismatch of people the idea of a true small town to me is lost…or maybe it’s just lost along the I-95 corridor. As a community planner, I know of whole inner-city communities (usually ethnic-nationality or single industry communities) that literally picked up and moved into an outer ring suburb and then picked up and moved again to a further ex-urb. While those communities may have been long separated from their inner-city roots, they certainly maintained their inner-city characteristics, which are both good and not so pleasant at times. Like most northeastern and Midwest cities, there has been a purging of all types of communities leaving the city for it’s suburbs which now blurs the imaginary line of city and suburb leaving little distinction between the two in some parts.
Now when my family first moved to the Baltimore suburbs in the mid 1980’s, there were definitely some “Leave-it to Beaver” type neighborhoods. The neighborhoods where you would drive by and everyone would just smile and wave at random strangers. While appearance wise, those neighborhoods are still around; the people in them are definitely not around anymore. In fact there are very few of those “Leave it to Beaver” type neighborhoods around anymore, even in the ex-urbs. The stereotypical “big city attitude” is found everywhere throughout the east coast and most prevalent in the Mid Atlantic.
But what’s most ironic about “big city attitude” myth is that the nicest people I have met on a day to day basis, whether it be a neighbor or a random stranger are the people actually living inside the big cities. For all the flack that New York City and Philadelphia get for being rude, inhospitable, uncouth places, I have received the warmest greetings from total strangers in these big cities then I ever have in the suburbs of Baltimore and D.C. While it’s true the people living in bigger cities maybe more direct and aggressive, I bet you will be treated more kindly by strangers in Midtown Manhattan of Center City, Philadelphia then you would in downtown Baltimore or D.C.
What’s your opinion on this? Anyone else have any similar or different experiences?
Friday, December 11, 2009
All things being equal, I'd rather be in Baltimore
A freind of mine on facebook recently said in his status update that:
"You know I hear people say all the time...'I'm sick of Baltimore and I can't wait till I leave'....well make sure you are leaving for a good reason because I guarantee you that after a while you are going to get sick of wherever you move to if you are not doing anything positive. Every place is like the next place without motivation and a game plan!....move for a reason and not an excuse."
Great point. I have definitely been guilty before about complaining about the lack of night life in Baltimore and wanting to leave for a bigger city. Both of my parents are from Philadelphia and when I was young I would always go up for weeks at a time to stay with relatives during the summer and visit them during holidays in the winter. It was from these visits that I fell in love with Philly and just the general feeling of being in a big city. Even though I lived less than a year of my life in Philly after being born there, I would even tell people growing up proudly and directly, I'm from Philly. The truth was I really a kid from suburban Baltimore who happened to visit Philadelphia often.
So ever since I was a kid, I have always been wishing to be somewhere else than Baltimore. Somewhere bigger. Somewhere more grand. Somewhere more flavorful. I never really appreciated Baltimore for what it was because I was too focused on what other cities had that Baltimore lacked. Throughout my childhood I would go back and forth from Philadelphia by train and by car and I would marvel at how fast the bigger city moved, the skyscrapers, the different cultures, the subways, the trolleys, the elevated trains. All Baltimore had was a bus and subway line that did not run on my side of town.
So when it was time to go way to college, naturally I choose to go to school in Philadelphia to no longer be a visitor but a resident of a big city. I enjoyed my time there, I soaked up everything Philly had to offer. The museums, the night life, the history, the sporting events, the culture, everything. The big city was everything I wanted it to be but also everything I did not expect it to be. The big city was colder. The big city made you rush and become brash because everyone was trying to hustle to get over. At times the city felt too dense, it would take sometimes an hour to get to another side of the city and park. The big city did not have much open grass and trees but had a lot of brick, concrete and steel. The big city was not laid back and relaxed.
After college was over, I got a job opportunity to go back to Baltimore. While I would certainly miss Philly and would love to move back, a part of me was relieved to go back home. Being back home made me relaxed again. Over the next year, I would travel back and forth from Philly to visit old friends when I realized something. I had spent my whole life wishing to be somewhere else only to get there and realize it wasn't what I thought it would be.
Don't get me wrong, I still got a lot of love for Philly and I would still move back there...if the situation was right. I would go back with my eyes wide open and I would not just jump back to the city at the first opportunity. So you would think, I would have learned my lesson about appreciating home but I did not. While back in Baltimore, I would travel south a lot to visit friends and sometimes just wander around in the city of our Nation's capital, D.C. I soon developed an adult wanderlust of D.C. similar to the childhood desires I had to be in Philadelphia.
Unlike Philadelphia, D.C. was not a big city. D.C. had a very similar scale to Baltimore but just exuded an overabundance of sophistication and hipness while still keeping a neighborhood charm from within its local neighborhoods. D.C. had what seemed like an endless amount of beautiful women and lots of young folks with money who spent it on the numerous megaclubs, clubs, lounges, restaurants that were defacto lounges, bars, entertainment venues that seemed to trump Baltimore's nightlife.
D.C. is a small city but I would have endless amounts of fun or course with the nightlife but also going to different museums, checking out it's many hipster-like neighborhoods and going to random cultural events. Everything was pretty much within walking distance of the Metro, which is one of the cleanest and best subway systems I have been on. Once again, all Baltimore had was a bus and a subway line that did not run on my side of town.
While I have never moved to D.C., it is only an hour away and I have come to really know the city through my frequent visits. And while I still love the town for it's endless amounts of beautiful women and nightlife, the amount of money you would have to make to enjoy said women and nightlife is outrageous. The amount of hours you would have to work to afford a lifestyle where you could enjoy the nightlife on a regular basis would run you ragged. And if the cost of living doesn't run you ragged, the horrible traffic and parking in D.C. and its surrounding areas will. One weekend of receipts from partying in D.C. often makes me appreciate the cheapness of my favorite local bars in Baltimore that much more.
Would I still move to D.C.? Maybe. D.C. has a lot of great neighborhoods and places with a lots of scenery and things to do. While I'm sure those places are nice, they are not quite home though. While in comparison to other cities, Baltimore may be small and laid back but I kind of dig that about my hometown. Here, I move around with ease. There's nothing here forcing me to move faster then I want too and there's no need to try to show off to keep up with the Joneses. This city allows you to be exactly who you are and not much more. Could it stand to have a better nightlife, transportation system and an overall hipness to it? Absolutely.
But all things being equal, I'd rather be in Baltimore.
"You know I hear people say all the time...'I'm sick of Baltimore and I can't wait till I leave'....well make sure you are leaving for a good reason because I guarantee you that after a while you are going to get sick of wherever you move to if you are not doing anything positive. Every place is like the next place without motivation and a game plan!....move for a reason and not an excuse."
Great point. I have definitely been guilty before about complaining about the lack of night life in Baltimore and wanting to leave for a bigger city. Both of my parents are from Philadelphia and when I was young I would always go up for weeks at a time to stay with relatives during the summer and visit them during holidays in the winter. It was from these visits that I fell in love with Philly and just the general feeling of being in a big city. Even though I lived less than a year of my life in Philly after being born there, I would even tell people growing up proudly and directly, I'm from Philly. The truth was I really a kid from suburban Baltimore who happened to visit Philadelphia often.
So ever since I was a kid, I have always been wishing to be somewhere else than Baltimore. Somewhere bigger. Somewhere more grand. Somewhere more flavorful. I never really appreciated Baltimore for what it was because I was too focused on what other cities had that Baltimore lacked. Throughout my childhood I would go back and forth from Philadelphia by train and by car and I would marvel at how fast the bigger city moved, the skyscrapers, the different cultures, the subways, the trolleys, the elevated trains. All Baltimore had was a bus and subway line that did not run on my side of town.
So when it was time to go way to college, naturally I choose to go to school in Philadelphia to no longer be a visitor but a resident of a big city. I enjoyed my time there, I soaked up everything Philly had to offer. The museums, the night life, the history, the sporting events, the culture, everything. The big city was everything I wanted it to be but also everything I did not expect it to be. The big city was colder. The big city made you rush and become brash because everyone was trying to hustle to get over. At times the city felt too dense, it would take sometimes an hour to get to another side of the city and park. The big city did not have much open grass and trees but had a lot of brick, concrete and steel. The big city was not laid back and relaxed.
After college was over, I got a job opportunity to go back to Baltimore. While I would certainly miss Philly and would love to move back, a part of me was relieved to go back home. Being back home made me relaxed again. Over the next year, I would travel back and forth from Philly to visit old friends when I realized something. I had spent my whole life wishing to be somewhere else only to get there and realize it wasn't what I thought it would be.
Don't get me wrong, I still got a lot of love for Philly and I would still move back there...if the situation was right. I would go back with my eyes wide open and I would not just jump back to the city at the first opportunity. So you would think, I would have learned my lesson about appreciating home but I did not. While back in Baltimore, I would travel south a lot to visit friends and sometimes just wander around in the city of our Nation's capital, D.C. I soon developed an adult wanderlust of D.C. similar to the childhood desires I had to be in Philadelphia.
Unlike Philadelphia, D.C. was not a big city. D.C. had a very similar scale to Baltimore but just exuded an overabundance of sophistication and hipness while still keeping a neighborhood charm from within its local neighborhoods. D.C. had what seemed like an endless amount of beautiful women and lots of young folks with money who spent it on the numerous megaclubs, clubs, lounges, restaurants that were defacto lounges, bars, entertainment venues that seemed to trump Baltimore's nightlife.
D.C. is a small city but I would have endless amounts of fun or course with the nightlife but also going to different museums, checking out it's many hipster-like neighborhoods and going to random cultural events. Everything was pretty much within walking distance of the Metro, which is one of the cleanest and best subway systems I have been on. Once again, all Baltimore had was a bus and a subway line that did not run on my side of town.
While I have never moved to D.C., it is only an hour away and I have come to really know the city through my frequent visits. And while I still love the town for it's endless amounts of beautiful women and nightlife, the amount of money you would have to make to enjoy said women and nightlife is outrageous. The amount of hours you would have to work to afford a lifestyle where you could enjoy the nightlife on a regular basis would run you ragged. And if the cost of living doesn't run you ragged, the horrible traffic and parking in D.C. and its surrounding areas will. One weekend of receipts from partying in D.C. often makes me appreciate the cheapness of my favorite local bars in Baltimore that much more.
Would I still move to D.C.? Maybe. D.C. has a lot of great neighborhoods and places with a lots of scenery and things to do. While I'm sure those places are nice, they are not quite home though. While in comparison to other cities, Baltimore may be small and laid back but I kind of dig that about my hometown. Here, I move around with ease. There's nothing here forcing me to move faster then I want too and there's no need to try to show off to keep up with the Joneses. This city allows you to be exactly who you are and not much more. Could it stand to have a better nightlife, transportation system and an overall hipness to it? Absolutely.
But all things being equal, I'd rather be in Baltimore.
Friday, October 23, 2009
Planning and the White City
As many city planners and urban historians know, the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago greatly influenced how city officials at the time could envision cities. See the fair included a futuristic expo about cities, which included human scale models of grand institutional buildings set alongside broad tree-lined boulevards and intricately laid out parks that incorporated the best of the city and nature. The expo laid the foundation for creating this nation’s first city Master Plan. The expo would forever change how America looked at its cities, which at the time were crowded, dreary places that lacked open space, clean air and parks for recreational activities. The very progressive and socially liberal expo of the 1893 World’s Fair was dubbed the White City after the color of all the monumental buildings that were constructed. Planners and cityophile geeks are probably familiar with the book and documentary, Magic and the White City, which covered the creation and influence of the 1893 expo.
Over one hundred years later, we have a knew version of the White City which is just as progressive and liberal as the 1893 expo was at it’s time. These meticulously planned cities are also very progressive and liberal and have a heavy emphasis on connecting the urban form with nature. These cities, which pride themselves on creating cities with a human scale, have been dubbed White Cities not because of the color of their buildings but because of the lack of color in their city’s population. Newsgeography.com recently ran an article called The White City, lamenting the fact that many of the cities that have been dubbed as progressive or even cool among national planning pundits and observers are almost entirely white. The article states:
“Among the media, academia and within planning circles, there’s a generally standing answer to the question of what cities are the best, the most progressive and best role models for small and mid-sized cities. The standard list includes Portland, Seattle, Austin, Minneapolis, and Denver. In particular, Portland is held up as a paradigm, with its urban growth boundary, extensive transit system, excellent cycling culture, and a pro-density policy. These cities are frequently contrasted with those of the Rust Belt and South, which are found wanting, often even by locals, as 'cool' urban places.
But look closely at these exemplars and a curious fact emerges. If you take away the dominant Tier One cities like New York, Chicago and Los Angeles you will find that the “progressive” cities aren’t red or blue, but another color entirely: white.”
The article continues on to question how can cities be labeled as hip and progressive if they lack a diversity of cultures. The author wonders out loud whether there is a correlation between what is labeled a progressive city and a lack of diversity within that city. And if that is so, what does that really say about those who consider themselves liberal? The author does acknowledge that having a homogeneous population allows cities to pass major government planning expenditures like transit with much more considerable ease because there are no competing interests, threatened communities or communities that would receive more benefits then others. While, without a doubt, planning for the diverse needs of multiple incomes, cultures and beliefs definitely makes planning for the whole a lot more difficult, the author does not let “progressive” cities off the hook for not reaching out to their small but present black communities. The article goes on to state:
“I believe that cities that start taking their African American and other minority communities seriously, seeing them as a pillar of civic growth, will reap big dividends and distinguish themselves in the marketplace.
This trail has been blazed not by the 'progressive' paragons but by places like Atlanta, Dallas and Houston. Atlanta, long known as one of America's premier African American cities, has boomed to become the capital of the New South. It should come as no surprise that good for African Americans has meant good for whites too.”
To that specific point, social commentator and essayist Ta-Nehisi Coates wrote on his blog that:
“...leaving aside the blinding whiteness of dubbing Atlanta "un-progressive," leaving aside that most of these "progressive" cities have more black people than their surrounding states, I think the implicit argument that these cities should be "doing more" to assure that their black population meets the national average is odious.
Man listen--Negroes like Atlanta. Negroes like Chicago. Negroes like Houston. Negroes like Raleigh-Durham (another area that doesn't make the cut, for some reason.) Negroes like Oakland. Negroes have the right to like where they live, independent of Massa, for their own particular, native, independent reasons (family? great barbecue? housing stock?) Just like Jewish-Americans have the right to like New York--or not. Just like Japanese-Americans have the right to like Cali--or not.”
I think Ta-Nehisi makes a great point. There are going to be cities that certain cities gravitate too for many reasons. Just because a city lacks diversity does not mean that they should pump up the city’s community of color just for the sake of being more diverse. True diversity will come to a city naturally and most importantly, internally as long as that city is open to everyone and is not discriminatory. Now if we find out that these “progressive” cities are really inhospitable to certain cultures or they try to minimize the size of a different culture (the old planning text adage is that when the minority population increases over 10% of the population, white flight starts to occur). If these cities are truly progressive and they still lack diversity then it may just not be those communities cup of tea.
As a city planner, I do find it interesting that the cities and places with the largest black populations such as Atlanta, Houston, Charlotte and the D.C. suburbs are some of the most sprawling cities and locales in the country. We all know that obesity is a national problem and near epidemic levels in portions of the black community. While having a preeminent large upper and middle class community in these major cities is great sign of progress, are the locations of where of the large black middle class lives really doing more harm than good? And while the author of The White City is asking why are progressively planned cities so white, the question I would like to know is why the locations of the black middle class are planned so horribly?
What is your take on progressive white cities and their lack of diversity? Also what is your opinion on why cities with a large black population have so much sprawl? Do you see any correlations? I would like to hear your thoughts, please leave a comment.
Over one hundred years later, we have a knew version of the White City which is just as progressive and liberal as the 1893 expo was at it’s time. These meticulously planned cities are also very progressive and liberal and have a heavy emphasis on connecting the urban form with nature. These cities, which pride themselves on creating cities with a human scale, have been dubbed White Cities not because of the color of their buildings but because of the lack of color in their city’s population. Newsgeography.com recently ran an article called The White City, lamenting the fact that many of the cities that have been dubbed as progressive or even cool among national planning pundits and observers are almost entirely white. The article states:
“Among the media, academia and within planning circles, there’s a generally standing answer to the question of what cities are the best, the most progressive and best role models for small and mid-sized cities. The standard list includes Portland, Seattle, Austin, Minneapolis, and Denver. In particular, Portland is held up as a paradigm, with its urban growth boundary, extensive transit system, excellent cycling culture, and a pro-density policy. These cities are frequently contrasted with those of the Rust Belt and South, which are found wanting, often even by locals, as 'cool' urban places.
But look closely at these exemplars and a curious fact emerges. If you take away the dominant Tier One cities like New York, Chicago and Los Angeles you will find that the “progressive” cities aren’t red or blue, but another color entirely: white.”
The article continues on to question how can cities be labeled as hip and progressive if they lack a diversity of cultures. The author wonders out loud whether there is a correlation between what is labeled a progressive city and a lack of diversity within that city. And if that is so, what does that really say about those who consider themselves liberal? The author does acknowledge that having a homogeneous population allows cities to pass major government planning expenditures like transit with much more considerable ease because there are no competing interests, threatened communities or communities that would receive more benefits then others. While, without a doubt, planning for the diverse needs of multiple incomes, cultures and beliefs definitely makes planning for the whole a lot more difficult, the author does not let “progressive” cities off the hook for not reaching out to their small but present black communities. The article goes on to state:
“I believe that cities that start taking their African American and other minority communities seriously, seeing them as a pillar of civic growth, will reap big dividends and distinguish themselves in the marketplace.
This trail has been blazed not by the 'progressive' paragons but by places like Atlanta, Dallas and Houston. Atlanta, long known as one of America's premier African American cities, has boomed to become the capital of the New South. It should come as no surprise that good for African Americans has meant good for whites too.”
To that specific point, social commentator and essayist Ta-Nehisi Coates wrote on his blog that:
“...leaving aside the blinding whiteness of dubbing Atlanta "un-progressive," leaving aside that most of these "progressive" cities have more black people than their surrounding states, I think the implicit argument that these cities should be "doing more" to assure that their black population meets the national average is odious.
Man listen--Negroes like Atlanta. Negroes like Chicago. Negroes like Houston. Negroes like Raleigh-Durham (another area that doesn't make the cut, for some reason.) Negroes like Oakland. Negroes have the right to like where they live, independent of Massa, for their own particular, native, independent reasons (family? great barbecue? housing stock?) Just like Jewish-Americans have the right to like New York--or not. Just like Japanese-Americans have the right to like Cali--or not.”
I think Ta-Nehisi makes a great point. There are going to be cities that certain cities gravitate too for many reasons. Just because a city lacks diversity does not mean that they should pump up the city’s community of color just for the sake of being more diverse. True diversity will come to a city naturally and most importantly, internally as long as that city is open to everyone and is not discriminatory. Now if we find out that these “progressive” cities are really inhospitable to certain cultures or they try to minimize the size of a different culture (the old planning text adage is that when the minority population increases over 10% of the population, white flight starts to occur). If these cities are truly progressive and they still lack diversity then it may just not be those communities cup of tea.
As a city planner, I do find it interesting that the cities and places with the largest black populations such as Atlanta, Houston, Charlotte and the D.C. suburbs are some of the most sprawling cities and locales in the country. We all know that obesity is a national problem and near epidemic levels in portions of the black community. While having a preeminent large upper and middle class community in these major cities is great sign of progress, are the locations of where of the large black middle class lives really doing more harm than good? And while the author of The White City is asking why are progressively planned cities so white, the question I would like to know is why the locations of the black middle class are planned so horribly?
What is your take on progressive white cities and their lack of diversity? Also what is your opinion on why cities with a large black population have so much sprawl? Do you see any correlations? I would like to hear your thoughts, please leave a comment.
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
The Heart & Soul of Cities
Yesterday I watched a documentary called “The Nine Lives of Marion Barry” and it was a pretty fair portrayal of one of the most controversial political figures within the last fifty years. Marion Barry (who had a Master’s in chemistry…who knew?!?) was a civil rights leader who came to Washington D.C. in the 1960’s were he came a political activist who later became a city council member and ultimately the mayor. In his third term as the mayor of the Capital, Barry (as I’m sure many of you are aware) had one of the most epic political downfalls ever in this country as he was caught using crack cocaine on videotape in a joint police & F.B.I. sting operation.
A man who had worked so hard for the real citizens of D.C. had disgraced himself and his city became a national laughing stock as he had to serve six months in a Federal prison for drug possession. In 1994, the city had seemed to become the national laughing stock as they re-elected Barry for a fourth term. Marion Barry and his re-election triggered national debates about black political leadership, the crack epidemic, the polarization of black and white communities and the effectiveness of past civil rights leaders. One man, born in abject poverty who picked in cotton in Tennessee as a child, who worked his way through college and stopped short in getting his PhD in chemistry to join the civil rights movement, managed to stir up a whole heap of controversy as he became the political face of our nation’s capital.
But this post isn’t just about Marion Barry. This post is about the people who make up the heart and soul of cities. Those folks that would elect and re-elect people like Marion Barry who had listened and fought for them. These folks represent the guts of cities. They range from the menial job workers, to teachers and professors, to the hustlers and the unemployed, to proud families who had lived in the city for decades. These folks represented the everyday life of Washington D.C. that had little to do national politics, congress or the White House. Without a doubt, Washington D.C. is a one industry town. The Federal government as well as the massive amount private contracting jobs that it produces, makes up the lion’s share of jobs in the city and metropolitan area. There is a perception sometimes that D.C. is a hollow city that is just made up of Federal workers and contractors. However as someone who grew up an hour north of the city in Baltimore, I knew there were two different D.C.’s. There was the Capital and then there was Black D.C.
This dichotomy is prevalent in many cities where the public face is within stark contrast to the everyday lives of the citizens who make the city run. There are the skyscrapers of Manhattan and there are the flats, rowhouses and project high rises of Harlem, Brooklyn and the Bronx. There are the beautiful beaches and art deco line streets of South Beach in Miami and there are the barrios of Little Haiti and Overtown. In my fair city of Baltimore, there is the world-renowned Inner Harbor and there is East and West Baltimore as depicted on the HBO television series, “The Wire.” In fact one of my favorite scenes from The Wire was the series ending final montage were one of the main characters stares at the skyscrapers surrounding the harbor while the show runs through images of the everyday life of normal city residents. It was as if someone was admiring the beauty of a castle and its walls from afar while those in its kingdom toiled in a meaningless servitude from within the walls. If Baltimore was a castle then Washington D.C. was an Emerald City both literally and figuratively.
In one of the later renditions of the Wizard of OZ, Emerald City is described as a city with splendid palaces and gardens but beset with crime and poverty. In these renditions the city wasn’t green but the citizens wore green glasses as a way to stop seeing what was going on around them. If this isn’t apropos to how the Federal government treated the residents of the city then I don’t what is. This is what makes Marion Barry’s rise to power so fascinating. In a city full of allusion, grandeur and power, the man chosen to lead the city came from those who were thought of as powerless. For as powerful as the Federal Government is in a global context, it still does not represent the city, the people do. And the needs of the everyday people of the city had been ignored. For every powerful lobbyist that lived in the city there was a bus driver and a hairdresser. For every congressman there was a teacher and a sanitation worker. For every staff aid, there was a high school drop out and some one underemployed. While cities fight to attain the former examples previously mentioned, Barry fought for the needs of the latter who were the heart and soul of Washington D.C.
A man who had worked so hard for the real citizens of D.C. had disgraced himself and his city became a national laughing stock as he had to serve six months in a Federal prison for drug possession. In 1994, the city had seemed to become the national laughing stock as they re-elected Barry for a fourth term. Marion Barry and his re-election triggered national debates about black political leadership, the crack epidemic, the polarization of black and white communities and the effectiveness of past civil rights leaders. One man, born in abject poverty who picked in cotton in Tennessee as a child, who worked his way through college and stopped short in getting his PhD in chemistry to join the civil rights movement, managed to stir up a whole heap of controversy as he became the political face of our nation’s capital.
But this post isn’t just about Marion Barry. This post is about the people who make up the heart and soul of cities. Those folks that would elect and re-elect people like Marion Barry who had listened and fought for them. These folks represent the guts of cities. They range from the menial job workers, to teachers and professors, to the hustlers and the unemployed, to proud families who had lived in the city for decades. These folks represented the everyday life of Washington D.C. that had little to do national politics, congress or the White House. Without a doubt, Washington D.C. is a one industry town. The Federal government as well as the massive amount private contracting jobs that it produces, makes up the lion’s share of jobs in the city and metropolitan area. There is a perception sometimes that D.C. is a hollow city that is just made up of Federal workers and contractors. However as someone who grew up an hour north of the city in Baltimore, I knew there were two different D.C.’s. There was the Capital and then there was Black D.C.
This dichotomy is prevalent in many cities where the public face is within stark contrast to the everyday lives of the citizens who make the city run. There are the skyscrapers of Manhattan and there are the flats, rowhouses and project high rises of Harlem, Brooklyn and the Bronx. There are the beautiful beaches and art deco line streets of South Beach in Miami and there are the barrios of Little Haiti and Overtown. In my fair city of Baltimore, there is the world-renowned Inner Harbor and there is East and West Baltimore as depicted on the HBO television series, “The Wire.” In fact one of my favorite scenes from The Wire was the series ending final montage were one of the main characters stares at the skyscrapers surrounding the harbor while the show runs through images of the everyday life of normal city residents. It was as if someone was admiring the beauty of a castle and its walls from afar while those in its kingdom toiled in a meaningless servitude from within the walls. If Baltimore was a castle then Washington D.C. was an Emerald City both literally and figuratively.
In one of the later renditions of the Wizard of OZ, Emerald City is described as a city with splendid palaces and gardens but beset with crime and poverty. In these renditions the city wasn’t green but the citizens wore green glasses as a way to stop seeing what was going on around them. If this isn’t apropos to how the Federal government treated the residents of the city then I don’t what is. This is what makes Marion Barry’s rise to power so fascinating. In a city full of allusion, grandeur and power, the man chosen to lead the city came from those who were thought of as powerless. For as powerful as the Federal Government is in a global context, it still does not represent the city, the people do. And the needs of the everyday people of the city had been ignored. For every powerful lobbyist that lived in the city there was a bus driver and a hairdresser. For every congressman there was a teacher and a sanitation worker. For every staff aid, there was a high school drop out and some one underemployed. While cities fight to attain the former examples previously mentioned, Barry fought for the needs of the latter who were the heart and soul of Washington D.C.
The Nine Lives of Marion Barry Documentary
A trailer to a documentary about the former mayor of Washington D.C.
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
DC Graffiti in Adams Morgan
From Robert Gandy of the Baltimore Examiner:
"When asked about what "urban art" meant to them, people on a hot summer's street in the Adams Morgan neighborhood of Washington DC gave a breadth of answers showing a range of ideas. In typical DC fashion, those that did not outright ignore the question shouted answers as they hustled past. "Graffiti, I guess" said the woman with a bundle of sunflowers. "Outside," grunted a DCPD beat cop. "Too thick a question," said a woman in a light blue dress. Ryan Feurtardo said it "is fantastic art. Can be real creative." Jon Kenney and Caroline Leoni said it was "free expression. Do-it-yourself" art. Leoni added, "It's mixed media," and pointed to political graffiti in an adjacent alley.
I think DC has better graffiti and Urban Art pieces then the ones below that were taken from the article. It's a little boring. To be honest though I can't remember seeing any great tag pieces anywhere in the Distinct. Have any of you seen any great graffiti tags in D.C.?
"When asked about what "urban art" meant to them, people on a hot summer's street in the Adams Morgan neighborhood of Washington DC gave a breadth of answers showing a range of ideas. In typical DC fashion, those that did not outright ignore the question shouted answers as they hustled past. "Graffiti, I guess" said the woman with a bundle of sunflowers. "Outside," grunted a DCPD beat cop. "Too thick a question," said a woman in a light blue dress. Ryan Feurtardo said it "is fantastic art. Can be real creative." Jon Kenney and Caroline Leoni said it was "free expression. Do-it-yourself" art. Leoni added, "It's mixed media," and pointed to political graffiti in an adjacent alley.
I think DC has better graffiti and Urban Art pieces then the ones below that were taken from the article. It's a little boring. To be honest though I can't remember seeing any great tag pieces anywhere in the Distinct. Have any of you seen any great graffiti tags in D.C.?
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Obama calls DC soft
NBC Chicago reports that President Obama is telling DC to toughen up when it comes to dealing with snow.
The article reports:
"So, it's good to see you guys. Can I make a comment that is unrelated to the economy, very quickly? And it has to do with Washington. My children's school was cancelled today because of what? ..... Some -- some ice?
"... As my -- as my children pointed out, in Chicago, school is never cancelled. In fact, my seven-year-old pointed out that you'd go outside for recess in weather like this. You wouldn't even stay indoors. So it's -- I don't know. We're going to have to try to apply some flinty Chicago toughness to this town."
As someone who grew up in the Mid-Atlantic, I have to agree with the Prez. Although I will say that the Mid-Atlantic has not had a bad winter for 6-7 years now, so the first suspicion of snow makes everyone panic now. I remember during bad winters it would take at least 6 inches to close schools down...but that was more due to the fact the school system could not afford to take any more school days off for weak snow storms.
The article reports:
"So, it's good to see you guys. Can I make a comment that is unrelated to the economy, very quickly? And it has to do with Washington. My children's school was cancelled today because of what? ..... Some -- some ice?
"... As my -- as my children pointed out, in Chicago, school is never cancelled. In fact, my seven-year-old pointed out that you'd go outside for recess in weather like this. You wouldn't even stay indoors. So it's -- I don't know. We're going to have to try to apply some flinty Chicago toughness to this town."
As someone who grew up in the Mid-Atlantic, I have to agree with the Prez. Although I will say that the Mid-Atlantic has not had a bad winter for 6-7 years now, so the first suspicion of snow makes everyone panic now. I remember during bad winters it would take at least 6 inches to close schools down...but that was more due to the fact the school system could not afford to take any more school days off for weak snow storms.
Thursday, January 22, 2009
The Inaugural Tranist Ride
On January 20, 2009, America witnessed a truly history making moment when the first Black President was sworn into office. Bark Obama who inspired people of all races, genders, cultures and backgrounds drew an estimated 2 million people to the The Mall to watch his inauguration as the 44th President of the United States.
This is an account of one man's experience with the DC Metro Transit System during this history making day.
To begin with, everyone who came to DC knew that the transit system could potentially be shut down because there were early estimates that there would be more transit riders then the Metro could actually handle at full capacity. On top of that, transit stops along with streets would be closed in the vicinity of The Mall and the Capital Building. With that, I braced myself for the worst as I headed to The Mall from the DC suburbs in Maryland.
The beginning of the trip was not that bad. As me and my friend headed toward the nearest suburban transit stop we had noticed a long line of cars waiting to park, we thought this was not a good sign but we only waited 15 minutes or so. As we made it on the train, at 5:30 in the morning it was clear that almost everyone on the train was headed to the Inauguration. The train was semi-packed but nothing crazy as we imagined. As the train crossed into city and we got closer to DC, the train started filling up quickly.
Our first transfer. We transferred to the next train and amazingly the train was right on schedule and we had perfect timing. So far so sweat. Then came the 2nd transfer. The transfer this time was leading us directly to the transit stop that our Inauguration ticket to get off. The trains and the platforms were jam packed but we were eventually able to squeeze onto the train and make it to our stop.
Overall, our train ride lasted only 30 minutes surprisingly. For the overall train ride coming into the Inauguration, I would give The Metro a "B"
Unfortunately the ride back was not as smooth,
After watching history being made and standing on my feet in the cold for 5 hours, me and 2 million others decided to leave The Mall and head back to the Metro. Due to the large crowd it took 1.5 hours to leave The Mall...understandable. What was not understandable was the mass of humanity that was standing in front of our Metro stop telling the Metro Stop was closed and on top of that telling us to go back while hundreds of thousands of people are still coming from The Mall.
So...my friend and I snaked through the restless crowd, which took 30 minutes to get through to get to the next Metro station...closed. So we walk to the next Metro station...closed. Then we walked to another Metro station to see the gates locked and a line of people waiting for the gates to re-open at 6:30. It was only 3 pm.
We finally found some cops who told us that they had been sending people back to the first station that we had left because it was closed. The cops were shocked to find out that, that station along with all the others were...closed. As we walk back in a circle to the beginning we saw several sights at various Metro stops. My favorite sights were the National Guard taking over one Metro stop and the 3 block long plus line that surrounded all other transit stations.
Eventually we kept walking...and walking...and walking until we found a Metro stop that was almost 2 miles away from the Inauguration and from most of the Inaugural crowd. In all it took 4 hours to get back to my original destination on The Metro. 4 hours in the cold I might add with no food. But you know what, it was a once an lifetime opportunity. I don't know if I would have done it again but I am sure glad that I did. Not only did I get a chance to see history being made, I have a story to go along with it as well: "The Day the Metro Never Came"
Peace
This is an account of one man's experience with the DC Metro Transit System during this history making day.
To begin with, everyone who came to DC knew that the transit system could potentially be shut down because there were early estimates that there would be more transit riders then the Metro could actually handle at full capacity. On top of that, transit stops along with streets would be closed in the vicinity of The Mall and the Capital Building. With that, I braced myself for the worst as I headed to The Mall from the DC suburbs in Maryland.
The beginning of the trip was not that bad. As me and my friend headed toward the nearest suburban transit stop we had noticed a long line of cars waiting to park, we thought this was not a good sign but we only waited 15 minutes or so. As we made it on the train, at 5:30 in the morning it was clear that almost everyone on the train was headed to the Inauguration. The train was semi-packed but nothing crazy as we imagined. As the train crossed into city and we got closer to DC, the train started filling up quickly.
Our first transfer. We transferred to the next train and amazingly the train was right on schedule and we had perfect timing. So far so sweat. Then came the 2nd transfer. The transfer this time was leading us directly to the transit stop that our Inauguration ticket to get off. The trains and the platforms were jam packed but we were eventually able to squeeze onto the train and make it to our stop.
Overall, our train ride lasted only 30 minutes surprisingly. For the overall train ride coming into the Inauguration, I would give The Metro a "B"
Unfortunately the ride back was not as smooth,
After watching history being made and standing on my feet in the cold for 5 hours, me and 2 million others decided to leave The Mall and head back to the Metro. Due to the large crowd it took 1.5 hours to leave The Mall...understandable. What was not understandable was the mass of humanity that was standing in front of our Metro stop telling the Metro Stop was closed and on top of that telling us to go back while hundreds of thousands of people are still coming from The Mall.
So...my friend and I snaked through the restless crowd, which took 30 minutes to get through to get to the next Metro station...closed. So we walk to the next Metro station...closed. Then we walked to another Metro station to see the gates locked and a line of people waiting for the gates to re-open at 6:30. It was only 3 pm.
We finally found some cops who told us that they had been sending people back to the first station that we had left because it was closed. The cops were shocked to find out that, that station along with all the others were...closed. As we walk back in a circle to the beginning we saw several sights at various Metro stops. My favorite sights were the National Guard taking over one Metro stop and the 3 block long plus line that surrounded all other transit stations.
Eventually we kept walking...and walking...and walking until we found a Metro stop that was almost 2 miles away from the Inauguration and from most of the Inaugural crowd. In all it took 4 hours to get back to my original destination on The Metro. 4 hours in the cold I might add with no food. But you know what, it was a once an lifetime opportunity. I don't know if I would have done it again but I am sure glad that I did. Not only did I get a chance to see history being made, I have a story to go along with it as well: "The Day the Metro Never Came"
Peace
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
A Transit Planner's Nightmare: The 2008 Inauguration
With over 4 million people coming to town and an estimated 10,000 charter buses rolling in, where do you park all the buses? How long is a line of 10,000 buses you ask according to some officials is would stretch around the entire Capital Beltway and then stretch to Baltimore end to end.
The Washington Post reports:
"The sheer size of the charter bus contingent, carrying as many as a
half-million people, has an enormous cascading effect on the rest of
transportation planning. Widespread street closures downtown will prevent
charter buses from dropping passengers off at events, so officials need to
figure out where buses will park. The parking locations, in turn, will
affect where and how many people squeeze on to packed Metro trains."
The Metro can't accommodate everyone, so officials also have to prepare for
others to walk to events or set up shuttle bus service from outlying areas to
downtown. However even at full capacity the Metro can not accommodate the crowds
expected at the inauguration.
"The transit agency will run an unprecedented 15 hours of consecutive rush-hour rail service on Inauguration Day. Even so, Metro officials say they can accommodate only 4,700 buses, or roughly 235,000 people, at Metrorail station parking lots, according to senior planner Jim Hughes. More than that would overwhelm the system. Although Metro has about 60,000 parking spaces at 42 stations, charter buses take up two regular spaces, and Metro also wants to keep spaces open for the region's nearly 6 million residents.
If Metro takes 4,700 busloads of people, that means city and regional officials need to find parking for the remaining 5,300 buses. "
If you plan to be in Washington D.C. like I do for the Inuaguration, be prepared to walk...far...in the cold.
The Washington Post reports:
"The sheer size of the charter bus contingent, carrying as many as a
half-million people, has an enormous cascading effect on the rest of
transportation planning. Widespread street closures downtown will prevent
charter buses from dropping passengers off at events, so officials need to
figure out where buses will park. The parking locations, in turn, will
affect where and how many people squeeze on to packed Metro trains."
The Metro can't accommodate everyone, so officials also have to prepare for
others to walk to events or set up shuttle bus service from outlying areas to
downtown. However even at full capacity the Metro can not accommodate the crowds
expected at the inauguration.
"The transit agency will run an unprecedented 15 hours of consecutive rush-hour rail service on Inauguration Day. Even so, Metro officials say they can accommodate only 4,700 buses, or roughly 235,000 people, at Metrorail station parking lots, according to senior planner Jim Hughes. More than that would overwhelm the system. Although Metro has about 60,000 parking spaces at 42 stations, charter buses take up two regular spaces, and Metro also wants to keep spaces open for the region's nearly 6 million residents.
If Metro takes 4,700 busloads of people, that means city and regional officials need to find parking for the remaining 5,300 buses. "
If you plan to be in Washington D.C. like I do for the Inuaguration, be prepared to walk...far...in the cold.
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