Racist housing practices as a precursor to uneven neighborhood change in a post-industrial city

Sadler, Richard C.; Lafreniere, Don

doi:10.1080/02673037.2016.1181724

Cited by 65 publications

(43 citation statements)

References 49 publications

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“…Several elements are of particular importance to the issue of land abandonment. During and after the Great Migration (particularly the second wave that included more African Americans), an array of measures including restrictive covenants, federally sanctioned mortgage discrimination and zoning were devised to limit where blacks could live and under what terms they could access capital to buy (or repair) a home (Bradford, ; Rothstein, ; Sadler and Lafreniere, ). The most common form of mortgage capital available were high‐interest, insecure, contract mortgages (Satter, ; Coates, ; Badger, ).…”

Section: Race and Land Abandonmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Race and the Production of Extreme Land Abandonment in the American Rust Belt

Hackworth

2018

Int J Urban Regional Res

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Extreme land abandonment is one of the most visible expressions of urban decline. Conventional theory emphasizes housing lifecycle processes, municipal fiscal challenges and deindustrialization to explain its prevalence. Empirically however, these factors are not strongly associated with the most extreme instances of land abandonment in the American Rust Belt. Race, by contrast, is strongly associated with these patterns, yet there is little mention of it in conventional theory. This article draws on group threat theory to explain how the construction of Blackness as a threat to white property, power and political influence, has propelled the production of extreme land abandonment. The constructed threat has translated into a sustained suppression of demand and capital for overwhelmingly black neighborhoods. These forces operate both independently and as an accelerant for other abandonment drivers. IntroductionHeidelberg Street in Detroit is fairly typical of the city's near east side. Virtually every home on the street has been abandoned and demolished since the early 1970s (see Figure 1). Today, its open spaces make it look more like a semi-rural town in central Michigan than the center of what was once the fourth largest city in the United States. Though extreme, Heidelberg Street is not unique--62 other census tracts in Detroit alone have also lost half or more of their housing since 1970. In total, there are 269 such extreme housing loss neighborhoods (EHLNs) spread across 49 cities in the region. 1 Though they account for only a small percentage of overall neighborhoods in the region, these spaces are highly visible, and a frequent focus for scholars, practitioners, artists and the general public.2 'Ruin porn' photographers and documentarians flock to such neighborhoods to record ostensibly representative images of Detroit and other cities (Kinney, 2016). Planners and city officials struggle to manage the costs associated with such places (Hackworth, 2015). Urban scholars seek to explain how they became so concentrated in some cities as opposed to others (Dewar and Weber, 2012). Conventional explanations of land abandonment emphasize some combination of housing lifecycle processes, deindustrialization, or municipal fiscal collapse. But, when operationalized across the region, these drivers exhibit much weaker relationships with extreme abandonment than an additional factor that has only been partially developed in this context: race. I argue that race has an under-appreciated causal influence on the production of such extreme land abandonment, past and present. In particular, the construction of Blackness as a threat to white property, political power and safety 1Extreme housing loss neighborhoods (EHLNs) are census tracts that lost more than half of their housing between 1970 and 2010. The more detailed definition and justification for this threshold is contained in the study design section. 2In the 49 cities with extreme housing loss, 6.8% of tracts were EHLNs, 47.3% of tracts had lost 0-49.9% o...

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Section: Race and Land Abandonmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…could access capital to buy (or repair) a home (Bradford, 1979;Rothstein, 2014;Sadler and Lafreniere, 2017). The most common form of mortgage capital available were high-interest, insecure, contract mortgages (Satter, 2009;Coates, 2014;Badger, 2016).…”

Section: Race and Land Abandonmentmentioning

confidence: 99%

Race and the Production of Extreme Land Abandonment in the American Rust Belt

Hackworth

2018

Int J Urban Regional Res

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“…The driving factors vary from demographics, economy, society, and policies at global and local levels. For example, socio-spatial inequalities were found to more strongly influence city shrinking compared with economic factors in the American Rust Belt [13]; falling birth rates and the effects of German reunification were the main factors affect shrinkage in Germany [14]. The demographic change, which refers to the ageing population and low birth rate, is the primary cause of city shrinkage in Japan [3]; the economic level and population structure are highly related to city shrinkage in China [15].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Spatiotemporal Differences in Determinants of City Shrinkage Based on Semiparametric Geographically Weighted Regression

et al. 2019

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City shrinkage, as an ongoing worldwide phenomenon, is an issue for urban planning and regional development. City shrinkage is remarkable in Japan, with over 85% of municipalities experiencing population loss from 2005 to 2015. As Japan’s society ages and with its low fertility rate, city shrinkage has had a tremendous negative effect on economic development and urban planning. Understanding the spatial dependence and spatial heterogeneity of city shrinkage and its determinants is essential for ensuring the sustainable development of a city or region. In this study, a semiparametric geographically weighted regression (SGWR) model was adopted to explore the spatiotemporal differences in determinants of city shrinkage. The results reveal that the SGWR model incorporating the global and local variables is more interpretive compared to ordinary least squares and geographically weighted regression models in exploring the correlates of city shrinkage. We found the spatial dependence and heterogeneity of shrinking cities resulted from demographic, economy, and social factors, and revealed low fertility, the ageing population, and enterprise change ratio influenced city shrinkage in different regions at different times in Japan, whereas foreign population ratio, industry structure, and social welfare had global impacts. The findings provide useful information for understanding city shrinkage at global and local scales.

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“…Flint’s food retail network is at an advanced stage of consolidation. Beginning in the late 1960s with the passage of a Fair Housing Ordinance, and accelerating with severe deindustrialization due to layoffs by the city’s former primary employer—General Motors—white and later middle class flight has cut the city population in half [ 49 – 52 ]. Since 2012, the Flint urban area has lost six grocery stores, including five chains.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Integrating expert knowledge in a GIS to optimize siting decisions for small-scale healthy food retail interventions

Sadler

2016

Int J Health Geogr

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BackgroundThe availability of healthy foods in a neighborhood remains a key determinant of diet and diet-related disease in disadvantaged communities. Innovative solutions to the ‘food desert’ problem include the deployment of mobile markets and healthy corner store initiatives. Such initiatives, however, do not always capitalize on the principles guiding retail development and the possibilities of GIS-based data. Simultaneously, community partners are not always engaged effectively in the planning for such interventions, which limits acceptability and suitability of such work.MethodsThis paper highlights the results of a participatory mapping exercise to optimize the siting of a planned healthy food retail intervention in Flint, Michigan. Potential sites are chosen by engaging experts in a three-stage mapping process that includes the analytic hierarchy process and point allocation of five key variables (including food access, socioeconomic distress, population density, access to transit, and proximity to neighborhood centers), as well as direct mapping of suitable sites.ResultsResults suggest a discrete set of areas—primarily in the northwestern quadrant of the city—where small-scale healthy food retail interventions might be most strategically located. Areas with the most consistent overlap between directly mapped sites and very high levels of suitability align well with neighborhoods which are distant from existing grocery stores.ConclusionsAs a community-based strategy, this increases the opportunity for effectively improving neighborhood access to healthy foods by optimizing the potential sites for healthy food interventions. Community partners have already been active in using these results in project planning for just such an intervention.

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Racist housing practices as a precursor to uneven neighborhood change in a post-industrial city

Cited by 65 publications

References 49 publications

Race and the Production of Extreme Land Abandonment in the American Rust Belt

Race and the Production of Extreme Land Abandonment in the American Rust Belt

Spatiotemporal Differences in Determinants of City Shrinkage Based on Semiparametric Geographically Weighted Regression

Integrating expert knowledge in a GIS to optimize siting decisions for small-scale healthy food retail interventions

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