Neighborhoods and Urban Development

Anthony Downs

doi:10.5771/9780815717348

Summary

American cities are shifting collections of individual neghborhoods. Thousands of residents move every year within and among neighborhoods; their flows across a city can radically and quickly alter the character of its neighborhoods. What is behind all this fermentthe decline of one area, the revitalization of another? Can the process be made more rational? Can city neighborhoods be stabilized--and older cities thus preserved?

This book argues that such flows of residents are not random. Rather, they are closely linked to overall migration into or out of each metropolitan area and to the way U.S. cities develop. Downs contends that both urban development and the social problems it spawns are built upon social arrangements designed to benefit the middle-class majority. Racial segregation divides housing in each metropolitan area into two or more markets. Socioeconomic segregation subdivides neighborhoods within each market into a class hierarchy. The poor live mainly in the oldest neighborhoods, close to the urban center. The affluent live in the newest neighborhoods, mostly at the urban periphery. This separation stems not from pure market forces but from exclusionary laws that make the construction of low-cost housing illegal in most neighborhoods. The resulting pattern determines where housing is built and what housing is left to decay.

Downs uses data from U.S. cities to illustrate neighborhood change and to reach conclusions about ways to cope with it. he explores the causes and nature of racial segregation and integration, and he evaluates neighborhood revitalization programs, which in reviving part of a city often displace many poor residents. He presents a timely analysis of the effect of higher energy costs upon urban sprawl, argues the wisdom of reviving older cities rather than helping their residents move elsewhere, and discusses the advantages and disadvantages of public and private policies at the federal, state, metropolitan-area,

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Bibliographic data

Copyright year: 2010
ISBN-Print: 978-0-8157-1920-5
ISBN-Online: 978-0-8157-1734-8
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield, Lanham
Language: English
Pages: 189
Product type: Book Titles

1. Contents No access
1. The Nature of Neighborhoods No access
2. Problems Arising from Neighborhood Change No access
3. Exploring Future Policies Concerning Neighborhoods No access
4. The Necessity for Neighborhood Deterioration No access
5. Federal and State Policies No access
6. City Policies No access
7. Neighborhood Policies No access
8. The Boundaries of This Study No access
1. Conclusions from This View of Neighborhoods No access
2. Nonmarket Linkages and Self-Reinforcing Expectations No access
3. Organizations within Neighborhoods No access
1. Factors in Population Mobility No access
2. Variations in Mobility Rates No access
3. Population Mobility and Neighborhood Stability No access
1. The Trickle Down Process and Urban Growth No access
2. The Effect of the Trickle Down Process on Neighborhoods No access
3. Spatial Hierarchy of Neighborhoods No access
4. Differential Code Enforcement by Neighborhood No access
5. Continuous Neighborhood Change No access
6. Some Motives for Socioeconomic Segregation No access
7. Differential Benefits to Households No access
8. The Slowing of Urban Growth No access
1. Agents of Neighborhood Change No access
2. Stages of Change in Decline and Revitalization No access
3. Intensified Land Use No access
4. Neighborhood Life Cycles No access
5. Housing Construction and Neighborhood Change No access
1. The Nature of Revitalization No access
2. Causes of Revitalization No access
3. Benefits and Costs of Revitalization No access
4. Displacement No access
1. The Arbitrage Model No access
2. Differential Incomes No access
3. Racial Prejudice No access
4. Microdynamic Illustrations of Racial Change No access
5. The Negative Effects of Racial Change No access
6. Stable, Racially Integrated Neighborhoods No access
7. Hispanics in the United States No access
1. Demographic and Economic Trends No access
2. High Gasoline Prices No access
3. Neighborhood Decline No access
4. Neighborhood Redevelopment No access
1. Rhetorical versus Real Possibilities No access
2. The Proper Institutional Level for Action No access
3. Strategies No access
4. Personal Values and the Limits of Public Policies No access
1. Redistributing Incomes within Metropolitan Areas No access
2. Deconcentrating the Poor No access
3. Improving Access to Housing Credit No access
4. Improving Public Schools No access
5. Additional Recommendations No access
1. Effects of Suburban Growth upon Central Cities No access
2. Stimulating Central City Revitalization by Limiting Suburban Growth No access
3. Achieving Fairer Distribution of the Social Costs of Suburban Growth No access
4. Providing More Accessible Mortgage Financing for City Revitalization No access
5. Balancing Neighborhood Revitalization and Displacement No access
6. Encouraging Suburban Growth to Reduce Housing Prices No access
7. Conclusion No access
1. Available Resources No access
2. Strategies for Spatially Allocating Resources No access
3. Treatment by Neighborhood No access
4. Coping with Housing Deterioration No access
5. Housing Code Enforcement No access
6. Assessment Practices No access
7. Traffic and Transportation No access
8. Conclusion No access
1. Some Attitudes of Neighborhood Residents and Their Implications No access
2. Personal Values and Participation in Local Organizations No access
3. Raising Neighborhood Consciousness No access
4. Transferring Government Authority to Neighborhoods No access
5. Transferring Delivery of Some Services to the Neighborhood Level No access
6. Overcoming Neighborhood Resistance to the Location of Key Public Facilities No access
7. Conclusion No access
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4. D No access
5. E No access
6. F No access
7. G No access
8. H No access
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10. J No access
11. K No access
12. L No access
13. M No access
14. N No access
15. O No access
16. P No access
17. Q No access
18. R No access
19. S No access
20. T No access
21. U No access
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24. Y No access
25. Z No access