Gentrification in Brooklyn
A closer illustration of the gentrification of the neighborhoods in Brooklyn, New York.
What is Gentrification?
Gentrification is a complicated topic. These days, it is used to describe the “revitalization” of run down, poorer neighborhoods, or in the words of Amanda Boston: “ the exclusionary restructuring of urban space.” “Exclusionary” being the key word here. Gentrification used to be the process of upper-middle and middle class people rehabilitating urban spaces, addressing the problems of those who lived there. In more recent years, it has come to mean displacing the families in these neighborhoods by renovating the areas into “luxury condominiums, chain stores, high-end boutiques, and corporate entertainment and tourism venues” (Boston 2020), therefore making the area unaffordable for those who once lived there. The process of gentrifying a neighborhood or city is used to push out the urban poor and replace them with more “desirable” clientele. More often than not, those who are displaced are Black and people of color, such as those who were affected by the gentrification of Brooklyn, New York.
Gentrification in Brooklyn
Since the early 1900s, Brooklyn has been undergoing gentrification with the help of several pro-gentrification policies such as “segregation, redlining, urban renewal, planned shrinkage/catastrophic disinvestment, de-industrialization, mass criminalization, HOPE VI,2 the foreclosure crisis, and gentrification” (Boston, 2020). Predatory policies such as redlining have been used by banks to discriminate against Black homeowners. Redlining gave lenders an excuse to give Black people “higher-cost and higher-risk loans than their white counterparts” (Boston, 2020). This made it very difficult for Black people to pay off their loans, leading to about one out of every four Black homeowners in Bedford-Stuyvesant to lose their homes. This paved the way for private investors to buy up the land at very low cost and renovate it into urban spaces more appealing to the white and wealthy populations. It also is a factor in the significant rise in the cost of living, again, leading to the displacement of the poorer populations in these neighborhoods.
“Developers and investors rely on the conditions created by racialized disinvestment and destabilization—such as depressed property values, “blight,” financial precarity, and foreclosure—as prerequisites for real estate speculation” (Boston, 2020).
According to the 1960 Census, the population of Bedford-Stuyvesant, a neighborhood in Brooklyn, in 1960 was 72 percent black, 12 percent Puerto Rican and 16 percent white. Since then the black component has increased to 76 percent and the Puerto Rican to 15 percent. Whites now constitute only 10 percent of the population. Most of the whites in the area are old while the largest segment of the black population is under 30.
Harmful Effects of Gentrification
The harmful effects of gentrification are clear. In the 1960s the population of the city Bedford-Stuyvesant was 72% Black and only 16% white (Pincus, 1969). Since undergoing gentrification, the population as of 2019 is 46% Black and almost 30% white (Furman Center, 2022). Black people are being disproportionately displaced out of their homes and neighborhoods to make way for a whiter, wealthier clientele. This forced migration is supported by predatory policies such as redlining and subprime loans. Not only does gentrification cause the displacement of thousands of families, it also leads to the “speedy and vicious uprooting of longtime residents, erasure of local histories, and destruction of social networks and community institutions” (Boston, 2020).
How to Combat Gentrification
Economic solid forces are the elemental root of gentrification. To prevent gentrification and “To keep residents in their neighborhoods, ... Williams said that cities need to foster economic growth and opportunities in low-income communities, and tear up existing zoning laws” (King Williams, 2022). Economic growth can lessen gentrification, and the focus on wealthy and expensive neighborhoods, if decreased, could help the prevention. Since gentrification is the outcome of powerful economic forces, misleading those forces could result in the displacement of cities. According to Adam Hengels, there are “only two ways to fight Gentrification,” among which only one of the ways will be preferable to fight. The first solution is “widespread liberalization of zoning,” and the other is “to eradicate rich people all together.” Ideally, the second option could have a permanent resolution, but who wants to do that? We believe this issue retains more reasonable ways to find the best outcome. Therefore, as stated by Joe Kriesberg in the article “Strategies For Responding To Gentrification,” “...key actors in the affordable housing system need to overcome their reluctance to acquire existing apartments and preserve their affordability before it is too late. This can be the only way to truly prevent displacement of current residents since they live in buildings that already exist—not ones yet to be built.” Fortunately, this strategy has already succeeded in Boston and Somerville. Another angle of this problem is expressed as “While housing displacement gets most of the attention, I am increasingly concerned about cultural and economic displacement. When longstanding, locally-owned small businesses are forced to move (or worse, close), it impacts the business owner and the entire community. Similarly, as the demographics of a place change, many residents feel the loss of their cultural community and home. Advocates are now fighting to help local businesses stay open.”
Resources
“Bedford Stuyvesant Neighborhood Profile.” NYU Furman Center, https://furmancenter.org/neighborhoods/view/bedford-stuyvesant.
Boston, Amanda. “Gentrifying the City: From Racialized Neglect to Racialized Reinvestment.” Items, Items, 17 Sept. 2020, https://items.ssrc.org/layered-metropolis/gentrifying-the-city-from-racialized-neglect-to-racialized-reinvestment/.
“Brooklyn's 1938 ‘Redline’ Map.” _ Region NYC, 27 May 2014, https://region.nyc/2014/04/28/brooklyns-1938-redline-map/.
Hengels, Adam, et al. “Only 2 Ways to Fight Gentrification (You're Not Going to like One of Them).” Market Urbanism, 24 Dec. 2017, https://marketurbanism.com/2015/01/28/2-ways-fight-gentrification/.
Kovie, ZORA. “The Cities Where Gentrification and Covid-19 Collide | by Kovie Biakolo | ZORA.” Zora Medium, 16 September 2020, https://zora.medium.com/the-cities-where-gentrification-and-covid-19-collide-f672f44f0a9b.
Kriesberg , Joe, et al. “Strategies for Responding to Gentrification.” Strategies for Responding to Gentrification | Joint Center for Housing Studies, 4 June 2018, https://www.jchs.harvard.edu/blog/strategies-for-responding-to-gentrification.
Lionel Pincus and Princess Firyal Map Division, The New York Public Library. "Bedford-Stuyvesant, Ocean Hill, Tompkins Park, Stuyvesant Heights." The New York Public Library Digital Collections. 1969. https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/c42cb93f-8dd9-ca65-e040-e00a18064e5c.
Schwartz, Lela, and Cushing N. Dolbeare. “Social Media Activism Highlights Brooklyn Gentrification – On the Home Front.” On the Home Front, 14 August 2015, https://hfront.org/2015/08/14/social-media-activism-highlights-brooklyn-gentrification/.
Williams, Mariette. “Gentrification Doesn't Have to Force Minority Residents out of Their Homes. Activists Say There Are 3 Ways to Protect Communities.” Business Insider, Business Insider, https://www.businessinsider.com/personal-finance/how-to-protect-longtime-residents-from-gentrification-2020-9.
