Last week, we read Lance Freeman’s chapter “Making Sense of Gentrification.” He provides first hand experiences of residents of Clinton Hill and Harlem that allow for the analyzation of gentrification in urban spaces. He explains that gentrification can be examined by focusing on both the demand and supply side of urban living. In other words, gentrification can be attributed to shifts in consumer preferences and the cyclical nature of capital and its constant search for the highest rate of return. Hence, historically black neighborhoods are becoming much more white, and this racial/class change comes with many implications like whites demand for better resources. In class, I discussed the ways in which we see the “improvements” occurring in these gentrified spaces. However, I want to specifically discuss how gentrification can be attributed to the fluctuating relationship among capital investments and the production of urban space (the Economic Process Theory).

As the population of the world increases, cities are increasingly expanding to allow housing for new residents who have jobs in these metropolitan areas. However, as the new urban middle class has proven to us, there is an increasing desire to be close to the city center. Even though the 20th century was a time where a suburban lifestyle was desired, the new generation of middle class individuals have shown a higher tendency to prefer urban living.

An important aspect in defining and observing gentrification is the way in which capital flows into a place. Freeman particularly analyzes Clinton Hill and Harlem as places that have experienced gentrification. In his chapter, he discusses the neighborhoods that surround these two historically black neighborhoods. Places like West Chester and Cobble Hill have very high housing prices. However, housing prices are much lower in Clinton Hill and Harlem. Therefore, to real estate agents, business owners, and political figures these low costs are what excited a lot of potential for these places.  

The economic process theory shows us how land amenities like a particular landscape, certain natural resources, or the historicity of a place can lead to economic opportunities and investment. In the case of Harlem and Clinton Hill, it is clear that these neighborhoods have a great location in terms of being close to Manhattan, but with historic brownstones lined up and down the streets. To investors and potential home buyers, it is an attractive space with low housing costs, but all the same amenities as a more expensive neighborhood. Furthermore, as real estate agents soon started to market and sell housing in these neighborhoods, the cultural and physical dynamic of these places changed. In other words, gentrification had begun.

As the new urban middle class moved into Harlem and Clinton Hill, they did not stay silent about the lack of middle class amenities in their new adopted home. This demand for better resources was met with business owners opening stores and providing a market for a wealthier audience. However, existing residents of these places still had a lack of capital that allowed them to purchase items at the same places the new urban middle class individuals shopped at. Nonetheless, it is important to realize the way capital contributes to these changes. Because middle class individuals have different preferences and are able to purchase more luxury items, they will always be met with suppliers that provide these items.

I believe the economic process theory is a very interesting way of thinking about gentrification. There will always be a demand and supply side of housing, and this relationship determines what economic opportunities will stem from it. Also, this post was not meant to look past all the other factors that contribute to gentrification. It was instead to focus on one particular relationship between consumers and producers of place.

This past week, we read Kevin Loughran’s paper, “Parks for Profit: The High Line, Growth Machines, and the Uneven Development of Urban Public Spaces,” where he examines the era of neoliberalism, stratified economic and cultural resources that produce a spectrum of unevenly developed public parks. Specifically, he examines the “High Line,” a one and a half mile long elevated linear park on the West side of Manhattan, which was formerly a viaduct section for the New York Central Railroad. Loughran argues that this transformation “structure[d] the [privileged] leisure and consumption practices of a new urban middle class and anchor[ed] the continued super-gentrification of the surrounding communities” (57). In this post, I want to consider how the idea that cities are machines for economic growth contributes to gentrification and the privileged leisure and consumption practices of the urban space.

John Logan and Harvey Molotch portray the city as a growth machine, where it is built, maintained, and shaped by groups of people (i.e. pro-growth elites) who stand to benefit from the growth. However, because elites try to maximize profit, their projects often contribute to the gentrification of space in the city. For example, in neighborhoods like “Manhattan’s Lower East Side, community gardens that once served to ‘take land out of the market economy and decommodify it’ now function as symbols of ‘authentic’ urban communities” (51). This development was a result of the new urban middle class’ demand for housing in the city. To elites, this was purely an economic decision in which they realized that through developing the neighborhood, property value and marginal profit per home would increase. Furthermore, elites’ commodification of urban space also shows how “parks catering to poor communities and immigrants are underfunded, [and] forgotten unless they can serve ‘growth’ schemes” (50). While parks in high-income areas are readily maintained and regulated, parks in low-income areas represent a disinvestment of effort and interest to raise social welfare because profit-maximizing economics does not consider morality. I believe these “growth schemes” also lead specifically to privileged leisure and consumption practices in gentrified spaces.

Elites of the city are not the only individuals contributing to the gentrification of urban space. Businesses, who also prioritize profit maximization, take advantage of newly gentrified neighborhoods and urban space. In the reading, Loughran describes how the High Line displays “billboards for luxury brands – Veuve Clicquot, Armani, and Hennessey” (59). Economically, this is a strategic placement of advertisements for these companies. Socially, this is a representation of how the privileged leisure practices of those who walk the high line allow businesses to marginalize low-income individuals. The “iconic ghetto” illustrates the reason for this increasing marginalization of urban spaces. Although the “iconic ghetto” is an analyzation of the perception of blacks to whites, I believe it can also contribute to understanding this example. The overwhelming whiteness of places and spaces (i.e. the High Line) reinforces a normative sensibility where people of color are absent, not expected, and marginalized when present. The billboards, along with the shops and amenities of the High Line, are specifically targeted to the middle-class white individual, who are the most common visitors of the High Line.

Gentrification in urban spaces is due to elites striving for profit maximization and growth in the city. Consequently, this leads to middle-class individuals moving into spaces like the Lower East Side of Manhattan. These individuals have preferences, interests, and values which are targeted by higher end brands like Armani, Starbucks, and Rolex. Therefore, luxury brands are able to target not only the individuals but space where they occupy. However, this leads to the marginalization of low-income people who do not share the same privileged preferences.

-David R.