Harlem changes.. Detroit parallel?

[iheartthed]

Iheartthed, I know that you like disagreeing with me for the sake of it, but please provide evidence regarding effective gentrification efforts in NYC beginning in the late 1980's. Further, please provide evidence that any widespread gentrification occurred in Harlem and other once high-crime neighborhoods. While there was some revitalization in the 1980s, as well as some temporary reductions in crime, there was not widespread gentrification until the mid to late 90's, several years after the dramatic drops in crime had begun.

New York City's murder count peaked at 2245 in 1990, but was in the 1800-ish range for the few years preceding that. 1800 was still an incredibly high number, considering that the city at the time had about 1 million fewer people than it does now.

I'm disagreeing with you because you are wrong.

Gentrification: The Case of Clinton Hill

Published: February 8, 1987

THERE is always human and political turmoil when a city neighborhood is being retrieved from abandonment and decay and, in this regard, the Clinton Hill section of downtown Brooklyn is no exception. But unlike other minority neighborhoods that have been overrun by middle-income whites in search of affordable housing, Clinton Hill has been propelled into gentrification by an integrated mix of middle-income New Yorkers.

http://www.nytimes.com/1987/02/08/re...l?pagewanted=1

[EastsideAl]

Also, although there was significant abandonment of buildings during the 70s and into the early '80s, there was never anything like what you see in Detroit.

While there was never the level of abandonment that exists in areas of Detroit, Harlem experienced quite significant abandonment in the 1970s and 1980s.

I'm not sure why you repeated what I said. But, yes, I have seen Vergara's pictures and they are indeed haunting [[as are his shots of Detroit).

Harlem indeed did not start whitening out significantly [[I hesitate to use the word "gentrify" here, because there were always middle class and even well-to-do African-American areas in Harlem) until the last decade or so. While I'm sure that the citywide and nationwide drop in crime had something to do with it, that was far from the primary driver, which was the extremely high cost and unavailability of comparable housing elsewhere within easy traveling distance of Manhattan's business centers.

The "gentrification" of other areas in the city though, such as the northern part of the Upper West Side, Hell's Kitchen, the extension of the East Village into what had been the Lower East Side, had already been underway for decades by then, and for the most part were already complete. As were [[as indicated by iheartthed above) large portions of what's now called collectively "brownstone Brooklyn" [[i.e. Ft. Greene, Clinton Hill, Prospect Heights, etc.). Most of Park Slope was already long gentrified by then. The big driver in Brooklyn was definitely available desirable housing at a reasonable price.

I moved into Williamsburg for the first time in 1988. The area had suffered badly and several buildings had been abandoned in the area between the subway and the bridge. Crime was definitely a problem there, and would remain so into the late '90s, and most of the area was built over with pretty dreary old tenement buildings and industry, but the area was consistently whitening out and gentrifying because there were large spaces and apartments available for a fraction of the cost of Manhattan and within easy commuting distance via the subway.

[ziggyselbin]

He said that most major cities experienced significant reductions in crime. Yes, Detroit too.



http://www.nytimes.com/1997/10/27/us...pagewanted=all

Ignorance is not sexy.

For every thing you cite I can cite ten that refute it. The fact is and overwhelmingly so that when Mayor Guliani and William Bratton instituted the broken windows theory of crime fighting that is when crime was significantly in NY. I have read all the other stuff so don't bother on this you are wrong.

[ziggyselbin]

Iheartthed, I know that you like disagreeing with me for the sake of it, but please provide evidence regarding effective gentrification efforts in NYC beginning in the late 1980's. Further, please provide evidence that any widespread gentrification occurred in Harlem and other once high-crime neighborhoods. While there was some revitalization in the 1980s, as well as some temporary reductions in crime, there was not widespread gentrification until the mid to late 90's, several years after the dramatic drops in crime had begun.

New York City's murder count peaked at 2245 in 1990, but was in the 1800-ish range for the few years preceding that. 1800 was still an incredibly high number, considering that the city at the time had about 1 million fewer people than it does now.

Do you notice that iheart is never wrong? Never have I read iheart respond with .."good point" or .."I didn't think of that" or.. "maybe I'm wrong"... this is from a twenty something know it all who has an image of Detroit akin to some fading decaying woman from a Tennessee Williams play.

There is no use arguing with iheart as she is always right.

[iheartthed]

For every thing you cite I can cite ten that refute it. The fact is and overwhelmingly so that when Mayor Guliani and William Bratton instituted the broken windows theory of crime fighting that is when crime was significantly in NY. I have read all the other stuff so don't bother on this you are wrong.

Heh...

There is no use arguing with iheart as she he is always right.

Apparently. I was absolutely right about one thing...

Ya know, I have a feeling that no matter what I offer, you will continue to believe the fallacy that NYC neighborhoods did not gentrify until after the city's crime rate began to fall. That isn't the case, but whatever. Believe what you want to believe.

[EastsideAl]

While Bill Bratton's changes to the NYPD's policing methods may certainly have had an effect on lowering crime in NYC, there really is no question that crime rates declined significantly nationwide throughout the 90s and into the 2000s.

This includes Detroit, which saw index crimes falling up to 2006, including a big 25+% drop from 1998 to 2002. And the number of murders in the city declined from 615 in 1991 [[and a horrifying high of 714 in 1974) down into the 350s by 2005. Which is not to say that Detroit is safer than NYC, or that the crime rate isn't still far too high in the city, but it is definitely lower than it has been in the past, and absolutely declined from the early '90s to the mid '00s - as it did in almost every large city in the country.

[cman710]

I'm disagreeing with you because you are wrong.
http://www.nytimes.com/1987/02/08/realestate/gentrification-the-case-of-clinton-hill.html?pagewanted=1

That was an interesting article. However, I am confused you would cite this article to support your perspective, because it presents a mixed picture regarding gentrification and its relationship to crime, one that does not really support your perspective.

First, the article implies that gentrification occurred after Clinton Hill received a historical designation, making many of the structures eligible for tax credits. This raises the importance of government action in spurring gentrification - not people moving on their own or reductions in crime.

Second, the article notes the importance of the presence of anchor institutions in the neighborhood, and that fact that the neighborhood had always remained fairly stable. [["Much of the neighborhood's stability is credited to the institutional presence of the Brooklyn Academy of Music in Fort Greene and St. Joseph's College and, most importantly, Pratt Institute in Clinton Hill. Pratt, located near the neighborhood's center, is a college for 4,000 students of engineering, architecture, design and fine arts.") This raises the question of whether crime in Clinton Hill was always better than other surrounding areas. If crime had never been awful in the neighborhood, or was relatively better than surrounding areas, then that may have spurred the interest in Clinton Hill in the first place, as people looked for cheaper places to live outside Manhattan.

Third, in the period prior to 1987, crime had been mostly going down in New York City. While there had been 1826 murders in 1981, there were 1668, 1662, 1450, and then in 1986 an uptick, to 1582. So the period in which there was revitalization in Clinton Hill actually followed [[and was accompanied by) a period of reduced crime.

While these factors do not disprove your argument, they certainly do not support it.

[ziggyselbin]

While Bill Bratton's changes to the NYPD's policing methods may certainly have had an effect on lowering crime in NYC, there really is no question that crime rates declined significantly nationwide throughout the 90s and into the 2000s.

This includes Detroit, which saw index crimes falling up to 2006, including a big 25+% drop from 1998 to 2002. And the number of murders in the city declined from 615 in 1991 [[and a horrifying high of 714 in 1974) down into the 350s by 2005. Which is not to say that Detroit is safer than NYC, or that the crime rate isn't still far too high in the city, but it is definitely lower than it has been in the past, and absolutely declined from the early '90s to the mid '00s - as it did in almost every large city in the country.

My uneducated guess would be the reason crime may have gone down in detroit is the dwindling population. I say may have because what the heck good did it do? There was no significant revitalization in any neighborhoods, people continue[[still)to leave in droves, practitcally no retail that isn't third rate......the list goes on _ what tangible good did this crime reduction produce?

[iheartthed]

While these factors do not disprove your argument, they certainly do not support it.

It supports my statement that NYC was gentrifying long before the steep crime rate drops that occurred in the mid to late 1990s. And thus it wasn't the crime rate drops that were primary catalyst for the urban reinvestment.

[EastsideAl]

My uneducated guess would be the reason crime may have gone down in detroit is the dwindling population. I say may have because what the heck good did it do? There was no significant revitalization in any neighborhoods, people continue[[still)to leave in droves, practitcally no retail that isn't third rate......the list goes on _ what tangible good did this crime reduction produce?

I'm sure the declining population had something to do with the reduction in raw numbers of crimes. But the crime rate [[number of crimes per 100,000 people) also went down in pretty much all major categories during this period. So there was a real decline in crime in Detroit. Crime today is still at lower levels than it was in the late 80s and early 90s, or in the mid 70s.

And I would argue with your no significant revitalization claim too. Real estate prices rose quickly during much of this period. There was a burst of new construction in the city for the first time in over 40 years, and several new neighborhoods were created. Older neighborhoods like Corktown and Woodbridge saw houses bought and renovated. The Midtown area grew to prominence [[helpfully renamed), and more people were living downtown than had been there in quite a number of years. Lots of new shopping areas were built [[alas, mostly ugly strip malls), including many new grocery and drug stores. Lots of new businesses opened. Even population loss slowed for awhile. The city was far from great, but things sure seemed to be moving in the right direction finally.

The problem is that in the last several years of misery a lot of gains have been just as quickly lost. Population loss has increased greatly. Crime has started rising again. Unemployment is at epic highs. And the overheated real estate market of the previous decade left huge numbers of homeowners underwater or in foreclosure with no hope at all of recouping what once seemed a good investment. This has ruined and devastated neighborhoods.

All of which shows at least one thing, it's almost impossible to revitalize anyplace or have any "gentrification" if you don't have a functioning economy. There's nothing to attract people to Detroit and little to attract anyone to the entire metropolitan area here, and so nothing to cause any population pressure or rise in values that would create the conditions for gentrification, as long as there are few decent jobs and an economy that is quickly contracting.