The gentry are coming
A faux Victorian mansion takes shape on a block filled with shotgun shanties and dilapidated apartments.
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Longtime neighbors of limited means watch as a yuppie couple pulls up in a Volvo station wagon to direct the movers.
It's a scene that could be repeated in about half of Atlanta's neighborhoods.
Big-spending new residents bring a lot of benefits to the city. After all, who would be opposed to plummeting crime rates, spruced-up homes, better-funded schools and a wider selection of shops, restaurants and bars?
But gentrification -- the influx of middle-class residents into working-class neighborhoods -- gets tricky when you consider how the city of Atlanta has, or hasn't, kept it in check.
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Critics of the city's laissez-faire approach lament that officials didn't take steps to protect Atlanta's stock of affordable housing when the redevelopment craze cranked up a decade ago.
Instead, starting the mid-1990s, the Atlanta Housing Authority tore down thousands of public housing units and replaced them with mixed-income developments that offered a fraction of the number of homes for the poor. At the same time, developers and home buyers who discovered the benefits of city life pushed up prices in neighborhoods from Kirkwood to Castleberry Hill. And Mayor Shirley Franklin and Atlanta City Council didn't require that a portion of the tidal wave of new development be set aside for subsidized, low-income housing.
"The first thing you do in a situation where affordable housing is under attack is keep what you've got," says Larry Keating, a Georgia Tech professor of city planning who sat on Atlanta's gentrification task force earlier this decade.
The next step is to adopt policies that prevent new construction from serving only one class of society. "There's always going to be pressure from the development interests to service more higher-income people," Keating says.
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Some argue that the influx of mostly white, middle-class residents stands to make Atlanta less diverse. But that's not entirely true.
To people like Ed Gilgor, who heads up the city's Neighborhood Planning Unit that covers one of the fastest gentrifying pockets of Atlanta, the arrival of new residents should be encouraged. That's because newcomers ensure that a wider mix of people will live in a given place.
But shouldn't the influx be staved off once a neighborhood is in danger of being populated predominantly by one class of people at the expense of another?
In a perfect world, every neighborhood would be populated by a cross-section of people of different races, religions and sexual orientation -- and neighbors would find a way to peaceably coexist.
The coexisting part isn't always easy, though. And that's particularly true today as wave after wave of wealthier residents flow into the city.
"The people who move in now have a very different view from the folks who moved in even as recently as two to three years ago," Gilgor says of his East Atlanta neighborhood.
"They have a more suburban mentality," he continues. "They don't understand that they've moved into a community where we all live on top of each other, and, in the words of Rodney King, 'We all have to get along.'"
Comments and questions can be sent to mara.shalhoup@creativeloafing.com or letters.atl@creativeloafing.com.
Read more
This report was prepared by Mara Shalhoup and Michael Wall, with assistance from Ken Edelstein and Sarah Winterfield.
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COMMENTS
RE: The gentry are coming
Posted by Devin Barbee on 08.11.06 @ 12:23 PM
During the 60's, stupid ignorant whites ruined Atlanta with White Flight. Just because middle class (like themselves) blacks moved into their neighborhood. When blacks moved in, we had no choice but to take over. Although Atlanta has progress tremendously under black leadership, Atlanta has also suffered due blight and crime. Most think that gentrification will help whites "retake" Atlanta and the city is trying to prevent this by annexing predominantly black areas in South Fulton County. I for one think that is not a good ideal, the city is not ready to annex anymore areas, Atlanta needs to take care of what it has now, let Fulton fix its problem, annexing South Fulton County will cause more problems. I would like to say to those South Fulton Residents, think about your futures, you claim you have crowded schools, well at least your schools are not poor performing like Atlanta Public Schools, students in the APS school system rank dead last. I honestly believe most of the South Fulton County residents who want to be annexed are not even thinking about their children’s future, only about themselves and claim the name Atlanta, which you could if you live in Conyers. But if annexed, they will see that Atlanta will still give priority to faster growing areas like Downtown, Midtown, and Buckhead, and South Fulton will lag even behind poorer black neighborhoods. Leaving Fulton County will only give rise to the county, not Atlanta. However when it is all said and done, whites in Atlanta still "run" the city because they have more money. If it was not for wealthy white, Atlanta would be nothing! Blacks who live in Atlanta claim that they have Saks, Neiman Marcus, fine dining, the Aquarium, and alot to do here. However few blacks even participate in these fine "Hotlanta" activities. The point that I am trying to make is that Atlanta needs to be diverse. Not mostly black, not mostly white. I hope gentrification will transform the city. Not run the lower class away, but give the city a more upscale look. We need to look at the fact that certain measures taken by gentrification will help this city. I use to live in Memphis where the population is becoming increasingly black. It's not helping the city. Memphis has nothing, property value is 17% below average and crime is taking over the city. I am not going to lie; blacks cause most of the crime done in Fulton and Dekalb County. I know so many blacks that don't live in black areas for that solid fact. Crime is everywhere and it's not going anywhere, but being constantly sympathetic to the lower class and making everything "affordable" for them is not going to help the city, even Shirley Franklin knows that. And to the Black man living in town, I am a black man myself, who wants hip hop bars downtown, where there is constant security and a possible shooting because some asshole step on your shoe. Stop being narrow minded Atlanta.
RE: The gentry are coming
Posted by underradar on 08.04.06 @ 11:01 PM
The points made above deal with the after-effects of property being bought, folks moving in and raising economic indexes. What needs to be explored is the "machine" that coerces people to sell so-called "dilapidated" or "blighted" property, making room for new development. Dirty tricks that are intended to avoid fair pricing under eminent domain. The largest force here is long-term--effectively "churning". Neighborhoods are ruined purposely by power-brokers in collusion with HUD and possibly even facilitating drug distribution--absent land-owners buy at pennies on the dollar and hold long-term until economic development projects push values higher. Drive the 60's middle class out--then bring 'em back in. Wholesale "churning" turnover is bad for areas, regardless of rich move-ins or the opposite (was "flight). Healthy neighborhoods have families with several generations--even several generations of the same family.
RE: The gentry are coming
Posted by intown rocks on 07.29.06 @ 06:27 PM
I get so sick of all this whining about the "poor black folks" getting pushed out. Where I live, they are getting over $200K for their run down shanties and fleeing to a mansion in the burbs. And the burbs are getting more and more "diverse" all the time. We already have had several transplants in my neighborhood from Gwinnett who want to get away from gangs and thugs - so they move to intown. I think it's a hoot. Come on gentry - the water's warm and the real estate is going through the roof!