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white flight is to blame for the mess we have today in terms of running to develop farmland only for them to run back as they abandoned the oasis they thought they left
With the city....we'll know if they're serious if they develop 5th ward all the way or do something with Sunnyside and 3rd ward as a whole...if not, consider 610 West the next urban jungle
Race should have nothing to do with poverty given the amount of opportunity available if you work hard, unless you're in some backwoods town, which Houston is definitely not.
Many hardworking families with kids today cannot afford to live in Houston's urban core primarily because private school is prohibitively expensive. The middle class and even part of the upper middle class cannot afford $30k per year per kid. That is worse than college b/c it lasts 14 years and you don't have time to save for it. That is not to mention how stressful it is to get in to these private schools.
THIS and a single family house in the urban core sized for a family with 2-3 kids would cost at the very least twice and likely much more than what it would cost in Houston's nicest suburbs (Memorial does not count - I mean Woodlands or Sugar Land)
Why do people think you can't get a good public education inside the city? It's a 100% possible if you push your kids to do well with the magnet program.
White flight and the suburbs are the direct result of school desegregation plus the need for ever increasing population to have a place to live.
We can't all live in the inner city in a mile high building.
As school desegregation led to equal opportunity in the work place, income became the new way to segregate. Nobody cares anymore what race or religion a person is. They don't want their kids in school with the "underclass".
Time and economics bring people into the city. The gasoline shortage and crowded freeways of Houston brought people back into the city limits of Houston. There was still a problem with HISD. They created magnet schools.
If the population of Texas and Houston doubles in the next 30 years, where will those newcomers live?
When DH was a long range planner for a fortune 100 company, he tried to get them to build schools next to office buildings. Kids could commute with their parents, hence more time together. Parents would be just a few steps away from school plays and meetings. Everybody thought he was nuts.
That may have been the case in the 70's, 80's and 90's, but I don't believe it's the case anymore in regards to professional white neighborhoods.
Today you see "white flight" from what were professional neighborhoods when you have people of different economic and behavioral factors move in. Generally speaking, if you have a black family move into a traditionally white professional neighborhood, and the father is lawyer or business owner and you see the kids at the bus stop or playing catch in the front yard, no issue. If you have a a white family that is barely able to afford the mortgage (or they are renting), a non-running car gets parked in front of the house collecting leaves and dirt and the kids are throwing their beer bottles out the window a block before pulling into the driveway, problem. What is currently happening is that you are having families from different economic backgrounds with different social habits that aren't considered the norm moving into these neighborhoods, and it turns out that a lot of the time it's people of a different race or ethnicity. However, the "problems" are found with the lawn not being cut, the loud bass blaring from the kids car pulling in at night, the junk accumulating by the front door and untreated ant mounts collecting along the fence line, not the color of the skin are any traditional clothing.
You can go to a restaurant and receive crappy service from a waiter who is a different race than yourself, but he is a crappy waiter for everyone; however, some people will see that waiter as crappy while others will assume the crappy service is due to your difference in race and the waiter giving the crappy service due to racial reasons.
To an extent, I would agree with you that that particular behavior [in my previous post] may have been a primary characteristic of an era (70's-2000's). Today, however, there is also the factor of "ratio" to consider. What I mean by that is: if a white family feels it is being "closed in" [outnumbered] by several other families of different cultures moving in to the neighborhood [once predominantly white], they will eventually move out, irrespective of professional achievement or economic status. Put rambunctious behavior aside, as alluded to in your post. This type of white flight happens today. It is a psychological yearning for belonging and maintaining a certain caste association, which can clearly be interpreted as intolerance to other cultures and races.
It is so evident today; even in London. While over there, I frequently go to East London because of the 2012 Olympic Park, Westfield Mall, Night life, feel of the city, etc. While I worked in the UK as a US expat, I talked to a colleague [white guy] of mine back in the office [2 hrs out of London] and I told him about East London and how I have a great time on the weekends. His reaction was like I was talking of a plague or something similar, and he said, "No thanks, I never go into East London". And truly, in East London, a native-white would be a minority on the street. So this is an example of white flight, due to ratio displacement, motivated by cultural/ethnic intolerance. As I mentioned earlier on, East London today "belongs" to everybody, but the native-white Londoner...but it once "belonged" to them.
White flight and the suburbs are the direct result of school desegregation plus the need for ever increasing population to have a place to live.
We can't all live in the inner city in a mile high building.
As school desegregation led to equal opportunity in the work place, income became the new way to segregate. Nobody cares anymore what race or religion a person is. They don't want their kids in school with the "underclass".
Time and economics bring people into the city. The gasoline shortage and crowded freeways of Houston brought people back into the city limits of Houston. There was still a problem with HISD. They created magnet schools.
If the population of Texas and Houston doubles in the next 30 years, where will those newcomers live?
When DH was a long range planner for a fortune 100 company, he tried to get them to build schools next to office buildings. Kids could commute with their parents, hence more time together. Parents would be just a few steps away from school plays and meetings. Everybody thought he was nuts.
That, actually, makes a lot of sense. The only negative is that the kid's schools would change if there was a job change (and it wasn't in the same area).
To an extent, I would agree with you that that particular behavior [in my previous post] may have been a primary characteristic of an era (70's-2000's). Today, however, there is also the factor of "ratio" to consider. What I mean by that is: if a white family feels it is being "closed in" [outnumbered] by several other families of different cultures moving in to the neighborhood [once predominantly white], they will eventually move out, irrespective of professional achievement or economic status. Put rambunctious behavior aside, as alluded to in your post. This type of white flight happens today. It is a psychological yearning for belonging and maintaining a certain caste association, which can clearly be interpreted as intolerance to other cultures and races.
It is so evident today; even in London. While over there, I frequently go to East London because of the 2012 Olympic Park, Westfield Mall, Night life, feel of the city, etc. While I worked in the UK as a US expat, I talked to a colleague [white guy] of mine back in the office [2 hrs out of London] and I told him about East London and how I have a great time on the weekends. His reaction was like I was talking of a plague or something similar, and he said, "No thanks, I never go into East London". And truly, in East London, a native-white would be a minority on the street. So this is an example of white flight, due to ratio displacement, motivated by cultural/ethnic intolerance. As I mentioned earlier on, East London today "belongs" to everybody, but the native-white Londoner...but it once "belonged" to them.
I gotta disagree with you partner. It's way more complicated to move then you think. It's absurdly expensive to flip your home and buy a new one, can cost in the 10's of thousands on costs alone. Not to mention uprooting your kids from their schools and their friends. Sorry man, I know minorities feel this way and I get that. I really do. By it is a psychosis in your head. I'm not denying racism doesn't exist. I'm also not denying that people would probably "prefer" to live among their own in a perfect world. But the reality doesn't back that up. It's just too expensive and risky to move simply because a few black people moved into your area. The idea is actually absurd when one spends a minute or two and thinks about it.
What can happen is something in a way that's related. Out of "greed" if someone owns a house let's say that is valued at 500k. And let's say a "lot" of black people move into the area and they "believe" that property values will drop because of it, they might sell their home now before their property values drop and move into an area where property values are going up. BTW, you do not need to be racist to follow this logic. It's game theory. If you think "others" will follow this logic, then you will want to sell before they do. So you can be a card carrying ACLU member with a Rachel Maddow sticker on your bumper but if you are motivated by greed, you will sell your house and move if you feel the value might drop with the complexion of the neighborhood.
where did the idea come from that you need a 3000 sq ft house if you have kids? its often brought up as a reason families move to the suburbs, like they are being physically squished in a 2000 sq ft house in the city. its a silly idea and makes you look silly
where i live there were families with multiple sets of kids living in these houses and it was an "it" and popular place to live in the 60s and 70s. i see several families with older kids here still. with people moving into the cities i see the "big is always better" mentality going away. itll be harder to sell 2 story homes than single story.
where did the idea come from that you need a 3000 sq ft house if you have kids? its often brought up as a reason families move to the suburbs, like they are being physically squished in a 2000 sq ft house in the city. its a silly idea and makes you look silly
where i live there were families with multiple sets of kids living in these houses and it was an "it" and popular place to live. i see several families with older kids here still.
I agree...but. What if the issue is they can buy that 3k square foot home for 50% less in the burbs then the 2k square foot home in Bellaire. Also, another factor you are ignoring is my post from earlier about greed. Ask our resident realtors on this board which homes appreciate faster, small homes or large homes. I had a buddy in his 20's that moved out of the city and into the burbs and bought this behomouth of a house. Lived by himself. I asked him why would he ever do that. His answer was it will sell faster and appreciate faster. And sure enough, his home went up 30% in two years, flipped it and moved. The smaller homes around him didn't even uptick. You guys are constantly making the mistake of analyzing things from the standpoint of a single variable. Life is 100 times more complicated then that.
Thus, while it is clearly not right to say race is the only motivation for what is called "white flight," it is also not right to say that race is not a motivation. Race, to some extent, indicates social status in America, even in 2013. Houston is a place where there is a plethora of cultural and ethnic diversity, yet sadly the wealthiest areas in the city are almost without exception the whitest. Memorial? white; River Oaks? white; The Heights? getting whiter by the day; Bellaire? also predominantly white.
True, but is changing from white/black to rich/poor
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