Capping The Cross-Bronx: Infrastructure Bill To Be Used To Undo Robert Moses-Era Environmental Racism

[OyCrumbler]

Originally Posted by scatman

Id point out the Treme section of New Orleans (I-10), East side of Milwaukee (Park East Freeway) and Southside of Syracuse, New York (Route 81) as examples of Black neighborhoods destroyed by freeways. But this is a New York thread.....!

And back to New York, the fact of highways being built to take middle class, mostly white, residents, to Long Island, Westchester and New Jersey, leaving mostly Black and Latino residents, who were redlined and were denied homes in the suburbs, in the crumbling cities.....!

So, yes, it's race as well as poverty!

Right, a lot of times the neighborhoods destroyed were black neighborhoods as that often correlated with poor neighborhoods. I think with the Cross Bronx though, a lot of these neighborhoods when the expressway was built through it were often working class or poor ethnic whites at the time (though there are mostly no longer so). They certainly weren't rich neighborhoods, but it's inaccurate in terms of historic context to say that all of them had to do with broader issues of race though at the time there wasn't necessarily broad mainstream cultural acceptance of a lot of ethnic whites especially if they weren't pretty fully assimilated and were of ethnic groups that were a bit, uh, swarthier or had come into the country more recently.

[Robert.Dinero]

Originally Posted by scatman

While not a highway, the ghosts of San Juan Hill have a "way-before Lincoln Center story" to tell......!

Poor? Absolutely not, The West Bronx was first built because the rich didn't want to live in the City anymore, The Bronx was built for luxury and you can tell by looking at most buildings on the Grand Concourse, and even Effed up neighborhoods like Highbridge (one of the most effed up co-ops that is now no better than NYCHA buildings still has its fountain in the middle and used to have ducks swimming way back in the days). It was mostly rich Jews, and Irish and Italians who made it out of the City.
The more working-class Italians lived in Belmont.