Where will they go ???

[BrianTH]

Originally Posted by new-era

Here's a novel idea . . .

Not so novel:

Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

If you wanted to try something truly novel, you could start with decriminalizing psychoactive drugs.

[selltheburgh]

Originally Posted by eccotecc

selltheburgh,

I don't think once, in the numerous post I've made to this thread, have I said anything about economic status or race. I have spoken about criminal elements and those with undesirable lifestyles that reduce the quality of life in a neighborhood. The undesirable lifestyles I'm referring to are the petty thieves, drug dealers, and drug users. Then there are of course the gang bangers and their hanger ons.

I wasn't referring to you directly. I just meant the general tone of the thread.

[eccotecc]

Originally Posted by selltheburgh

I wasn't referring to you directly. I just meant the general tone of the thread.

selltheburgh,

I'm going to let you in on a little secret. I was once poor, but when I saw how well those rich folk lived, I decided to change my lifestyle.

[eschaton]

Originally Posted by Joe Magarac

This is a very odd thread. I think it's because the OP didn't use plain language to say what he means. His/her question appears to be: if East Liberty gentrifies, as it looks like it's going to, what will happen to the poor black people who are living there now?

Agreed. That said, there are poor white populations being displaced in many areas of the city as well. One could point to the choking out of the last of the locals in Oakland, for example, or more recently Southside flats and Lawrenceville.

Originally Posted by Joe Magarac

When the East Liberty projects were demolished, most of the people who lived in them moved either to Homewood or to Upper Lawrenceville. Homewood didn't change much as a result, but Upper Lawrenceville has changed from being fairly yinzery to being, well, fairly Homewood-y. My guess is that this change will continue. It's possible that Lower and Middle Lawrenceville will gentrify, at which point there will be pressure on Upper Lawrenceville to follow suit, and then the OP can ask what will happen to the poor black people of Upper Lawrenceville. But that's a long way off.

It's "possible Lower and Central Lawrenceville will gentrify?" Dude, they have. rents are like double what they were five years ago. All the Section 8 is leaving the neighborhood, and even the most busted-out alley houses are rented by 20somethings now. I give it five years until no "locals" live here besides those who owned their houses.

Upper Lawrenceville is a more interesting case. The locals in Lawrenceville are really, really racist at times, and I've wondered if the influx of black people into Upper Lawrenceville would trigger the old timers to move on, causing a racial inversion. But even the siding-clad alley houses are becoming student rentals now. Provided crime stays relatively low up there, I see the black population having fallen by quite a bit by the end of the decade.

FWIW, I think Stanton Heights is the only part of the East End which could go downhill. It's stable now, but it's not the sort of neighborhood that gentrifiers like, as it's very suburban with ugly postwar housing stock. The southern third of it is overwhelmingly black, but safe and socially stable. Still, I could see, particularly if Garfield gets redeveloped, troublemakers getting pushed up into that area.

[eschaton]

I'll fill in a bit more generally the trends I see in the longer term.

East:

I foresee very little chance for new neighborhoods to decline, due to the level of development throughout the East End. East Liberty is the only black neighborhood which is seeing substantial gentrification. Garfield is not gentrifying so much as Penn Avenue is being annexed by Friendship. The first signs of turning around Larimer, Homewood, East Hills, and Lincoln-Lemington-Belmar is probably 10 if not 20 years away (and the latter two will probably decline more before they make a comeback). In addition, mixed-income redevelopment is constantly happening in the Hill District, which means the population there will likely decline far slower than other bad neighborhoods in the coming decades.

As I said, I think Stanton Heights is the only logical place that can go downhill (due to undesirable 1950s housing stock, and comparative isolation). The bulk of the displaced in the East I think will continue to flow into Penn Hills (which has a lot more nice neighborhoods to burn through yet), with minor spillover into Verona and parts of the Woodland Hills School District:

North:

I think ultimately the entire residential portion of the lower Northside west of 579 will be gentrified. This means a lot of people (black and white) are going to be displaced yet from the outer portions of Central Northside, Manchester, and West Deutschtown. I think even the "Brighton Place" section of California-Kirkbride will turn around eventually. In addition, Perry South continues to go downhill, meaning not only won't it be able to absorb the population, but it will probably continue to lose people at a rapid clip.

What will absorb the population? Marshall-Shadeland is in a rapid transition to ghetto. Look on real estate sites like Trulia - a ridiculous number of houses are available at rock-bottom prices, because the homeowners are desperate to get out, and slumlords don't control the market like the true ghetto neighborhoods yet. In addition, I still believe there will be slight declines in portions of Brighton Heights and Perry North as the craziness from Marshall Shadeland and Perry South bleeds over.

Neighborhoods I'm not sure about either way are Fineview, East Deutschtown, Troy Hill, Spring Hill/City View, Spring Garden, and Summer Hill. I could see these areas going several different ways, depending upon if gentrification successfully jumps the highway, and if the city decides to close Northview Heights eventually.

South:

Right now, the southern hilltop neighborhoods are widely thought of in rapid decline, due to both the closure of the projects in Saint Clair and Arlington Heights, as well as the rapid abandonment of Beltzhoover. This is probably the largest geographic area of decline in the city, and includes Arlington, Allentown, Knoxville, and Mount Oliver. It also includes portions of Mount Washington, and nearby but technically not south hilltop Carrick is in the same bind.

That said, I don't know if this will go on unabated. The displaced population from the projects in total was only around 2,000, and the troublemakers probably number a few hundred. For things to continue to decline at such a rapid pace, you'd need to see those displaced from places like East Liberty deciding to move across the city rather than a neighborhood or two down. If this happened, I'd expect Bon Air to be the next shoe to drop.

West:

The "greater West End" is seeing essentially the same dynamic that the southern portions of the city have seen, but on a smaller scale befitting its smaller population. The project closed in this case was Broadhead Manor in Fairywood. Most of the project residents moved to Sheraden, which is pretty evidently now in a quick decline.

As with the South, however, the total number of troublemakers here is rather small. If Pittsburgh had a major realignment, I could see a lot of the West End declining rapidly (Elliot, Crafton Heights, Esplen, West End Village, etc), but barring this, I think that Sheraden will just take over for Fairywood as being the notoriously "bad" neighborhood.