1. Learning Places The City: 50 Years of Transformation
NYCCT/Summer 2017/Phillip
Adapted from multiple sources

2. Learning Outcomes Impact of Urban Renewal
Social and economic forces that shaped NYC in the last 50 years
Social and economic impact of loss of manufacturing
Impact of containerization
New spatial organization and economic strategies for NY and other cities
Key words: urban renewal, suburbanization, red lining, slum, ghetto, containerization, gentrification

3. US Cities 1960s Older industrial US cities “blighted”
Clearance projects
Urban Renewal -- Late 1940s-1970s, government effort to revitalize aging and decaying inner cities… including massive demolition, slum clearance, and rehabilitation
Robert Moses and the Cross Bronx Cross Bronx Expressway
Brooklyn Heights

4. Impact of Urban Renewal (“Negro Removal”) 1950-60s
Revitalization of urban areas to provide for a greater range of housing, employment, and social activities
Low rise buildings replaced by public housing and other development
Federal Housing Admin. policies supported loans for suburban development, e.g., Levittown, that barred blacks and encouraged red lining
With suburbanization and white flight, public housing became all black
“Slum clearance” residents and destabilized the neighborhood

5. Cities 1960s Cities Crime, riots, social unrest
Buzz words: inner city, ghetto, welfare, underclass
Positive images of cities erased

6. Definitions
Ghetto – a part of a city in which members of a particular group or race live usually in poor conditions
Slum – a densely populated usually urban area marked by crowding, dirty run-down housing, poverty, and social disorganization
Red lining denying mortgages (and financial and economic services) to neighborhoods that contained certain races, religions, and ethnic groups–eventually extended into all financial and economic services

7. Familiar?

8. Social and Economic Forces that shaped New York from 1960s-present
Suburbanization
White flight
The automobile
Loss of manufacturing jobs s
Reduced industrial production
Historic preservation
Levittown Promotional
Levittown: The Origins of Suburbia
The Tragedy of Urban Renewal

9. 1970s Loss of Manufacturing in NY and the Northeast
Major Ports in NY and other cities in decline
High labor costs in NY and Northeast
Migration of businesses to the South
Cheaper production, labor and shipping abroad
Containerization

10. The Shipping Container and Economic Change
How containerization shaped the modern world
“Revolutionized the flow of goods”
Increased international trade volume
Reliable, secure
Lowered the cost of shipping
Lower transport cost = lower cost and variety for consumers
(Postel 2006; Levinson, 2006)

11. Before Containerization (50 years ago)
Distribution by many modes: ship, truck, train
Workers moved goods from mode to mode -- expensive (land to ship at departure port, then to truck or train on arrival at end point)
Dockworkers On the Waterfront
Organized crime
Theft, little security
Different prices regulations for various goods
(Postel 2006; Levinson, 2006)
Source: Levinson; Postrel

12. Containerization in New York City
Maritime economy declined (Dumbo, Gowanus, Greenpoint, Red Hook, Williamsburg )
Dockworkers, managers, insurers and other businesses that supported maritime economies left NYC

13. Containerization=Globalization
The rapid movement of people, information, and capital
The stretching of social, political and economic activities across frontiers, regions and continents.

14. Regeneration Response to bulldozer urban renewal of the 1960s
Urban social movements formed to stop neighbor hood destruction and preserve historic neighborhoods
The social movement resulted in the formation of Historic Districts (e.g., Brooklyn Heights; SoHo)
The social movements were not successful in preserving the industries and communities in the new Historic Districts
(Judd, Fainsteins, 1999)
Robert Moses v Jane Jacobs
NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission

15. Old Waterfront

16. Spatial Re-organization of Cities
Old Waterfront
Warehouses
Industrial centers
Navy yards
Commercial boats
Working class
New Waterfront
Centers for artists
Luxury hotels
High-end residences, gentrification
Cruise ships
Retail and entertainment facilities
Magnets of tourism

17. South Street Seaport, NY

18. Baltimore Harbor

19. Brooklyn Bridge Park

20. Commodification of old structures
Adaptive reuse of old structures - new uses for industrial and other old buildings Chelsea Market, former biscuit factory; the Highline
Pier A
Chelsea Piers
Chelsea market

21. Economic Strategies for Cities
Cities now spaces of service consumption
Services, like hospitality and tourism, not traditional industries, are impetus of growth
Cities transformed
New image of cities as places of leisure
Cities marketed and sold
Cities gentrified

22. Standardization Standardized services Formulaic hotels and restaurants
Boutiques
Historic structures into malls
“Bohemian” environment
Similar spatial arrangements
Leisure is “commodified”
Gentrification – Socio-cultural changes in an area resulting from wealthier people buying housing property in a less prosperous community; wealthy displacing the poor

23. Sameness and Diversity
Cities are more alike
Cities have nuances that make them different
Cities must retain their “sense of place” – history, diversity, neighborhoods, cultural traditions, arts, cuisine and attractions and events
How?

24. BQE

25. Resources Judd, D. R. & Fainstein, S.S. The tourist city. New Haven,
Burns, R. (1999). New York, a documentary film. [Alexandria, Va.]: PBS Video.
Evans, H. (2012). Harold Evans: How containerization shaped the modern world. Retrieved from
Judd, D. R. & Fainstein, S.S. The tourist city. New Haven,
Connecticut: Yale University Press, 1999.
Levinson, M. (2006) The box: how the shipping container made the world smaller and the world economy
bigger. Princeton, NJ. Princeton University Press
Postel, V. (2006, March 23). The container that changed the world. [Review of the book The box: how the
shipping container made the world smaller and the world economy bigger, by M. Levinson.
New York Times. Retrieved from
ReasonTV  (2011) The tragedy of urban renewal: The destruction and survival ...
Retrieved from

26. Additional Resources Levitttown: A case study of racial inequality
Sheridan Boulevard
Levitttown: A case study of racial inequality
Mollen on Moses Cadman Plaza