IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/urbstu/v58y2021i2p405-424.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Mapping gentrification and displacement pressure: An exploration of four distinct methodologies

Author

Listed:
  • Benjamin Preis

    (Department of Urban Studies and Planning, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA)

  • Aarthi Janakiraman

    (Department of Urban Studies and Planning, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA)

  • Alex Bob

    (Department of Urban Studies and Planning, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA)

  • Justin Steil

    (Department of Urban Studies and Planning, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA)

Abstract

As housing costs continue to increase across many cities in North America and Europe, local governments face pressure to understand how housing’s rising cost is changing neighbourhoods and to ensure that everyone can access a home they can afford. To confront displacement concerns, cities are adapting models developed within academia to identify neighbourhoods that may be susceptible to gentrification and displacement. We compare four gentrification and displacement risk models developed by and for the US cities of Seattle, Washington; Los Angeles, California; Portland, Oregon; and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and apply all four methodologies to one city, Boston. We identify the geographic areas of agreement and disagreement among the methods. The comparison reveals striking differences between the models, both in inputs and outputs. Of the 18 variables considered among the four models, only two variables appear in all four models. In the resulting maps, the four methods identified between 25 and 119 of the 180 Boston census tracts as at risk of gentrification and displacement, or as currently gentrifying. There are only seven tracts that all four models agreed were either gentrifying or at risk of gentrification and displacement. The findings indicate a need for cities to consider critically the assumptions of the models that are included in urban policy documents, as indicators and thresholds have major impacts on how neighbourhoods in the liminal space of gentrification and displacement are characterised. This novel comparison of United States local government analyses of gentrification provides insight as modelling moves from theory to practice.

Suggested Citation

  • Benjamin Preis & Aarthi Janakiraman & Alex Bob & Justin Steil, 2021. "Mapping gentrification and displacement pressure: An exploration of four distinct methodologies," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 58(2), pages 405-424, February.
  • Handle: RePEc:sae:urbstu:v:58:y:2021:i:2:p:405-424
    DOI: 10.1177/0042098020903011
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0042098020903011
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/0042098020903011?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ernesto Lopez‐Morales, 2011. "Gentrification by Ground Rent Dispossession: The Shadows Cast by Large‐Scale Urban Renewal in Santiago de Chile," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 35(2), pages 330-357, March.
    2. McKinnish, Terra & Walsh, Randall & Kirk White, T., 2010. "Who gentrifies low-income neighborhoods?," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 67(2), pages 180-193, March.
    3. Tom Slater, 2006. "The Eviction of Critical Perspectives from Gentrification Research," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(4), pages 737-757, December.
    4. Tom Slater, 2009. "Missing Marcuse: On gentrification and displacement," City, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 13(2-3), pages 292-311, June.
    5. Ding, Lei & Hwang, Jackelyn & Divringi, Eileen, 2016. "Gentrification and residential mobility in Philadelphia," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 38-51.
    6. Chase Billingham & Barry Bluestone & Stephanie Pollack, 2010. "Maintaining diversity in America's transit-rich neighborhoods: tools for equitable neighborhood change," New England Community Developments, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, pages 1-6.
    7. Lena Edlund & Cecilia Machado & Maria Micaela Sviatschi, 2015. "Gentrification and the Rising Returns to Skill," NBER Working Papers 21729, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    8. Ellen, Ingrid Gould & O'Regan, Katherine M., 2011. "How low income neighborhoods change: Entry, exit, and enhancement," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(2), pages 89-97, March.
    9. George Galster & Stephen Peacock, 1986. "Urban gentrification: Evaluating alternative indicators," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 18(3), pages 321-337, August.
    10. Neil Smith & James DeFilippis, 1999. "The Reassertion of Economics: 1990s Gentrification in the Lower East Side," International Journal of Urban and Regional Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 23(4), pages 638-653, December.
    11. Edlund, Lena & Machado, Cecilia & Sviatschi, Maria, 2015. "Bright Minds, Big Rent: Gentrification and the Rising Returns to Skill," IZA Discussion Papers 9502, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    12. Raphael W. Bostic & Richard W. Martin, 2003. "Black Home-owners as a Gentrifying Force? Neighbourhood Dynamics in the Context of Minority Home-ownership," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 40(12), pages 2427-2449, November.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Jan Voltaire Vergara & Maria Y Rodriguez & Jonathan Phillips & Ehren Dohler & Melissa L Villodas & Amy Blank Wilson & Kenneth Joseph, 2024. "An evaluation framework for predictive models of neighbourhood change with applications to predicting residential sales in Buffalo, NY," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 61(5), pages 838-858, April.
    2. Claudia Maria López & R. Varisa Patraporn & Kelliana Lim & Kylee Khan, 2022. "Walking to Build a Critical Community-Engaged Project: Collaborative Observations of Neighborhood Change in Long Beach, California," Social Sciences, MDPI, vol. 11(5), pages 1-18, April.
    3. Seung-Chul Noh & Jung-Ho Park, 2021. "Café and Restaurant under My Home: Predicting Urban Commercialization through Machine Learning," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(10), pages 1-22, May.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Dragan, Kacie & Ellen, Ingrid Gould & Glied, Sherry, 2020. "Does gentrification displace poor children and their families? New evidence from medicaid data in New York City," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 83(C).
    2. Kristian Behrens & Brahim Boualam & Julien Martin & Florian Mayneris, 2024. "Gentrification and Pioneer Businesses," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 106(1), pages 119-132, January.
    3. Seth A. Williams & John R. Hipp, 2022. "The shape of neighborhoods to come: Examining patterns of gentrification and holistic neighborhood change in Los Angeles County, 1980–2010," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 54(2), pages 265-294, March.
    4. Seung Kyum Kim & Longfeng Wu, 2022. "Do the characteristics of new green space contribute to gentrification?," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 59(2), pages 360-380, February.
    5. Sue Easton & Loretta Lees & Phil Hubbard & Nicholas Tate, 2020. "Measuring and mapping displacement: The problem of quantification in the battle against gentrification," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 57(2), pages 286-306, February.
    6. Meltzer, Rachel & Ghorbani, Pooya, 2017. "Does gentrification increase employment opportunities in low-income neighborhoods?," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 52-73.
    7. Elizabeth Delmelle & Isabelle Nilsson, 2020. "New rail transit stations and the out-migration of low-income residents," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 57(1), pages 134-151, January.
    8. Jeffrey Lin, 2017. "Understanding Gentrification’s Causes," Economic Insights, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, vol. 2(3), pages 9-17, July.
    9. Zawadi Rucks-Ahidiana, 2021. "Racial composition and trajectories of gentrification in the United States," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 58(13), pages 2721-2741, October.
    10. Atuesta, Laura H. & Hewings, Geoffrey J.D., 2019. "Housing appreciation patterns in low-income neighborhoods: Exploring gentrification in Chicago," Journal of Housing Economics, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 35-47.
    11. Kacie Dragan & Ingrid Ellen & Sherry A. Glied, 2019. "Does Gentrification Displace Poor Children? New Evidence from New York City Medicaid Data," NBER Working Papers 25809, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Nilsson, Isabelle & Delmelle, Elizabeth, 2018. "Transit investments and neighborhood change: On the likelihood of change," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 167-179.
    13. Baum-Snow, Nathaniel & Hartley, Daniel, 2020. "Accounting for central neighborhood change, 1980–2010," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 117(C).
    14. Shadi O. Tehrani & Shuling J. Wu & Jennifer D. Roberts, 2019. "The Color of Health: Residential Segregation, Light Rail Transit Developments, and Gentrification in the United States," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 16(19), pages 1-19, September.
    15. Cody Hochstenbach & Wouter PC van Gent, 2015. "An anatomy of gentrification processes: variegating causes of neighbourhood change," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 47(7), pages 1480-1501, July.
    16. Tim Winke, 2021. "Housing affordability sets us apart: The effect of rising housing prices on relocation behaviour," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 58(12), pages 2389-2404, September.
    17. Jeremy Auerbach & Christopher Blackburn & Hayley Barton & Amanda Meng & Ellen Zegura, 2020. "Coupling data science with community crowdsourcing for urban renewal policy analysis: An evaluation of Atlanta’s Anti-Displacement Tax Fund," Environment and Planning B, , vol. 47(6), pages 1081-1097, July.
    18. Berrebi, Simon J. & Watkins, Kari E., 2020. "Who’s ditching the bus?," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 136(C), pages 21-34.
    19. Devajyoti Deka, 2017. "Benchmarking gentrification near commuter rail stations in New Jersey," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 54(13), pages 2955-2972, October.
    20. Ingrid Gould Ellen & Keren Mertens Horn & Katherine M. O’Regan, 2013. "Why Do Higher-income Households Choose Low-income Neighbourhoods? Pioneering or Thrift?," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 50(12), pages 2478-2495, September.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:urbstu:v:58:y:2021:i:2:p:405-424. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.gla.ac.uk/departments/urbanstudiesjournal .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.