Gentrification in a Global Context

April 3, 2013 ENG11 Professor: Jonathan Katz Student: Darina Markyanova Draft#1. Essay #3 Gentrification. Gentrification is believed to have occurred as early as the 1870’s in Europe, and later on its spreads out in North America and Australia. However, it was first observed in 1964 in Camden Town, North London by Ruth Glass. She is found an actual term and clearly describe its definition. “Gentrification is a renewal of an urban area, accompanied by displacement of poorer residence by more affluent ones” (Williams 547).

As known gentrification it’s a process that has been marred by a lot of controversy, but I believe it’s have a positive influence on any neighborhood and its community. However, some would disagree with that, because gentrification also has a negative influence on previous residents, who usually becomes a victim of displacement. Consequently, gentrification has two sides: it could be positive and negative. “Maria Marquez, 37, has slept on the sofa for past 12 years to give her mother and son two bedrooms in their apartment in Chicago’s gentrifying Logan Square area.

But eventually, she says, we’re gonna get kicked out. It’s a matter of time. ” (Hampson 1). Displacement of lower class residents appear through process of gentrification. It happens when urban developers transform low income neighborhoods into new and upscale communities. This is result in the eviction of the poor from their affordable housing as these urban developers target to replace them with wealthier tenants. Often these old, broken buildings that requires multiple repairs and renovations quickly been replaced by luxury homes as loft apartments and condominiums.

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In the fact that most of the original low income tenants cannot afford to live and pay for the new houses, so they are forced to move into lower social communities. As low class social residents move out, businesses that served them also forced to either sell out to richer companies that can serve the new wealthier tenants or to completely close down. “99-cent stores …bodegas are gone. There’s large delis now… inexpensive beer – you can’t even buy that in the stores. The stores have imported beers from Germany… feta cheese instead of sharp Cheddar cheese.

That’s a whole other world. ” These tremendous changes forces some people to leave theirs gentrified neighborhood and look for new home else where. On the other hand those new upscale communities becoming a safer and cleaner place to live due to garbage pick ups, intensive police enforcements; necessary presence of door mans and well maintained properties by handy man. “The gang bangers are not around as much, and you don’t see the prostitutes on the corners like used to…” (Hampson 4). This is shows that quality of life tremendously had changed and improved.

However, even though the idea of gentrification might have some good for the development of urban poor areas, it comes with its pitfalls which include possibility of that crime will go up. For example, many poor and young individuals in more populated environments with rich residents will be urging to get involved in social vices overrides and commitments of crimes. Finally the frustration that follows on the eviction of the previous tenants usually results in confrontation between new tenants and the old tenants who see the new ones as the root to all their problems.

As a result rich residents become to considering the people in the ghettos as potential criminals. Meanwhile previous residents is feeling neglect by the central government, because over the years ghetto have been enforced and put under intense surveillance of low flying helicopters and 24 hours police ground patrols. This has led to restrictions and curfews on residents on the ghettos. The fact that heavy police presence around ghettos has aggravated the already soar relations between ghetto and the more affluent tenants.

As prove to this “... the police are now here to protect ‘them’ and not ‘us’…” (Lee 2). This is having led to complete segregation of these two sets of population. The rich are unable to go ghettos out of fear of being harmed while the ghetto cannot go into rich neighborhoods out of fear of arrests by law enforcing officers who have been placed in these locations to prevent any accidents that could happen to the rich. Today gentrification has been identified in almost every industrial country.

It happens everywhere and the truth is – if community is close by to the area that under development, eventually it will get gentrified in the countless time. Besides changes that affiliated with gentrification usually positive, for all of that, as I stated above countless number of evidences and factors why gentrification is so superior and so beneficial for any community that develops and grows. Though this is may be controversy as usually poor residents get “lost” and divided into two opposite cultural and social levels in their area, where they were lived and grow up.

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