Quote:
Originally Posted by VivaLFuego
Interesting passage. I think it just highlights how different the perspective was circa 1950 - remember that 1950 was before gentrification had entered the popular lexicon and was basically not even considered in the universe of possible outcomes for an older decayed neighborhood. 1950 was also before the effects of urban renewal (slum clearance, etc.) could be fully comprehended. Heck, it was a decade before Jane Jacobs even wrote Death and Life..., which itself was ahead of its time. The past 60 years of experience give us a much different perspective on what politicians and planners confronted at that time.
The lesson to me is the importance of humility - what are planners and politicians missing now that will seem so obvious in 50 years? Confronted with the same knowledge they had (and nothing more), would we have acted differently?
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Well, after a little bit of research, I guess we all know now what really happened. In order to receive federal funding to make investment to renew the city, St. Louis had to officially designate the areas as "blighted slums" - even those which were not necessarily slums, but rather high density neighborhoods. Oh yeah, I'm sure it was easy to pass the 33% of those units without private toilets as slums... even I have a hard time imagining so many St. Louis residents having to use communal toilets. Another blog writer said it best that they could have just built covered breezeways from the apartments to the toilet areas, create for those who didn't have, and rebuild the sewage system - kind of like how they did it in Soulard.
But the rest of the destruction? Were they really slums? Or were they prime land that could be cleared for development and enrich the pockets of those in power who wanted to expand development in a land-locked city separated from the county, and who had a hard time raising additional tax revenue that might have come from more outward development had they remained with the county. Plus they could disperse the minority low-income population and attract higher income business. Raising revenue and budgets, and lining the pockets. The skilled worker exodus would simply need high amounts of parking spaces, and they would be lured back in the city to work in the newly created office buildings. I can see how the planners thought that it was all so very logical.
Yes, so very powerful people could persuade the federal government that the areas should be indeed designated as slums - and then receive the billions of dollars (in todays terms) for investment.
It all came down to greed of a few in power- nothing more. I'm such a naive guy to think it could have been anything different. Even with all that money, they couldn't slow the exodus and economic decentralization.
The whole thing is so sad, and nothing really ever changes. What's gonna happen to North St. Louis and McKee? Same thing, except this time much of it is already destroyed - so it's less unethical than what happened in the 50s.
But less unethical is what we've become... not good enough for me.
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