Gentrification and Universities

Paper Summary:

This paper discusses a new-style gentrification movement, driven primarily by universities' faculties and staffs, seeking housing in the campus neighborhoods to be closer to their jobs and to take advantage of cultural benefits of the university area, forces long-time and mainly lower-income residents out of the area. The author reviews programs at the University of Pennsylvania in gentrifying West Philadelphia, New York University in New York City and Emory University in Atlanta and highly recommends using the model of developer James Rouse's 36 years old planned community of Columbia, Maryland, which is openly dedicated to racial and socio-economic diversity. The paper recommends that, in order to preserve a mixed neighborhood in the vicinity of USC, the university, using its human assets to help in this effort, must be proactive and prevail upon government to assist by offering various concessions to developers and grants to individuals.

Table of Contents
Shared Prosperity Program
The NYU Partial Solution
Financing Fixes
West Coast Solutions
Deep South Suggestions
A Lesson from the East Coast
Summary

From the Paper:

"While the university itself cannot change any local housing and development ordinance, it can encourage the city to follow at least some of the steps taken by New York City last year when it realized much of its own subsidized or low-cost housing was about to become much more expensive because of the way the original legislation was written. At that point, the city began discussions with the City's pension funds, which make investments in order to grow, concerning the possibility of developing new loan programs for developers that would provide long-term low-interest financing for all those developers who were willing to retain their buildings as low-income buildings. USC could also seek assistance from large pension funds locally that typical invest in real estate."

More papers on Gentrification and Universities:

• Term Paper # 141628 : "Gentrification and Displacement"
• Analytical Essay # 130275 : "Gentrification and Urban Renewal"
• Term Paper # 104661 : "Gentrification and Counter-Gentrification"

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