EVICTIONS & REDLINING

ABOUT THIS MAP

Evictions inscribe themselves in a long cycle of racialized disinvestment-reinvestment. In the 1930s, the federal government instituted a national policy of mortgage lending based on racial hierarchies. Maps of every major American city were drawn up to determine how "safe" each neighborhood was to receive loans from the Homeowner Loans Corporation (HOLC) based on a rating. Any neighborhood that had more than 5% Black residents was immediately "redlining," deemed to risky for mortgage lending. Based on these racist assumptions, POC neighborhoods across the US were systematically dinsvested, while white families were offered loans to flee urban centers and settle in affluent suburbs to pursue the American dream of homeownership.

"White flight" was facilitated by the federal urban renewal program in the postwar context, which tore down neighborhoods deemed "blighted" or depressed to make way for highways that made commuting from suburbs to urban job centers much easier. Thousands of families, primarily in communities of color, were uprooted by urban renewal under the guidance of Robert Moses in NYC, destroying the urban fabric and social networks of these neighborhoods. After redlining barred entire neighborhoods out of the mortgage system and urban renewal tore them apart, many neighborhoods faced hardships.

Throughout the 1970s, the City of New York instituted a policy of "planned shrinkage," where neighborhoods deemed worthless saw their public services shut down. The "Decade of Fire" in the Bronx is the most infamous example of how the City facilitated the near-decimation of an entire borough.

To visualize how the afterlives of racialized urban planning impact New Yorkers today, visit the Race & Evictions map of this Atlas.