Brilliant look at gentrification - causes, specifics, effects. Told through the changes that have happened in different New York neighbourhoods. He looks at specific longtime businesses, at the politics and policy behind changes, at the effects on lower income families, at the disaster that sometimes follows high rent gentrification. He also adds comments and analysis from the literature on gentrification and its effects - these are good sources for followup. There is also some discussion of the social changes that are behind this gentrification and suburbanization of the city.
I like his view of the historical role and importance of cities - essentially an environment of freedom and tolerance.
Reading this book brings back a lot of memories from my trips to New York in the late 70s. Also, early days in Toronto. The process of urban change has been similar in Toronto, though not so extreme or so rapid. But the result, the "same-ification", the whitewashing, the commodification has been the same.
Interesting to read someone writing about the same questions and complaints I have had about Toronto over the past few years. A subject to pursue.
The real question though, is what next? If the city has lost its place and role as a home for diversity and difference, where do you go? Scattered and down your own rabbit hole?
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