While reading the middle half of Root Shock, it was quite surprising to realize the dramatic effects urban displacement can have on people. Dr. Fullilove discusses the history of urban replacement on communities and how people struggled in order to survive urban replacement. The author discusses how people were torn away from their communities due to urbanization of “insignificant” communities. What I found interesting to notice was that the author pointed out how the sense of closeness amongst former neighbors was essentially gone. It would seem that in rough times, like urban renewal, people would in a sense try to stick together and help one another get through the struggle. It is understandable that after urbanization people would not be so closely tied with each other because of the distance separating them. However, one would think that people would try to maintain a sense of family despite the distances separating them. The whole shift of community is very radical due to urban renewal. Before urban renewal, all the neighbors were very much intertwined in each other’s lives, but afterward it was as if a partition was built that forever separated former neighbors from each other.

My question would be, despite the effects of urban renewal why didn’t former neighbors maintain contact with each other? People do maintain contact with each other in spite of long distances between them…