This week’s readings bring up a completely new, daunting topic, climate change. Watching videos of calving glaciers ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hC3VTgIPoGU ) induces thoughts of the scary future that is imminently approaching, where rising oceans will impact large portions of the worlds population.
Analysis of the cities reactions to natural disasters discussed in the readings further induces doubt about the future of less privileged households in the face of rising oceans and other natural disasters.
Miriam Greenberg in “The Disaster inside the Disaster: Hurricane Sandy and post crisis redevelopment” discusses a pattern she calls “crisis driven development”, whereby changes in cities are implemented because of a radical problem. The opposite side of this same spectrum is discussed in Jarret Murphy’s “The Flood Next Time”, where he says the city uses its “flexible adaption pathway” principles to plan for the more foreseeable future, and hope for future innovations to help plan forward. Both “crisis driven development” and “the flexible adaption pathway” are really ways of saying things will happen because there will be changes pushing them along, either in the form of major crisis or new innovation.
However, in the meantime, Melissa Checker in “Green is the New Brown: “Old School Toxics” and Environmental Gentrification on a New York City Waterfront”, primarily discusses the North Shore of Staten Island, and actions taken by the Bloomberg Administration known as PlaNYC. PlaNYC is an effort to plan for changes in NYC, including expected increases in population, changing climates, and aging infastructure ( http://www.nyc.gov/html/planyc/html/about/about.shtml ). The Mayor’s Office of Recovery and Resiliency (OPR) also splits responsibility with The Office of Long Term Planning and Sustainability (OLTPS) to ensure proper implementation of PlaNYC. These offices produce reports every four years to ensure continual progress and accountability. Checker, however seems disheartened with the projects taken on by PlaNYC because she sees them in direct contrast with other non-environmentally friendly projects the city has enacted such as Yankee Stadium where she says hundreds of existing trees were destroyed. She uses the term “environmental gentrification” to describe a correlation between gentrifying neighborhoods and “amelioration of environmental burdens” from one area, that will only encourage the burdens to move to other poorer areas.
The city has effectively, through New York State’s Brownfield Cleanup Program, changed and proposed changes to the landscape of previously completely industrial wastelands into more attractive businesses and residential space. While this situation may seem completely positive, it again is just another front for gentrification, and on its official website (http://www.dec.ny.gov/chemical/8450.html), it even states its intention to “revitalize economically blighted communities.” Much like in the reshaping of Times Square, perceived societal problems are “fixed” by intervening. However, through its “intervention”, many more economic opportunities open up for big businesses, pushing out those staked in before. Specifically in this case, increased truck traffic and overcrowding at schools haven’t really been a positive asset to the community.
On the other hand, Greenberg argues in “The Disaster Inside the Disaster” writes, “a technological fix will not build real resilience, as it will not address the broader social and environmental inequalities that increase vulnerability and lay the ground for future crisis.” Meaning that, a broader even plan needs to be laid out to help fix environmental concerns all around. Even though Greenberg is specifically addressing hurricanes and Brownfield Cleanup is about industrial wasteland, similar ideas persist about help only being pumped into furthering the economics of the city, as opposed to local residents.
It seems as though economic advantages tied to ecology, lead to further gentrification throughout the whole spectrum of both climate change preparation and waste cleanups.
I’d also like to note, however, that in a Siemens sponsored study measuring carbon dioxide emissions per capita, water consumption, waste recycled, and number of LEED-certified buildings NYC came up in the top three cities in 2011 (http://blogs.wsj.com/metropolis/2011/06/30/new-york-emerges-as-green-city-leader/). So, it seems as though, Bloomberg was able to accomplish multiple goals. Not only did New York grow economically during his time as mayor, it also made great environmental strides. Nonetheless, through some of those policies, low income locals living in many parts of New York City, were pushed out of their homes to make way for gentrified, ‘green’ spaces.
