PBS ran a special on suburban sprawl last week entitled “Blueprint America: Road to the Future.” The special profiled three U.S. cities—Denver, Portland and New York City—taking three very different approaches to metropolitan transit.
The special began with Denver and local political battles over a nearly complete highway enclosing the region. Opponents of the highway suggested that it contributes to sprawl and is decimating the environment, while proponents made the groundbreaking observation “Our population is increasing, and they have to live somewhere!” Basically, metro-Denver residents are dependent on their cars due to greedy real estate developers, federal subsidies for suburban development, and a general American “car culture.” And this dependency has had dramatic effects on the area’s quality of life and air quality. Thirty-minute rush hour commutes now take upwards of two hours, meaning more carbon emissions and more pollution.
Portland was profiled next as a region bucking the trend of suburban sprawl. When the city was offered federal dollars for highway construction in the 1970s, city officials instead invested in light rails and other public transit systems. White, middle class families were followed with cameras as they rode their bikes to the local grocery store and then to a neighborhood playground. Under Mayor Bloomberg, New York City—already very “green” by emissions standards—is following Portland and also making environmental sustainability a civic priority.
The common thread throughout the entire special was twofold: Sprawl has dramatically negative effects the environment, and better transit is necessary if we want to be a “green,” eco-friendly nation. White, middle-class families in Portland were quoted in the special gleefully recounting how they can ride their bikes to work, instead of driving. But what about folks that don’t even have cars? What about folks who live in neighborhoods spatially disconnected from job opportunities? These controversies over public transportation are uncomfortably whitewashed, and the only people we hear from are middle class individuals with the privilege to choose environmentally friendly lifestyles. Here we are, debating the best way to commute to work, when black male unemployment is 17.2%.
This discussion brings up the idea of framing—how we talk about social issues. The Obama Administration’s head of The Department of Transportation was quoted in the PBS special saying, “We’re thinking about transit more than ever before.” But how are they thinking about it? Are they thinking about it as a political move, a way to garner support from “green loving” liberals? Or is the conversation more altruistic—a way to help the country recover from the economic crisis? Or—and here’s where things get interesting—can it be positioned as a social justice, a social need for already marginalized urban communities?
In Lone Pursuit, Sandra Susan Smith—a brilliant sociologist at UC-Berkeley—discusses black joblessness in southeast Michigan, carefully analyzing job referral reluctance among poor African Americans. A cycle of distrust proliferates among the black poor in “Southeast County,” Michigan, thwarting the dissemination of job information through informal networks. She posits that a weak job referral structure at the individual level in Southeast County helps explain low employment levels for blacks at the group level.
Throughout the book, however, her respondents also noted the trials and tribulations associated with mass transit. Indeed, this is a hot topic in Southeast Michigan. Currently, state officials are split on plans to build a commuter rail from “Southeast County” (Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti) to either Detroit or Grand Rapids. Representatives from Grand Rapids are seeking to make their city the “center” of the state, whereas Detroit representatives are simply trying to keep their city alive. And, of course, poor folks just want a job, and a way to get there.
This is also a nationwide problem; social scientists term it “spatial mismatch.” The idea is that the place of employment is divorced from a group or individual’s place of residence. In metropolitan America, work has “disappeared” to the suburbs via de-centralization, while poor, predominantly black city residents remain constrained to residence within city limits. See, this is what’s missing from conversations about transportation policy, environmental sustainability and suburban sprawl. Poor people, particularly in marginalized communities of color, need jobs and a reliable way to get to them. Lofty goals of “going green” are well and good, but we also need better public transit for the employment opportunities of the public.
In the aftermath of the financial crisis, a plethora of media outlets have profiled newly unemployed whites from corporate America. Coupled with the conversations of environmentalism and mass transit, it appears that the public conception of the economy has been effectively whitewashed. The effects of sprawl are more than simply environmental, and the need for mass transit is bigger than the quality of life for middle-class whites in Portland. We can’t allow our privilege to get in the way of seeing who really needs public transit, and why they need it.
The special began with Denver and local political battles over a nearly complete highway enclosing the region. Opponents of the highway suggested that it contributes to sprawl and is decimating the environment, while proponents made the groundbreaking observation “Our population is increasing, and they have to live somewhere!” Basically, metro-Denver residents are dependent on their cars due to greedy real estate developers, federal subsidies for suburban development, and a general American “car culture.” And this dependency has had dramatic effects on the area’s quality of life and air quality. Thirty-minute rush hour commutes now take upwards of two hours, meaning more carbon emissions and more pollution.
Portland was profiled next as a region bucking the trend of suburban sprawl. When the city was offered federal dollars for highway construction in the 1970s, city officials instead invested in light rails and other public transit systems. White, middle class families were followed with cameras as they rode their bikes to the local grocery store and then to a neighborhood playground. Under Mayor Bloomberg, New York City—already very “green” by emissions standards—is following Portland and also making environmental sustainability a civic priority.
The common thread throughout the entire special was twofold: Sprawl has dramatically negative effects the environment, and better transit is necessary if we want to be a “green,” eco-friendly nation. White, middle-class families in Portland were quoted in the special gleefully recounting how they can ride their bikes to work, instead of driving. But what about folks that don’t even have cars? What about folks who live in neighborhoods spatially disconnected from job opportunities? These controversies over public transportation are uncomfortably whitewashed, and the only people we hear from are middle class individuals with the privilege to choose environmentally friendly lifestyles. Here we are, debating the best way to commute to work, when black male unemployment is 17.2%.
This discussion brings up the idea of framing—how we talk about social issues. The Obama Administration’s head of The Department of Transportation was quoted in the PBS special saying, “We’re thinking about transit more than ever before.” But how are they thinking about it? Are they thinking about it as a political move, a way to garner support from “green loving” liberals? Or is the conversation more altruistic—a way to help the country recover from the economic crisis? Or—and here’s where things get interesting—can it be positioned as a social justice, a social need for already marginalized urban communities?
In Lone Pursuit, Sandra Susan Smith—a brilliant sociologist at UC-Berkeley—discusses black joblessness in southeast Michigan, carefully analyzing job referral reluctance among poor African Americans. A cycle of distrust proliferates among the black poor in “Southeast County,” Michigan, thwarting the dissemination of job information through informal networks. She posits that a weak job referral structure at the individual level in Southeast County helps explain low employment levels for blacks at the group level.
Throughout the book, however, her respondents also noted the trials and tribulations associated with mass transit. Indeed, this is a hot topic in Southeast Michigan. Currently, state officials are split on plans to build a commuter rail from “Southeast County” (Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti) to either Detroit or Grand Rapids. Representatives from Grand Rapids are seeking to make their city the “center” of the state, whereas Detroit representatives are simply trying to keep their city alive. And, of course, poor folks just want a job, and a way to get there.
This is also a nationwide problem; social scientists term it “spatial mismatch.” The idea is that the place of employment is divorced from a group or individual’s place of residence. In metropolitan America, work has “disappeared” to the suburbs via de-centralization, while poor, predominantly black city residents remain constrained to residence within city limits. See, this is what’s missing from conversations about transportation policy, environmental sustainability and suburban sprawl. Poor people, particularly in marginalized communities of color, need jobs and a reliable way to get to them. Lofty goals of “going green” are well and good, but we also need better public transit for the employment opportunities of the public.
In the aftermath of the financial crisis, a plethora of media outlets have profiled newly unemployed whites from corporate America. Coupled with the conversations of environmentalism and mass transit, it appears that the public conception of the economy has been effectively whitewashed. The effects of sprawl are more than simply environmental, and the need for mass transit is bigger than the quality of life for middle-class whites in Portland. We can’t allow our privilege to get in the way of seeing who really needs public transit, and why they need it.
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