Archive Report
Archive Report
Controversy Over Urban Redevelopment
Rising Criticism of Urban Renewal Programs
Established concepts of urban renewal are now being attacked by some of the program's long-time supporters as well as by its foes. Disillusionment has set in because more than a decade of federally supported redevelopment in major cities has failed to make the headway expected against urban blight and the social problems that blight creates and renewal is intended to relieve. Wholesale clearance of slum areas and pillar-to-post relocation of the families who lived there have generated wide discontent. Members of racial and ethnic minorities who have seen the slum buildings they occupied replaced by luxury apartment houses have grown resentful of city planning that rarely seems to make adequate provision for their needs. James Baldwin, ...