Masters Theses

Date of Award

5-2016

Degree Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science

Major

Geography

Major Professor

Madhuri Sharma

Committee Members

Nicholas N. Nagle, Stephanie A. Bohon

Abstract

Since the 1990s, Atlanta’s historically white and affluent northern inner suburbs have experienced increasing rates of poverty alongside growing racial/ethnic diversity, challenging a region notorious for private property politics and a history of supporting anti-immigrant and anti-poor legislation. Meanwhile, on the built landscape, high-end (re)development projects incorporating New Urbanist planning and design features, such as pedestrian accessibility, compact densities, and mixed land uses and housing types, have become increasingly common in this region, especially since the onset of the Great Recession. As Hanlon (2015) has noted, the “green turn” in public planning exemplified by New Urbanism may have adverse consequences for certain communities. Namely, the high prices and exclusivity of these projects may threaten the tenure security of working-class residents, many of whom—especially the Latino population—rely on the relative accessibility of in-town suburban housing to walk to work, stores, and transit stops. Thus, the growing emphasis on challenging sprawl and encouraging environmental sustainability via New Urbanist redevelopment may come at the expense of social and spatial justice. This thesis seeks to build on Hanlon’s critical work by asking, What types of neighborhoods in Atlanta’s northern inner suburbs have been targeted for New Urban-designed projects before and after the onset of the Great Recession, and how have these geographies changed following the crisis? To answer the first part of this question, I employ a logistic generalized linear model (GLM) to estimate the effects selected housing, locational, socioeconomic, and racial/ethnic characteristics have on the likelihood of neighborhoods to receive a New Urban-designed project from 1999 to 2015. To answer the second part, I conduct a second GLM that interacts a time period variable—indicating whether variables represent a neighborhood’s characteristics before or after the housing crash—with each other explanatory variable.

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