What’s this about?
The Built Environment & Health (BEH) project is an interdisciplinary program of research at Columbia University. Led by epidemiologist Andrew Rundle, BEH uses spatial data to examine the implications of the built environment, including land use, public transit, and housing, for physical activity, diet, obesity, and other aspects of health. With a focus on New York City, BEH research will inform public policy to promote health in the city and metropolitan area. BEH is affiliated with the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Health & Society Scholars program at Columbia.
There Goes the ’Hood
New Publication
Lance Freeman, BEH investigator and associate professor of urban planning at Columbia’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, recently published There Goes the ’Hood: Views of Gentrification from the Bottom Up. In his book, Freeman asks how gentrification affects the long-time residents of neighborhoods in transition. To find out, he interviewed the residents of two predominantly-black New York City neighborhoods, Harlem and Clinton Hill, Brooklyn. While residents may welcome the amenities and services that follow the influx of affluent neighbors, he learned that many also regard these new developments with cynicism and suspicion, reflecting a long history of discrimination and redlining. There Goes the ’Hood brings much-needed nuance and complexity to the debate over the impact of gentrification on inner-city neighborhoods.
Farai Chideya interviewed Freeman about the book for the National Public Radio show “News and Notes with Ed Gordon” on July 20th, 2006.
