CityLab Daily: The Economic Cost of Displacement by Urban Highways
Also today: Maui officials defend decision to not use sirens during wildfire, and US housing affordability hits worst point in decades.
Thousands of residents were ejected to make way for I-395 in Washington, DC.
Photographer: Al Drago/Bloomberg
The harm of US interstates to the Black neighborhoods they tore through wasn’t just physical. The displacement of neighborhoods and residents also cost some cities billions of dollars in lost home values and property taxes, according to a new report from Smart Growth America quantifying the monetary losses of highways in Atlanta and Washington, DC.
Based on today’s housing market and property tax rates, two highway segments that cut through the southern portion of DC eliminated $1.4 billion in home value, and another $7.6 million in annual property taxes. Those losses, which don’t take into account the value of commercial properties that were also destroyed, make the $4 billion federal reconnecting communities initiative a “pittance,” researchers told María Paula Mijares Torres. Today on CityLab: Urban Highways Cost Billions in Lost Home Value, Property Taxes