This is a common take and I tend to agree. But I wonder how we’ll feel 30 years from now. Maybe we’ll appreciate the new/modern homes now as they act as a time stamp. 🤷🏼♂️
Besides the rising cost of living, as a dc native I don’t mind the new buildings I just hate the flat box look of some of the new row homes. They stick out and not in a good way. It reminds me of the complaints Californians had a while back about all of the new “white box” homes instead of reviving the old classic styles. Also worked on the Yards redevelopment with the BID and I’m so proud of how it turned out. Great vid!
I’m torn about the new/modern row homes. They certainly look out of place but maybe as the years go on we’ll actually appreciate the diversity as the architecture kind of acts as a Time Machine. I need to get to a Nats and spend a day at the Yard. Thanks for sharing!
I've heard them called "middle finger houses" since they stick up above their neighbors like flipping someone the bird. I'm conflicted, since I want more residential square footage here, but I wish they'd do more to make them look like the historical houses.
You forgot to mention the H st streetcar line, which was built specifically to encourage development of H st and Benning Rd rather than to actually be useful transit, since it lacks a dedicated lane and is therefore slower than the bus.
We're working on getting it extended eastward, where it would connect H Street with multiple residential neighborhoods. The Council has agreed to fund it, but they delayed the project start, so it could still be cancelled. Sign up for emails from Friends of the DC Streetcar if you want to get involved.
Some of those areas swung so rapidly from decay to rapid development because developers were actively blackmailing the city into approving their development proposals. In the case of The Wonderbread Factory and the Tivoli Theater these landmark buildings were allowed to decay for decades while they were owned by developers who hope that if they allowed the buildings to be enough of an eyesore, eventually they would be granted permission to tear down the historic buildings. These keystone properties, while they were vacant and in disrepair helped to depress the local real estate market and made it harder for local minority residents to finance necessary home improvements and repairs. So it can be argued that even in the 1980s it was active neglect by absentee landlords and developers that caused a great deal of the urban blight. In areas of the city where smaller businesses owned and operated their own buildings, the swing from "blight" to "gentrification" was much less extreme.
Most developers don't hold or own those place for decades or since the 1980s. It has always been difficult to get approval for redevelopments. Sometimes local opposition can kill a project or they would nit pay off. DC had tough times in recent decades but is slowly turning around thanks due to new developments.
Tge alley resue modifications for shops and local small Businesses. Looks really good over all it gives work to many people and a place to stay. DC has always been mostly appartment buildings.
@@paxundpeace9970 You are very wrong about the role of property developers in the blight that pervaded the city in the 1970s and 1980s. For example, one man Herbert Haft owned the not only the Tivoli Theater but in total he owned 12 acres of commercial property in Columbia Heights. These vacant properties were boarded up and decaying for decades while under the ownership of developers/speculators.
Herbert Hart owned the Tivoli Theater site since 1981. Similarly Norman Jemal (Sr.) owned many blighted buildings for decades and let them sit empty, blighted and falling down for decades, not paying taxes on them yet retaining ownership.
the blagden alley development is super cool for upscale evening activities. two of my favorite dc restaurants (the dabney and causa) as well as a pretty cool rooftop bar (they also have a location in nyc) called death and co. while i do have mixed feelings regarding much of the new development in navy yard type areas, i mostly like what dc is becoming
Yay DC!! Great video!! There are so many developments happening across the region! I am so proud of all the work being done to increase the supply of housing here to make DC a place of opportunity for all! Rents are high but there are lots of high paying jobs. As you said other cities like Boston, NY and much of the sunbelt have rents spiraling out of control but DC has some good YIMBY energy...Over 5,000 housing units were built in the 0.5 SqMi Navy Yard neighborhood in the last 5 years alone! Lots of work to do of course but I do take a lot of pride in the area! If you ever need some insight for a video I can fill you in on the exciting developments in the area.
I’m jealous you live in DC! I really appreciate all your insight and advice. I want to visit again soon and take it all in. I’m also very interested in the surrounding areas like Arlington and Alexandria.
That's a lot considering that DC has maybe 200.000- 300.000 housing units. Despite new build costing more it is still better then fitting with 10 other people over the oldest junk appartment.
Yep, and I lived on NY and 1st before NOMA was revitalized. It was a dump down by the Metro station. I never had an issue going there or on the neighborhood, but Sursum Corda really needed the rebuild. "Gentrification" isn't always a bad thing if the developers keep in mind that people already live there and make it easier for them to stay.
@@kaveman_4242 Well, since it was mostly industrial and warehouses up until about 2010 or so, I wouldn't blame it on the locals. Up the street was the nice residential area, old row houses, etc. I never once had an issue with my neighbors, except one who kept his dog outside and it just barked all day and night.
I used to spend a whole lot of time in DC when I was in College and the next 10 years when I lived in Richmond. It is hard to believe these places are so gentrified. Prior to the Green Line, you just didn't go anywhere near these places. It was a scary area. With the green line, it looks like that instigated a lot of it. Hell when I was running around up there, Adams Morgan was just starting to gentrify...and look at it now. Not many people could afford to live there now. Logan Circle has always been expensive. DuPont Circle is more the center of Gay life in DC
A poster child for transit oriented development! DC really isn’t talked about enough. I very much enjoyed my time there. Perhaps I got my wires crossed somewhere between Logan & DuPont Circle. Thanks for sharing!
Yeah, it's amazing. In a lot of these places, there really wasn't much there before, but now there are a lot of things. Hope for DC's sake it continues.
Actually, the process of gentrification started much earlier. In the mid-1980s, the Capitol Hill district was already undergoing gentrification, though there was no local government program at the time. The poor black population was being pushed to the east and south, and you saw their townhouses interspersed with those recently bought by rich homeowners or filled with young people who worked as aides in Congress or the Senate. As for the latter group, four or five roommates would rent a townhouse together, but they were pushed out, when the houses they occupied were sold.
DC has become one of the most expensive metro areas in which to live. I lived there for a decade in the pre-gentrified mid-70s to the starting-to-gentrify in the mid-80s and already people were upset about the rising rents. Anything West of Connecticut Avenue was going to be at least twice as expensive as its eastern counterparts. The places where I lived--DuPont Circle, Logan Circle, Mount Pleasant and Adams Morgan are now untouchable. I loved the city, but it's a financial sacrifice to live there.
Cleanliness and space while valuable are not the most important metrics by which to judge the adequacy and effectiveness of a public transit system. Timeliness, safety, interruptions to service, and cost are much more important.
23 year Capitol Hill resident here: this neighborhood has become "quietly gentrified"...not really new development, but buyers who can afford to rehab old row houses so on a scale of 1-10, they have gone from like a 4 to an 8.
You were considering adding Capitol Hill to a feature on recently gentrified neighborhoods of DC? Baby, Capitol Hill has been exclusive for about a century and a half.
One other comment I would make: a few people here have noted the word gentrification and it's negative connotation, but another one is "urban renewal." It's fallen out of favor lately and doesn't have the same connotation as it used to, but back in it's heyday it was used to describe the destruction of cities to make way for housing projects and highways, what people at the time thought was "progress." It's mostly fine too use it now, as gentrification has become the bad word in its place, but I just wanted to spread the word on the history of that phrase.
Appreciate your feedback. Funny how certain words trigger certain feelings or thoughts and evolve over time. I wonder what will replace gentrification as the bad word?
Gentrification has primarly a Term from Germany to describe the the change from streets and communities that bad been in bad conditions and mabye even vacated to places that are 'seen as attractive and popular'. It goes like this a place mostly empty and vacated is seens as attractive for young people because of cheap rents. Maybe artistis and new Restaurants move in. Then as demand grows renovations start to pay of and places might change by a lot. It does not means old residents have to leave but quite often by the time this takes effect those place had already had been in demographic decline. Decades before the process starts.
Don't like call it genetrification it is just plain redevelopment. Thingd change all the time. They can't stay the same for ever. Urban renewal is a bit different term because it does include planed change instead of just the actions by a property owners or developer to choose to buy a place and to build something on it. Urban renewal might even be tight to eminent domain.
What’s so interesting about a lot of this redevelopment…it’s that it’s simply development. A lot of these places were simply empty land…..after having been destroyed in the 1960s
@@cities4pplAt many points in the video I saw beautiful Victorian style homes being replaced with soulless modernist styles. That's what I am talking about. My concern are soulless buildings replacing the beauty of (some of)the older buildings over time. A lot of modern mixed use developments look like copy and pastes of a each other, while older ones have a unique character to them. I see this in my own city. Yes there are some built that are nice looking and it's great they're keeping within the type of building and increasing housing supply. I'll take a McMain street over a McMansion any day, however I would take a Federalist rowhouse in a narrow cobblestone street over ANYTHING; because it's gorgeous and walkable. Think the ones in Philly or Boston. Do you know the urbanist TH-camr, the Aesthetic City? His video "What Makes Buildings Beautiful (And Why Beauty Does Matter)" is a great one to watch, if you haven't already.
I see. I actually 100% agree with everything you said. I have seen that video and partly inspired me to start my own! I simply love exploring all corners of the world so I enjoy spending hours in google street viewing the beautiful architecture. Cheers!
@@patriot9487some of the buildings in this video could be any neighborhood could be anywhere in America or Canada. I’m sad local charm is disappearing.
Metro is underrated because a) it's over-priced b) it's inefficient, and c) it's poorly run. Locals know this. You left the part out where Shaw/U Street declined due to ruing in the sixties. Some of those old businesses had been closed since then. And you're obviously not a local, as you left out Ben's Chili Bowl.
Shaw was pretty gentrified by 2000. Colombia heights was always a more upscale neighborhood. I’ll agree with H st. I wouldn’t really call navy yard gentrification it more about putting housing where old abandoned warehouses were. Logan circle was also always pretty nice calling it gentrified is like calling the lower manhattan gentrified.
Are you originally from DC. Back in the 70s to 90s if you were seen on Logan circle it was not a compliment. That street was filled with prostitution at the time.
Anyone complaining about Gentrification could have bought before 2016 pretty cheaply. We bought on H Street making under 50K total. CNBC making it showing folks under 50 also buying in Shaw.
I had to check the date of this video, assuming it was about 5 years old, but no it’s more recent. Folks considering these neighborhoods should look for themselves because they have become much more unsafe and less vibrant.
I just moved out of Shaw due to my apartment getting shot out. The hotel listed in Shaw also got shot. Navy Yard is one of the areas with the most carjackings, armed and unarmed. DC is great but currently going through massive increases in crime in every area (shootings, murder, carjacking, theft, etc.). Just want to make sure to let people know if they're looking at moving there.
Apparently that gentrification isn’t solving crime. Interesting how the most gentrified city also is one of a few that have seen crime continue to increase, even though it’s fallen overall in most big cities since 2022ish. I doubt it’s indicative of a larger trend though I haven’t looked further.
Any DC native knows it’s best to stay in the outskirts of DC such as Arlington or Silver Spring maybe. Who in the world told you Shaw was 100% safe. Next to Howard U. It’s much better now compared to the old days. A lot of transplants do not know the true history of DC.
Metro may be cleaner than NYC, but we dont have express trains or dual tracks. One set of malfunctioning doors and everones commute is f'ed. I'd trade with NYC in a heartbeat (they can keep the crime, tho)
Fair enough. I guess NYC metro is better period. The one thing that DC Metro has over NYC is the internal station architecture, just makes it feel more world class.
New York metro is great unreliable too. They really need urgent rapairs to installations and delays are crazy inpart the don't have enough staff. Crime is bad but delays affect all users every day.
The revitalization was needed but a lot of the architecture is just plain ugly. Boston does a much better job of medium density housing with out sacrificing design
This is great. Gentrification is such a loaded word. I wouldn’t describe this as gentrification. Gentrification is displacement of poor people, and adding all this cool development, especially development on parking lots does the opposite and protects the existing residents from displacement. We also need more public housing and expansion of Section 8, but private developments like this are good and are anti-gentrification.
@@cities4ppl I guess it’s an open question but personally I think it’s better to convince people that this development *isn’t gentrification* than to try to rework the definition of gentrification to mean a totally different thing.
Washington DC is objectively one of the most gentrified cities in the US. There is a lot of literature on this subject. There has been massive displacement of low income mostly black people in DC.
@@shomardinho14 That’s true and I’m not disputing that. What I’m saying is that the mechanism of displacement is not new development, it’s the lack of new development. Especially when someone is developing a building on a parking lot it’s transparent no one is being displaced by the new building. What causes displace,ent is income inequality and exclusionary zoning. New housing solves one leg of the problem.
Gentrification is wealthier people moving into an area, not necessarily poorer people moving out. More to the point, gentrification is the biggest non-issue ever. Its more common to see the reverse, wherein poor people moving to an area displace wealthier people by undercutting wages, lowering lowering test scores, and raising crime rates. In a racialized framing this is called white flight, and is also usually regarded as a bad thing because it hurts the local economy, even though it also lowers property values. Gentrification and white flight are both regarded as bad things even though they are exact opposite phenomenon. Ultimately what people are really upset about is apparent lack of economic mobility that would otherwise limit displacement in either situation, but people don't understand that so they instead complain about the symptoms.
Or just be ceded back to MD like the Virginia side of the original DC border. A much smaller federal district could be kept in tact (downtown) that would still function as the seat of the federal government. To give DC statehood and remove it as a federal district would require an amendment to the US Constitution.
And what happens to those of us who have been their through good & bad and now can't afford this gentrification?? You keep mentioning "Once a hub of African-American".. This is happening disturbingly fast in Brooklyn 😢.
It lools like ir is still a hub for african american culture. It is better to have a place for 10 families then home that is cheap and falling apart for 2 or 3 families. While sometimes you can question the selection of unit size. Often not many options for families it is giving housing to many people.
It looks like it sucks to live there. The apartments around the national stadium look like college dorms next to a college stadium. They're kids living 5 people to a one bedroom studio apartment. They made DC look like an idiot college town. It' looks like MTV rock the vote. It used to be cool when black people lived there making gogo music banging on buckets and trash cans. Now it's the Ikea Furniture Capital of the world. It doesn't make sense. When thinking of DC you used to think of antiques and food like the fish market in old town alexandria across the river. Now it's goofy. Now Napoleon dynamite took over and it has a goofy political vibe like a high school vote for pedro election. There used to be a higher sense of education. Not like harvard business schools, or harvard law school because those are kind of asshole educations. Smithsonian, and PBS was high art and high education. DC used to have the wholesomeness of PBS. There used to be a dignity that goes beyond money or laws. There was a natural sense of what the right thing to do is, and doing a good job.
Too crowded...too congested...too transient...it's soul less....love to visit....but it's no place to live...there is minimal quality of life...I lived there for 32 yrs....
The issue is that they have no representation. No senate seat. Almost no power in the house and congrees is deciding things for the city that should be left to the city council.
Good to see people who actually take pride in their local area and country are taking back what was purposefully being destroyed by people who will probably chose to go against the current the devolving world forever instead of leaving on their own.
At 2:55 wow, that's a lot mid-rise buildings, looks like a high pop density place.
Build build build!
I hope somebody decides to do some Victorian revivalist new builds. Not everything has to look so soulless and cold! Thanks for the video! :)
This is a common take and I tend to agree. But I wonder how we’ll feel 30 years from now. Maybe we’ll appreciate the new/modern homes now as they act as a time stamp. 🤷🏼♂️
@@cities4ppl
Doubt it. Modern architecture is meant to be stale and depressing. A psychological tool to manipulate people
@@cities4pplModern architecture has been around for 50 years already. The only people who seem to love it are modern architecture enthusiasts.
I am sorry, but the zoning laws and building codes don't allow that.
I feel like its just cheaper and easier to design industrial/modern architecture, which is why everyone does it
Besides the rising cost of living, as a dc native I don’t mind the new buildings I just hate the flat box look of some of the new row homes. They stick out and not in a good way. It reminds me of the complaints Californians had a while back about all of the new “white box” homes instead of reviving the old classic styles. Also worked on the Yards redevelopment with the BID and I’m so proud of how it turned out. Great vid!
I’m torn about the new/modern row homes. They certainly look out of place but maybe as the years go on we’ll actually appreciate the diversity as the architecture kind of acts as a Time Machine. I need to get to a Nats and spend a day at the Yard. Thanks for sharing!
I've heard them called "middle finger houses" since they stick up above their neighbors like flipping someone the bird. I'm conflicted, since I want more residential square footage here, but I wish they'd do more to make them look like the historical houses.
@@LesserAndrew good point about the square footage, I agree
I love your content! It’s crazy how much my hometown has changed in the past decade or so. Keep up the great work!
Thank you for the kind words! I wonder how much it will change in the next decade?
You forgot to mention the H st streetcar line, which was built specifically to encourage development of H st and Benning Rd rather than to actually be useful transit, since it lacks a dedicated lane and is therefore slower than the bus.
We're working on getting it extended eastward, where it would connect H Street with multiple residential neighborhoods. The Council has agreed to fund it, but they delayed the project start, so it could still be cancelled. Sign up for emails from Friends of the DC Streetcar if you want to get involved.
4:40 like how they kept the style while adding another story on top of one building
Some of those areas swung so rapidly from decay to rapid development because developers were actively blackmailing the city into approving their development proposals. In the case of The Wonderbread Factory and the Tivoli Theater these landmark buildings were allowed to decay for decades while they were owned by developers who hope that if they allowed the buildings to be enough of an eyesore, eventually they would be granted permission to tear down the historic buildings. These keystone properties, while they were vacant and in disrepair helped to depress the local real estate market and made it harder for local minority residents to finance necessary home improvements and repairs. So it can be argued that even in the 1980s it was active neglect by absentee landlords and developers that caused a great deal of the urban blight. In areas of the city where smaller businesses owned and operated their own buildings, the swing from "blight" to "gentrification" was much less extreme.
Most developers don't hold or
own those place for decades or since the 1980s.
It has always been difficult to get approval for redevelopments. Sometimes local opposition can kill a project or they would nit pay off.
DC had tough times in recent decades but is slowly turning around thanks due to new developments.
Plenty of awesome anf community serving projects had been done. Howard theazerfor example is now looking great
Tge alley resue modifications for shops and local small Businesses. Looks really good over all it gives work to many people and a place to stay. DC has always been mostly appartment buildings.
@@paxundpeace9970 You are very wrong about the role of property developers in the blight that pervaded the city in the 1970s and 1980s. For example, one man Herbert Haft owned the not only the Tivoli Theater but in total he owned 12 acres of commercial property in Columbia Heights. These vacant properties were boarded up and decaying for decades while under the ownership of developers/speculators.
Herbert Hart owned the Tivoli Theater site since 1981. Similarly Norman Jemal (Sr.) owned many blighted buildings for decades and let them sit empty, blighted and falling down for decades, not paying taxes on them yet retaining ownership.
Cancel
Reply
the blagden alley development is super cool for upscale evening activities. two of my favorite dc restaurants (the dabney and causa) as well as a pretty cool rooftop bar (they also have a location in nyc) called death and co. while i do have mixed feelings regarding much of the new development in navy yard type areas, i mostly like what dc is becoming
Great selection and video. I loved my time in Shaw in 2019.
Thanks, Gabriel!
Yay DC!! Great video!! There are so many developments happening across the region! I am so proud of all the work being done to increase the supply of housing here to make DC a place of opportunity for all! Rents are high but there are lots of high paying jobs. As you said other cities like Boston, NY and much of the sunbelt have rents spiraling out of control but DC has some good YIMBY energy...Over 5,000 housing units were built in the 0.5 SqMi Navy Yard neighborhood in the last 5 years alone! Lots of work to do of course but I do take a lot of pride in the area! If you ever need some insight for a video I can fill you in on the exciting developments in the area.
I’m jealous you live in DC! I really appreciate all your insight and advice. I want to visit again soon and take it all in. I’m also very interested in the surrounding areas like Arlington and Alexandria.
@@cities4ppl I live in Arlington!
That's a lot considering that DC has maybe 200.000- 300.000 housing units.
Despite new build costing more it is still better then fitting with 10 other people over the oldest junk appartment.
You forgot about NoMa, I would say Navy Yard and NoMa are the most gentrified neighborhoods in DC.
Tough to pick just 5 in cities like DC.
@@cities4ppl very true!
Yep, and I lived on NY and 1st before NOMA was revitalized. It was a dump down by the Metro station. I never had an issue going there or on the neighborhood, but Sursum Corda really needed the rebuild. "Gentrification" isn't always a bad thing if the developers keep in mind that people already live there and make it easier for them to stay.
@@kellycochran6487the idea is that, not all of course, those people MADE that area a dump so it’s better to get rid of them.
@@kaveman_4242 Well, since it was mostly industrial and warehouses up until about 2010 or so, I wouldn't blame it on the locals. Up the street was the nice residential area, old row houses, etc. I never once had an issue with my neighbors, except one who kept his dog outside and it just barked all day and night.
Lots of love for DC
hahahaha i think you caught footage of me walking along H street!
Great video! underrated
Blackdan alley is looking really nice. Plenty of small shops. Great work.
I used to spend a whole lot of time in DC when I was in College and the next 10 years when I lived in Richmond. It is hard to believe these places are so gentrified. Prior to the Green Line, you just didn't go anywhere near these places. It was a scary area. With the green line, it looks like that instigated a lot of it. Hell when I was running around up there, Adams Morgan was just starting to gentrify...and look at it now. Not many people could afford to live there now. Logan Circle has always been expensive. DuPont Circle is more the center of Gay life in DC
A poster child for transit oriented development! DC really isn’t talked about enough. I very much enjoyed my time there. Perhaps I got my wires crossed somewhere between Logan & DuPont Circle. Thanks for sharing!
@@cities4ppl If you are going down Mass Ave, Logan is the circle right before DuPont. DuPont is a much bigger circle (and very confusing)
Hell you should see Trinidad and H street now. From 2016 when I first went to now is a complete difference
Yeah, it's amazing. In a lot of these places, there really wasn't much there before, but now there are a lot of things. Hope for DC's sake it continues.
Lol so it’s bad that they’re taking bad neighborhoods and gentrifying them, but what about all the crime there?
Actually, the process of gentrification started much earlier. In the mid-1980s, the Capitol Hill district was already undergoing gentrification, though there was no local government program at the time. The poor black population was being pushed to the east and south, and you saw their townhouses interspersed with those recently bought by rich homeowners or filled with young people who worked as aides in Congress or the Senate. As for the latter group, four or five roommates would rent a townhouse together, but they were pushed out, when the houses they occupied were sold.
Cool ass channel man! Keep up the good work
DC has become one of the most expensive metro areas in which to live. I lived there for a decade in the pre-gentrified mid-70s to the starting-to-gentrify in the mid-80s and already people were upset about the rising rents. Anything West of Connecticut Avenue was going to be at least twice as expensive as its eastern counterparts. The places where I lived--DuPont Circle, Logan Circle, Mount Pleasant and Adams Morgan are now untouchable. I loved the city, but it's a financial sacrifice to live there.
Cleanliness and space while valuable are not the most important metrics by which to judge the adequacy and effectiveness of a public transit system. Timeliness, safety, interruptions to service, and cost are much more important.
I think a street view comparison showing the pop ups added to DC row houses would be another interesting way to show gentrification.
23 year Capitol Hill resident here: this neighborhood has become "quietly gentrified"...not really new development, but buyers who can afford to rehab old row houses so on a scale of 1-10, they have gone from like a 4 to an 8.
?
You were considering adding Capitol Hill to a feature on recently gentrified neighborhoods of DC? Baby, Capitol Hill has been exclusive for about a century and a half.
Its gentrified post 7th street NE since the mid 90s.
One other comment I would make: a few people here have noted the word gentrification and it's negative connotation, but another one is "urban renewal." It's fallen out of favor lately and doesn't have the same connotation as it used to, but back in it's heyday it was used to describe the destruction of cities to make way for housing projects and highways, what people at the time thought was "progress."
It's mostly fine too use it now, as gentrification has become the bad word in its place, but I just wanted to spread the word on the history of that phrase.
Appreciate your feedback. Funny how certain words trigger certain feelings or thoughts and evolve over time. I wonder what will replace gentrification as the bad word?
Gentrification has primarly a Term from Germany to describe the the change from streets and communities that bad been in bad conditions and mabye even vacated to places that are 'seen as attractive and popular'.
It goes like this a place mostly empty and vacated is seens as attractive for young people because of cheap rents. Maybe artistis and new Restaurants move in. Then as demand grows renovations start to pay of and places might change by a lot.
It does not means old residents have to leave but quite often by the time this takes effect those place had already had been in demographic decline. Decades before the process starts.
Don't like call it genetrification it is just plain redevelopment.
Thingd change all the time. They can't stay the same for ever.
Urban renewal is a bit different term because it does include planed change instead of just the actions by a property owners or developer to choose to buy a place and to build something on it.
Urban renewal might even be tight to eminent domain.
What’s so interesting about a lot of this redevelopment…it’s that it’s simply development. A lot of these places were simply empty land…..after having been destroyed in the 1960s
There are a lot of pretty homes that got replaced with soulless buildings but other than that, happy for D.C.
Increasing the housing supply is very much needed but DC still maintains its charm with its classic row and townhomes.
@@cities4pplAt many points in the video I saw beautiful Victorian style homes being replaced with soulless modernist styles. That's what I am talking about. My concern are soulless buildings replacing the beauty of (some of)the older buildings over time.
A lot of modern mixed use developments look like copy and pastes of a each other, while older ones have a unique character to them. I see this in my own city.
Yes there are some built that are nice looking and it's great they're keeping within the type of building and increasing housing supply. I'll take a McMain street over a McMansion any day, however I would take a Federalist rowhouse in a narrow cobblestone street over ANYTHING; because it's gorgeous and walkable. Think the ones in Philly or Boston.
Do you know the urbanist TH-camr, the Aesthetic City? His video "What Makes Buildings Beautiful (And Why Beauty Does Matter)" is a great one to watch, if you haven't already.
I see. I actually 100% agree with everything you said. I have seen that video and partly inspired me to start my own! I simply love exploring all corners of the world so I enjoy spending hours in google street viewing the beautiful architecture. Cheers!
@@cities4pplCheers! I enjoyed the video! Hope you continue making 'em
@@patriot9487some of the buildings in this video could be any neighborhood could be anywhere in America or Canada. I’m sad local charm is disappearing.
Metro is underrated because a) it's over-priced b) it's inefficient, and c) it's poorly run. Locals know this.
You left the part out where Shaw/U Street declined due to ruing in the sixties. Some of those old businesses had been closed since then. And you're obviously not a local, as you left out Ben's Chili Bowl.
Shaw was pretty gentrified by 2000. Colombia heights was always a more upscale neighborhood. I’ll agree with H st. I wouldn’t really call navy yard gentrification it more about putting housing where old abandoned warehouses were. Logan circle was also always pretty nice calling it gentrified is like calling the lower manhattan gentrified.
Are you originally from DC. Back in the 70s to 90s if you were seen on Logan circle it was not a compliment. That street was filled with prostitution at the time.
2:38 bro all the black people just disappear
Of COURSE that was DELIBERATE
@@brucebeamon5460 it’s emblematic of the effects of gentrification
Anyone complaining about Gentrification could have bought before 2016 pretty cheaply. We bought on H Street making under 50K total. CNBC making it showing folks under 50 also buying in Shaw.
I had to check the date of this video, assuming it was about 5 years old, but no it’s more recent. Folks considering these neighborhoods should look for themselves because they have become much more unsafe and less vibrant.
Sad as it is to say - this is true.
is it really "gentrified" if these pre fabricated box constructions are right next to public section 8 housing
3:45 and 4:38 nooo why do they allow this?!
The entire DMV area is going to explode once Amazon completes its HQ2. You're going to see an avalanche of tech companies coming into the area.
I just moved out of Shaw due to my apartment getting shot out. The hotel listed in Shaw also got shot. Navy Yard is one of the areas with the most carjackings, armed and unarmed. DC is great but currently going through massive increases in crime in every area (shootings, murder, carjacking, theft, etc.). Just want to make sure to let people know if they're looking at moving there.
Apparently that gentrification isn’t solving crime. Interesting how the most gentrified city also is one of a few that have seen crime continue to increase, even though it’s fallen overall in most big cities since 2022ish. I doubt it’s indicative of a larger trend though I haven’t looked further.
@@ecoRfanwhile in most cities crime peaked in 2022 in DC it peaked in 2023.
Violent crimes are down 30% car thefts are down 33%.
Too close to Avon, Barksdale, and Bunk!
Any DC native knows it’s best to stay in the outskirts of DC such as Arlington or Silver Spring maybe. Who in the world told you Shaw was 100% safe. Next to Howard U. It’s much better now compared to the old days. A lot of transplants do not know the true history of DC.
Metro may be cleaner than NYC, but we dont have express trains or dual tracks. One set of malfunctioning doors and everones commute is f'ed. I'd trade with NYC in a heartbeat (they can keep the crime, tho)
NYC crime is way less 😂
NYC crime isn’t that bad for a big American city
Fair enough. I guess NYC metro is better period. The one thing that DC Metro has over NYC is the internal station architecture, just makes it feel more world class.
New York metro is great unreliable too. They really need urgent rapairs to installations and delays are crazy inpart the don't have enough staff. Crime is bad but delays affect all users every day.
The revitalization was needed but a lot of the architecture is just plain ugly. Boston does a much better job of medium density housing with out sacrificing design
This is great. Gentrification is such a loaded word. I wouldn’t describe this as gentrification. Gentrification is displacement of poor people, and adding all this cool development, especially development on parking lots does the opposite and protects the existing residents from displacement. We also need more public housing and expansion of Section 8, but private developments like this are good and are anti-gentrification.
You’re right - I do intentionally use the word as it’s quite controversial and misunderstood.
@@cities4ppl I guess it’s an open question but personally I think it’s better to convince people that this development *isn’t gentrification* than to try to rework the definition of gentrification to mean a totally different thing.
Washington DC is objectively one of the most gentrified cities in the US. There is a lot of literature on this subject. There has been massive displacement of low income mostly black people in DC.
@@shomardinho14 That’s true and I’m not disputing that. What I’m saying is that the mechanism of displacement is not new development, it’s the lack of new development. Especially when someone is developing a building on a parking lot it’s transparent no one is being displaced by the new building. What causes displace,ent is income inequality and exclusionary zoning. New housing solves one leg of the problem.
Gentrification is wealthier people moving into an area, not necessarily poorer people moving out. More to the point, gentrification is the biggest non-issue ever. Its more common to see the reverse, wherein poor people moving to an area displace wealthier people by undercutting wages, lowering lowering test scores, and raising crime rates. In a racialized framing this is called white flight, and is also usually regarded as a bad thing because it hurts the local economy, even though it also lowers property values. Gentrification and white flight are both regarded as bad things even though they are exact opposite phenomenon. Ultimately what people are really upset about is apparent lack of economic mobility that would otherwise limit displacement in either situation, but people don't understand that so they instead complain about the symptoms.
Washington dc was founded too look like ancient Rome how our founding fathers saw the city more classical buildings and statues
how does anyone afford to live in this city? You need a total income of like 300k a year.
DC needs to become a state and have Senate representation just like other states.
I’d watch a video about that!
YEA WHEN THE DISTRICT BECOMES MORE WHITE IT WILL HAPPEN
Or just be ceded back to MD like the Virginia side of the original DC border. A much smaller federal district could be kept in tact (downtown) that would still function as the seat of the federal government. To give DC statehood and remove it as a federal district would require an amendment to the US Constitution.
Your WISH WILL PROBABLY COME TRUE NOW that it’s being GENTRIFIED 😒
And what happens to those of us who have been their through good & bad and now can't afford this gentrification?? You keep mentioning "Once a hub of African-American".. This is happening disturbingly fast in Brooklyn 😢.
It lools like ir is still a hub for african american culture.
It is better to have a place for 10 families then home that is cheap and falling apart for 2 or 3 families.
While sometimes you can question the selection of unit size. Often not many options for families it is giving housing to many people.
Can't help but bring up skin color. America is weak. Keep up with the economy.
Gentrification is a good thing
It looks like it sucks to live there. The apartments around the national stadium look like college dorms next to a college stadium. They're kids living 5 people to a one bedroom studio apartment. They made DC look like an idiot college town. It' looks like MTV rock the vote. It used to be cool when black people lived there making gogo music banging on buckets and trash cans. Now it's the Ikea Furniture Capital of the world. It doesn't make sense. When thinking of DC you used to think of antiques and food like the fish market in old town alexandria across the river. Now it's goofy. Now Napoleon dynamite took over and it has a goofy political vibe like a high school vote for pedro election. There used to be a higher sense of education. Not like harvard business schools, or harvard law school because those are kind of asshole educations. Smithsonian, and PBS was high art and high education. DC used to have the wholesomeness of PBS. There used to be a dignity that goes beyond money or laws. There was a natural sense of what the right thing to do is, and doing a good job.
So many ugly soulless box buildings. We need to bring back Art Deco.
DC never had a lot of art deco buildings. It's traditional building styles are classical revival and renaissance revival.
The hell with DC
Too bad they're all soft on crime over there.
Violent crime is down 30% so far in 2024 and car thefts down 33%. Compared to the last year at the same time. In mid July.
Lols, gross
DC is so pretty but so boring. Wish it had more going on
Too crowded...too congested...too transient...it's soul less....love to visit....but it's no place to live...there is minimal quality of life...I lived there for 32 yrs....
The issue is that they have no representation. No senate seat. Almost no power in the house and congrees is deciding things for the city that should be left to the city council.
Good to see people who actually take pride in their local area and country are taking back what was purposefully being destroyed by people who will probably chose to go against the current the devolving world forever instead of leaving on their own.
Whoever made this video doesn’t live in DC.