Not all new parks are linked to gentrification in low-income neighborhoods

Does the construction of new parks inevitably lead to nearby low-income neighborhoods becoming gentrified? It depends, find Alessandro Rigolonand Jeremy Németh. Studying different kinds of parks in ten US cities, they determine that function and location, not a park’s size, are linked to gentrification. Neighborhoods close to long, thin, centrally located parks like New York’s High-Line, are over 230 percent more likely to gentrify than other neighborhoods, while parks – both big and small – have little effect on poorer neighborhoods located at the edges of cities.

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