The University of Minnesota Mapping Project which documented systematic racial segregation through racial covenants and redlining has been “‘the single most important recent gift to Minneapolis,” according to Tom Weber in his book “Minneapolis, an Urban Biography.” Having been a student in a summer’s class on this eye opening topic, I agree. Furthermore, before it was Minneapolis it was Dakota land and “we newcomers have generally been rotten guests,” he added.
Urban renewal here resulted in demolition of the historic Metropolitan Bldg. Whereas, Boise enhanced it’s ethnic downtown diversity (Basque block) and didn’t demolish any businesses that made downtown attractive. Less is more in the case of Boise vs. Minneapolis.
Minneapolis: White and Black neighbors didn’t “just happen,” but were the result of long standing processes carried out thousands of local residents and overseen “by exclusive leadership in the city.”
1 comment:
Very interesting!
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