Does green infrastructure affect housing prices via extreme heat and air pollution mitigation? A focus on green and climate gentrification in Los Angeles County, 2000-2021

Abstract

Climate threats' increased frequency and intensity have recently severely threatened human health. In particular, racial/ethnic minority people have been disproportionately exposed to extreme heat and air pollution, but the cause of this is unclear. Green infrastructure can effectively mitigate heat waves and air pollution but is disproportionately distributed. Previous studies found that the introduction of green infrastructure could lead to green gentrification, which increases housing prices and drives out minorities nearby. This phenomenon could be an essential cause of climate threat inequity. Thus, this study, focusing on the linked process, measured the direct and indirect effect of neighborhood green infrastructure, extreme heat, and air pollution on single-family housing prices from 2000 to 2021 in LA County. We found that neighborhood extreme heat, air pollution (negatively), and green infrastructure (positively) have significantly affected housing prices and have increased recently. Notably, green infrastructure's indirect effects via mitigation of extreme heat and air pollution on housing prices increased more recently. In addition, recently increased inequity of green, climate, and housing prices by race/ethnicity showed that the increased impact of extreme heat, air pollution, and green infrastructure on housing prices could be a key reason for racial/ethnic minority people's green and climate gentrification acceleration.