Housing Filtration and the Intra-Urban Migration of Black Households in Milwaukee, Wisconsin

Abstract

Housing Filtration and the Intra-Urban Migration of Black Households in Milwaukee, Wisconsin LEO E. ZONN° INTRA-URBAN MIGRATION is the primary means by which the social-spatial mosaic of metropolitan America has been created and perpetuated. The pattern of household movement seems to be random at first, yet distinct patterns of movement may be distinguished upon closer scrutiny. At the largest scale, most intra-urban migration occurs within one of two distinct markets, both of which are distinguished according to race. One of these is characterized by white families, who adjust housing according to taste and within the constraints of cost and distance . The second market is comprised of blacks. These individuals also adjust housing according to taste and within the constraints of cost and distance, but most must choose a residence within the confines of a restricted market. Racial discrimination is the source of this market's formation and perpetuation, because it is a major force directing the intra-urban movement of black households.1 The movement of blacks within their own housing market is the subject of this paper.°Leo E. Zonn is Associate Professor, Department of Geography, Arizona State University. 1R. Helper, Racial Policies and Practices of Real Estate Brokers (Minneapolis : University of Minnesota Press, 1969); L. E. Zonn, "Housing and Urban Blacks: A Social Distance - Residential Distance View," Annals of Regional Science, Vol. 13 (1979), pp. 55-65. 93 94ASSOCIATION OF PACIFIC COAST GEOGRAPHERS In most cities, new and relatively high-cost housing is being constructed continuously, usually at the suburban periphery of existing residential areas. Higher income households that move into these dwellings release their previous residences to lower income households which, in turn, release their residences to yet lower income groups. This process may be envisioned as the means by which housing filters down through households or a population filters up through housing. At the bottom of the housing continuum, usually near the city center, residences of poor quality are abandoned and eventually destroyed; thus, at least hypothetically, lower income groups benefit by the access to better quality housing that has been released by higher income groups.2 The fact that most American cities are racially dichotomous provides a caveat in this seemingly simple input-output system of housing filtration, because most black and white intra-urban migration, and thus housing turnover and filtration, occurs within racially defined housing markets. Therefore, the process by which the two markets are linked and the process by which housing filtration occurs within both markets, need to be delimited before the filtration pattern for the whole metropolitan area can be clarified. Most literature concerned with housing filtration does not recognize that the housing market for blacks, 2B. J. L. Berry, "Short-Term Housing Cycles in a Dualistic Metropolis," in The Social Economy of the City, edited by G. Gappert and H. M. Rose (Beverly Hills, California: Sage Publishers, 1975), pp. 165-182; F. S. Kristof, "Housing Policy Goals and the Turnover of Housing," Journal of the American Institute of Planners, Vol. 31 (1965), pp. 232-245; F. S. Kristof, "Federal Housing Policies: Subsidized Production, Filtration and Objectives: Part I," Land Economics, Vol. 48 (1972), pp. 309-320; F. S. Kristof, "Federal Housing Policies: Subsidized Production, Filtration and Objectives: Part II," Land Economics, Vol. 49 (1973), pp. 163-174; J. B. Lansing et al., New Homes for Poor People (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1969); W. F. Smith, "Filtering and Neighborhood Change," in Internal Structure of the City, edited by L. S. Bourne (New York: Oxford University Press, 1971), pp. 170179 ; D. A. Kirby, Slum Housing and Residential Renewal: The Case in Urban Britain (London: Longman Group Limited, 1979), pp. 29-33. YEARBOOK · VOLUME 41 · 197995 which tends to be synonymous with the black ghetto, is not a totally dependent system.3 The black housing market should be examined more carefully, therefore, in terms of its internal structure and processes. Most of the new housing introduced into the total housing market is in the form of suburban housing. Blacks are notably underrepresented in the occupation of such housing, and thus the beginning of the filtration process is dominated by whites. As white households move up the housing...