Measuring Historical Urban Neighborhood Sustainability: America’s Grand Avenues

Michael Greenberg

doi:10.3390/su13031358

Abstract

From 1850 through approximately 1920, wealthy entrepreneurs and elected officials created “grand avenues” lined by mansions in New York City, Chicago, Detroit, and other developing US cities. This paper examines the birthplaces of grand avenues to determine whether they have remained sustainable as magnets for healthy and wealthy people. Using data from the US EPA’s EJSCREEN system and the CDC’s 500 cities study across 11 cities, the research finds that almost every place where a grand avenue began has healthier and wealthier people than their host cities. Ward Parkway in Kansas City and New York’s Fifth Avenue have continued to be grand. Massachusetts Avenue in Washington, D.C., Richmond’s Monument Avenue, St. Charles Avenue in New Orleans, and Los Angeles’s Wilshire Boulevard are national and regional symbols of political power, culture and entertainment, leading to sustainable urban grand avenues, albeit several are challenged by their identification with white supremacy. Among Midwest industrial cities, Chicago’s Prairie Avenue birthplace has been the most successful, whereas the grand avenues of St. Louis, Cleveland, Detroit, and Buffalo have struggled, trying to use higher education, medical care, and entertainment to try to rebirth their once pre-eminent roles in their cities.

Highlights

The industrial revolution brought unprecedented wealth and millions of eager immigrants to dozens of US cities located on the Atlantic seaboard and along the Midwest’sGreat Lakes and rivers
In response to the questions raised in the introduction, what was learned about the sustainability of historic city grand avenue-centered neighborhoods by focusing on historic grand avenues? Four observations stand out
The most obvious is that the nodes where these grand avenues originated almost always have remained locations where residents are notably healthier and wealthier than their counterparts living in the same cities

Summary

Introduction

The industrial revolution brought unprecedented wealth and millions of eager immigrants to dozens of US cities located on the Atlantic seaboard and along the Midwest’sGreat Lakes and rivers. The industrial revolution brought unprecedented wealth and millions of eager immigrants to dozens of US cities located on the Atlantic seaboard and along the Midwest’s. Entrepreneurs built mansions along grand avenues in Buffalo, Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, Galveston, Kansas City (MO), Los Angeles, New Orleans, New York City, Richmond (VA), St. Louis, and Washington, D.C., and others. Their mansions and grand streets, often 180 or more feet wide (55 m), with tree-lined medians symbolized the high quality of life that wealth could bring between 1850 and 1920. One century has passed since these grand avenues were built. With so many residential options available to affluent people, it is unrealistic to assume that mansions on grand avenues located in the heart of major cities would host so many of the wealthiest

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