Creating ‘ethnic Disneylands’
People who stroll through Philadelphia’s Chinatown on Saturday nights bathe in the lights of intriguing new restaurants, hip tea shops and stylish lounges.
But moving beneath that shiny exterior is a torrent of forces that threaten the neighbourhood’s very existence.
An influx of luxury housing, rising rents and land values, a soaring white population and slipping Asian population could mean the end of Chinatown’s 140year role as a gateway for immigrants and a regional hub for culture and family.
That’s the conclusion of a new study by a civil rights and education group that examined two decades of property and demographic records in the three big eastern Chinatowns — those of New York, Boston and Philadelphia.
“Chinatowns on the East Coast,” the report said, “are on the verge of disappearing.”
That doesn’t mean the buildings will vanish, or that the neighbourhoods will empty of people. Far from it. It means that, if unchecked, market factors promise to turn vibrant communities into “ethnic Disneylands” where visitors come to dine.
The report by the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund (AALDEF) provides a block-byblock, lot-by-lot examination that reveals a “staggering” level of change.
Entitled “Chinatown: Then & Now, Gentrification and Displacement on the East Coast,” the study relied on planning and urban-studies researchers at the University of Pennsylvania.
It showed that in Boston’s Chinatown, Asians have become a minority. New York’s Chinatown is saturated with hotels. And in Philadelphia, the median price of a Chinatown home has nearly quadrupled in 20 years.
Ellen Somekawa, executive director of Asian Americans United, doesn’t believe raising property values is always beneficial. “If you just make it about money and the marketplace, and who can pay the most for rent, that doesn’t recognize or protect the unique role of a community like Chinatown,” she says.
Chinatowns historically served as destinations for thousands of poorer immigrants who relied on friends and family to find housing and jobs. But the location of the neighbourhoods, often on the edges of downtowns, made them vulnerable.
In Philadelphia, residents have rallied to stop a prison, casino and Phillies ballpark from being built in Chinatown. Pittsburgh’s Chinatown was destroyed to make way for a highway. Chinatown in St. Louis was demolished to build Busch Memorial Stadium.
Chinatowns “have been destroyed by the state and state-led private development projects across many decades,” said Domenic Vitiello, who teaches city planning at Penn and worked on the study. “Talking about gentrification in Chinatowns has to be a discussion cast in that larger frame.”
Today, the report said, cultural history is exploited to attract the affluent.
“At what point does Chinatown cease to be Chinatown?” the report asked. “The present rate of growth of luxury units will certainly overtake and gentrify these neighbourhoods.”