GREENIFICATION
How environmental standards fuel Hub’s housing crisis
New green building standards are giving rise to a phenomenon researchers call “environmental gentrification” — an “elite, white waterfront for the young and wealthy” that’s pricing out other residents
“We are seeing that infrastructure that is meant to protect residents against climate change actually is also triggering new dynamics of insecurity and displacement of longtime communities,” MIT graduate Isabelle Anguelovski said.
Efforts to make Boston a more climate-resilient city — like fortifying East Boston’s flood-prone waterfront — are making it more desirable for development, driving up prices and pushing out residents in the historically low-income, immigrant neighborhood, according to research published in December by Anguelovski and her colleagues at the
Barcelona Lab for Urban Environmental Justice and Sustainability.
“The waterfronts are transforming into these elite, white waterfronts for very young and wealthy residents where the kids and longer-term residents who used to go there just don’t feel comfortable,” said Anguelovski, who noted developers will even use greening efforts as selling points on marketing materials.
East Boston offers a view of what’s happening along the waterfront throughout the city — and across the world as they grapple with the consequences of climate change and rising sea levels. A 2018 Harvard study found similar examples of environmental gentrification in Florida.
In Massachusetts, 90,000 homes are at risk for “chronic flooding” — flooding that occurs every other week — by 2100. About one-third of those are in Boston and many of those in East Boston, according to a 2017 study from the Climate Ready Boston initiative.
“It’s gone from an unused, abandoned shoreline to these big-box luxury development complexes where I feel like I could never afford to live,” said Magdalena Ayed, a climate activist with Boston Harborkeepers and an Argentinian immigrant who has lived in public housing for almost two decades.
New means of development has allowed for nearly 1,000 new luxury condominiums and apartments at four “mass developments” along a mile-long stretch of East Boston’s shoreline.
Offering uninterrupted panoramic views of the Boston skyline, apartments at The Eddy, Clippership Wharf, Portside and Boston East can retail upwards of $5,000 a month for a two-bedroom apartment. That’s a far cry from what the typical East Boston resident earning about $52,000 a year can afford — black and Latino households earn even less on average.
Rent in East Boston more than tripled over the last 20 years, jumping from $875 a month for a one-bedroom in 2000 to nearly $2,600, according to city and market data.
The steepest hikes in the neighborhood took hold over the past decade as the waterfront building boom brought 2,300 new apartments and condominiums online.
About 20% of those new units are deeded affordable, but City Councilor Lydia Edwards — who represents the district — said the percent will have to be much higher to avoid large-scale displacement of immigrants and working-class residents who call East Boston home.
“If we develop without a plan to include all people and all income levels, we will not have a community, waterfront or seaport with all income levels,” Edwards said.
Walsh said in a statement his administration has “focused on creating thousands of affordable housing opportunities and introduced new ways to prevent gentrification and displacement. Our housing, development and climate teams work together to ensure affordable housing in the city is available and protected from the impacts of climate change.”
Researcher Anguelovski describes this climate gentrification as an “unintended consequence of well-meaning climate resiliency efforts” — one that won’t be rectified without aggressive planning efforts.