Part IV: Land Use and Housing

Basically, the conclusion I came to is this: more affordable housing. Maybe that's just what's stuck in my head since that's what the end of the reading talks about, but it's still the thing that sticks out in my mind most. But it's true, we do need more affordable housing. I mean, especially in Chicago. The lack of affordable housing is insane. And this whole CHA Transformation just made the problem even worse if you ask me. I mean, I understand that they're trying to integrate certain neighborhoods and everything, but I am just extremely against it. This is how it works, just in case you don't know:

The CHA (Chicago Housing Authority) is making moves to integrate neighborhoods by tearing down the rundown projects--which are extremely segregated neighborhoods--and buliding new mixed-income housing. One third of the housing is going to be sold at full market price; one third is going towards subsidized housing (Section 8); one third is for public housing. And that's where the biggest problem lies. While it's great that they're integrating the neighborhoods that were so homogenously filled with the projects, they're forgetting that there's a whoooooole lot of people being put out on the street. OK, I take that back. They're not necessarily getting put out on the streets, but there is a big crisis over where the people from the projects are going to go. And that's where this lack of affordable housing comes into play.

With such a low amount of affordable housing, there really is this question about what are these people who aren't going to get one of the mixed-income units--what are they going to do? This issue has been on the table since even before the CHA transformation. I guess they didn't plan things out all the way, huh.