Trust and the Built Environment in New York City’s Public Housing

Abstract

Public housing has been an important site for empirical research on concentrated poverty, social isolation, and social organization. Scholars have demonstrated that public housing was disproportionately built in high poverty neighborhoods, thereby exacerbating the physical and social isolation of residents. They have also hypothesized that physical features of public housing may contribute to a breakdown of social organization. These hypotheses motivated the demolition of large and physically deteriorated public housing structures throughout the United States. I use the New York City Housing and Vacancy Survey to test the hypotheses that large building size and visible building disorder are associated with mistrust among neighbors, as would be expected by theories linking the built environment to social organization. Although I find some evidence that trust is less common in large buildings with higher levels of disorder, I argue that critics of public housing overstate the social effects of the built environment.

Evaluation of the Human Settlements Environment of Public Housing Community: A Case Study of Guangzhou

“…However, if insufficient consideration was given to the design stage to public housing development, a lot of problems could arise later on in the operational stage. For instance, existing research on public housing in New York City pointed out that public housing is usually built in areas with poor economic conditions, which increases the residents' sense of isolation [1]. Some researchers pointed out common problems in public housing such as insufficient communal areas and living space for low-income families when comparing with private housing in Hong Kong [2].…”

Concentrated incarceration and the public-housing-to-prison pipeline in New York City neighborhoods

“…Whether public housing developments serve as hotbeds of, magnets for, or generators of violence is an open empirical question with studies showing support for these three perspectives, depending on the time periods, spatial levels of aggregation, and specific cities ( 29 ). Third, public housing is correlated with higher levels of youth delinquency ( 31 ), higher levels of social disorder ( 32 ), higher levels of police surveillance ( 33 , 34 ), and lower levels of social trust ( 35 ).…”

Mental Health of High-Risk Urban Youth: The Housing Subsidies Paradox

“…Yet, due to various limitations (cross-sectional study design, inadequate measurement, and lack of objective markers of environmental quality), determination of environmental characteristics as causal, in relation to mental health, remains unclear (Evans 2003). Understudied issues of social organization and the fostering of trust among neighborhood residents further contributes to lack of clarity (Beck 2019;Sampson 2012). Public housing has been criticized for its perceived disorganization (Kotlowitz 1992), resulting from its initial design and subsequent deterioration.…”

“…Public housing has been criticized for its perceived disorganization (Kotlowitz 1992), resulting from its initial design and subsequent deterioration. However, even after the Homeownership and Opportunity for People Everywhere (HOPE VI) legislation in 1993 aimed at revitalizing public housing (Gilderbloom et al 2005) improving the living conditions of many public housing residents, it was not clear if the physical changes made any positive contribution to promoting a sense of community and social organization among low-income families (Beck 2019). Additionally overcrowding and poverty have been shown to hinder community building and interpersonal trust (Beck 2019;Wacquant 1991).…”