Urban Desirability

As white people flocked from the intensely redlined Brooklyn into suburbs, areas we know as trendy today like Bed-Stuy, Williamsburg and Bushwick, were deemed hazardous, dangerous places where criminals and poor people lived. It is during this era that Brooklyn was home to the largest Black community in the country. Historically, it has never been poor Black and Brown people moving into urban spaces, then destroying them. Rather Black and Brown people finding themselves in urban spaces that were predestined and planned to be abandoned. Infrastructure declined rapidly, public services were nowhere to be found and intense poverty was more and more concentrated.

People enjoying themselves at Albee Square Mall
Tools of segregation

Black and Brown people survived this period of blatant discrimination and prevented the real estate market from collapsing by building community gardens, creating block associations, kids swept the streets, and neighborhood clinics to name a few. Despite the way in which the community persevered and helped one another, Brooklyn’s appeal and desirability from outsiders was at an all-time low; so much so that by the 1970s, nearly all big and beloved department stores had left downtown Brooklyn. On the other hand, downtown’s infamy held space for small business owners that previously couldn’t have afforded a lease in the area, and as years went by, downtown Brooklyn became a staple for socializing, shopping, and having a good time, not having to worry about being judged or feeling unwelcomed. By the 80s and 90s, Fulton mall was known as the third most profitable shopping district in the city, right after fifth ave and Madison Ave in Manhattan. It was a place where the population’s culture and identity could be felt in the products; downtown was where people could get their sneakers, their Sunday best, glasses, jewelry, and Black literature among other things that couldn’t be found anywhere else.