| Chapter 1: | Introduction |
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Figure 1. Site of MacArthur Park subway development.
Source: McCormack Baron Salazar, who are currently (as of early 2009) the developers for the subway station site.
Historically, large-scale redevelopment projects in low-income neighborhoods, such as the one the city of Los Angeles planned for MacArthur Park, have led to the disruption of endogenous institutions and have displaced many of the residents and retail businesses from the targeted place (Anderson 1964; Gans 1982; Weiss 1980). This has been the historical pattern, from the progressive era at the turn of the century (1880s–1920s) and through the urban renewal era of the mid-1950s, and it continues today.
The interesting surprise in MacArthur Park is that, ten years after the subway was constructed and opened and ten years after the MacArthur Park area was designated as an official redevelopment area,4 the Mesoamerican neighborhood is still very much intact. In fact, there have been drastic improvements in the area, such as a strong reduction in crime, the institutionalization of certain informal services, improvements in local social services and educational facilities, greater efforts at community