Harks back to the San Fran conversation we had a month back. Austin is a very strange case, because as the reporter points out, it really makes no bones about its segregation. The interstate highway near-perfectly divides the races.
A point worth making is that south Austin (very Hispanic) and east Austin (black and Hispanic, more or less) are by far the most interesting parts of town. I grew up in west Austin, being white. West Austin's just a giant suburb. I spent all my time in south Austin, where the food, head shops and fun neighborhoods are. I guess what I'm trying to say is that the segregation is in my opinion extremely detrimental to both sides of the coin, not just the segregated group. Strange situation in Austin.
And of course disregarding for what purpose the segregation was originally begun, it's a largely economic thing now. That's pretty hard to reverse.
The article uses this statistic as the bedrock of its claim that Austin is in trouble re segregation. First, it's a statistic of income based segregation, not race -though I realize the two often go hand-in-hand (unfortunately) :
Secondly, Austin is TENTH on the list behind cities like New York, DC, Philly etc. -Not saying it's good to be "tenth" but it's also not terribly surprising given the large hispanic population. When people hear/read the word segregation they tend to automatically think "black" in the US based on our history. You mention that West Austin is black/hispanic while South Austin is more hispanic. Seems the income inequality is largely hispanic vs. white in Austin compared to other cities. -just a guess.
You are right, it's largely an economic thing and imo has less to do with businesses/white people intentionally segregating and more to do with businesses grabbing up cheap realestate and giving jobs to the educated. So, as always in these types of conversations the solution lies in educating our populace -ALL OF OUR POPULACE.
By the way, I've noticed that many other cities, Durham included, have adopted the keep ____ weird motto. Copy-cats. I love Austin, had a great time at scrimetime's wedding there. South Congress (SOCO) is a blast.
posted 3597 days ago