maximios

Thoughts and reflections as I turn 40 this week, and learn how to dwell at peace in space. In my fifth week of working in mall retail for the first time, I have learned that I am excellent at selling things. Actual things, like soap shaped like balls. And sometimes pink

Since my last email where I talked about being soft evicted, picking up work at the mall for the holidays, moving in temporarily with one of my best friends, and battling with IngramSpark so my book could come out, and getting but possibly not being able to use a DC

Just days after I uploaded my final copy of The Defying Gentrification Playbook to IngramSpark, so that it can be in your hands by December 16, I received spectacular news and terrible news. Pre-Order on Bookshop First, the spectacular news. I’m a DC Arts and Humanities Fellowship Grantee for the fiscal

This is a book written, typeset, and designed by me.

It’s the rawest, most real thing I ever expected to write for professional consumption.

And it’s the book I’ve needed for myself as I’ve done my best to defy gentrification, that refuses to be destroyed.

So many Black folks, especially the women and other gender marginalized ones, are heads of households, but those households don’t get enough salary and benefits to really thrive.

We get called welfare queens and uppity for just wanting a decent place for us and those we care about to lay our heads.

Many of us, despite working since our teenage years, cannot afford the average market-rate apartment or home in any US city or state.

And, as someone who’s been in rooms with some of the real estate and development decision makers, many who can’t comprehend folks that can’t afford their products, I decided it was time to get real about what’s needed to make sure Black folks are housed.

And, instead of just yelling at those folks in that room, I made sure that I gave gentle advice and encouragement to my fellow sista-siblings, that we aren’t broken and we are enough.

Housing is a human right, and there are more than enough things to use to play with money and build our wealth. Our backs, without our full consent, are not one of them.

So here I am, publishing what I think is the first self-help architecture and planning workbook for Black folks of marginalized genders (and the people that love and support them).

Regular readers and longtime supporters. I told you I would come back to this newsletter when I had a date for pre-orders and a place to launch the book. Well, I do have a release date, December 16, 2025, the Tuesday after my birthday. And in my next email, you’ll

Listen/watch an annotated version of this newsletter above or on your favorite podcast player. https://youtu.be/MsfnWGbPr7E Yes, gentrification is fascism and I don’t need to cite any other sources besides my own life experience to say it. I will include this link to the Hampton Insittute’s policy paper from 2021 that makes

Welcome back to Defying Gentrification, Crafting Liberation — an art, design, and policy newsletter/journal of myself Kristen Jeffers, a Black queer feminist disabled millennial (US southern)urbanist. In each of these newsletters, I share a reflection on how I see one of my six principles of Defying Gentrification work in my

In my last email/post, I had all but given up on this idea of defying gentrification. Then it hit me, my very existence in a world hostile to everything I am is defiance. I am enough. And when I thought about that I was like hey, there’s still something I

Hey y’all. I haven’t felt jolly for months, years even, and all of my wishes for you this year, have been very profane and anguish-ridden. I wanted to spare y’all those, but I did let loose in a semi-private online forum. Also, my apologies for ghosting y’all here. Technical difficulties

Welcome back to Eight Years a Washingtonian, a series where I talk about what I’ve learned since I moved here in 2016. That year was consequential for not just me but the region and the so-called country I live in, so I am, in a way, treating this like I’ve

This is a book written, typeset, and designed by me.

It’s the rawest, most real thing I ever expected to write for professional consumption.

And it’s the book I’ve needed for myself as I’ve done my best to defy gentrification, that refuses to be destroyed.

So many Black folks, especially the women and other gender marginalized ones, are heads of households, but those households don’t get enough salary and benefits to really thrive.

We get called welfare queens and uppity for just wanting a decent place for us and those we care about to lay our heads.

Many of us, despite working since our teenage years, cannot afford the average market-rate apartment or home in any US city or state.

And, as someone who’s been in rooms with some of the real estate and development decision makers, many who can’t comprehend folks that can’t afford their products, I decided it was time to get real about what’s needed to make sure Black folks are housed.

And, instead of just yelling at those folks in that room, I made sure that I gave gentle advice and encouragement to my fellow sista-siblings, that we aren’t broken and we are enough.

Housing is a human right, and there are more than enough things to use to play with money and build our wealth. Our backs, without our full consent, are not one of them.

So here I am, publishing what I think is the first self-help architecture and planning workbook for Black folks of marginalized genders (and the people that love and support them).

Regular readers and longtime supporters. I told you I would come back to this newsletter when I had a date for pre-orders and a place to launch the book. Well, I do have a release date, December 16, 2025, the Tuesday after my birthday. And in my next email, you’ll

Listen/watch an annotated version of this newsletter above or on your favorite podcast player. https://youtu.be/MsfnWGbPr7E Yes, gentrification is fascism and I don’t need to cite any other sources besides my own life experience to say it. I will include this link to the Hampton Insittute’s policy paper from 2021 that makes

Welcome back to Defying Gentrification, Crafting Liberation — an art, design, and policy newsletter/journal of myself Kristen Jeffers, a Black queer feminist disabled millennial (US southern)urbanist. In each of these newsletters, I share a reflection on how I see one of my six principles of Defying Gentrification work in my

In my last email/post, I had all but given up on this idea of defying gentrification. Then it hit me, my very existence in a world hostile to everything I am is defiance. I am enough. And when I thought about that I was like hey, there’s still something I

Hey y’all. I haven’t felt jolly for months, years even, and all of my wishes for you this year, have been very profane and anguish-ridden. I wanted to spare y’all those, but I did let loose in a semi-private online forum. Also, my apologies for ghosting y’all here. Technical difficulties

Welcome back to Eight Years a Washingtonian, a series where I talk about what I’ve learned since I moved here in 2016. That year was consequential for not just me but the region and the so-called country I live in, so I am, in a way, treating this like I’ve

Welcome back to Eight Years a Washingtonian, a series where I talk about what I’ve learned since I moved here in 2016. That year was consequential for not just me but the region and the so-called country I live in, so I am, in a way, treating this like I’ve

Part 3 of My Series Eight Years a Washingtonian, On My Relationship with this Town’s Largest Industry. Everything I’ve done that’s paid more than the (quite high for the United States) minimum wage in this region has been in service to or in the influence of a form of a

I mentioned in a prior post that I do a fair amount of walking and I no longer have my car now that I’m in DC. I wanted to break that down and help folks getting started here without a car to understand how car-free life works. This is very D.C. specific, but I used the same logic in a more modified form in Kansas City and in Raleigh in undergrad.

There are nine steps. Think of them as a Mazlow’s Hierarchy of Needs for transportation.

Step 1–Go on a map and get adjusted to where you actually live, not where you think you live in your head.

Especially if your only experience in DC is the area between the Capitol Building and the Lincoln Memorial, which by the way is 2.6 miles long and takes 56 minutes to walk in its entirety. I learned the hard way back in 2009 how large of a walk this is. We went to the Lincoln Memorial at night on our first day of our visit. I continued to have pain throughout the remainder of my trip that was only fixed when I started wearing hosiery. Thankfully this was during November and they also helped keep me warm.  These days, I’m still adjusting my schedule and my backpack weight so I don’t end up with back aches from carrying my whole life around to too many places across the city daily.

This is also a plea to learn your neighborhood name (or names in my case, as I technically overlap and depending on who I’m talking to, this can be a cause for consternation and write me off as being a trustworthy individual). Please also learn how to say neighborhoods like Glover Park and that it’s Malcolm X Park and National Airport and Anacostia is just the area around the Frederick Douglass House. Try not to truncate neighborhood names other than NoMa./rant

Use Google Maps and overlay the Metro on the actual map. You will thank me, when you realize that Shady Grove is not that close at all. In fact, I’ll give you a bone, here’s the D.C. Metro map to proper scale.

D.C. Metro Map at the Actual Scale of the System by Peter Dvorak. Click on the image to see all of his pictures and to purchase his work as a print.

Step 2–Understand that while this city moves at a faster pace, you travel at a slightly slower pace over less land, especially if you live inside the District or close in.

Actually, even if you live pretty far out, don’t expect ease of travel during rush hours on weekdays. Also, if you are commuting and you find that you would be better served living close to your office, in one of the suburban areas, go live there and be closer to not just your work, but a handful of quality happy hour places and suburban big box stores and trails and 20-60 minute trains into downtown and back out. Or if you’re like me and like being in the middle of everything, as I’ve managed to do as a stroke of luck, by all means, stay where you are future (or present) neighbor. Or, you may find family is close by, but work may change. Or work may just change. Or you start dating someone.

As good chefs know, keeping a well-stocked pantry with your staples helps maintain some consistency in cooking. The same goes for your commute. With so many choices, you could travel so many ways. However, time and money are still finite and you want to maximize them both as you choose how to get around the region.

Step 3 –See how far you can walk to get to your destination.

Every day for me is a walking architecture tour. You may find that for yourself as well, so definitely start exploring on the sidewalks. You may find that even if you walk slow, you’ll get to your destination cheaper, faster and with some physical activity built in. From my position on Georgia Avenue, I walk to Petworth station, to the Shaw/Howard station, to U Street and to the Columbia Heights station. If I wanted to get more exercise in, Adams Morgan and Chinatown and Dupont and Metro Center become part of my walkshed.

If the only things I needed to do were in walking distance every day, I would stop here and I’d have a perfect budget and I’d be living in a perfect village. But we can’t all live in Clarendon. And because we all don’t just live in Clarendon and sometimes we want to go to a Smithsonian museum or a Nats game, we have to use more than our two feet. Also, what If I can’t walk?

Step 4–See how far you can bike, both with your personal bike and Capital Bikeshare.

I am still proud of myself for making this journey with Lina, even if I had to space over two days and use the hotel storage where I was attending the event. At this moment I’m just across the Potomac from the monument core on the Mt. Vernon Trail.  

First of all, if you haven’t ridden a bike in years, and you already know your balance isn’t the greatest, I would reach out to my friends at the Washington Area Bicyclist Association(WABA) and see when their next learn-to -ide class is. Then, I would go on Craigslist or to one of the local thrift stores and see where you can get a nice used bike. Folks at WABA can help you with that as well. I would not buy a bike from Walmart or Target. They may be cheap, but they are so heavy, you might as well be riding a Capital Bikeshare (CaBi). Once you pay your $85 a year for a CaBi membership, you get 30 minutes free per bike and there are stations all over. I suggest you get a fob, even if you don’t plan on using it much.

I will admit though that uphill rides can be a bit rough and anything north of U Street and Florida Avenue starts the uphill climb, at least in the Northwest quadrant. Also, CaBi stations get sparse the further north you go. And if you’re in one the main dense suburbs, you may have slightly better comfort and markings to go where you need to go or you may have nothing at all. Also, learn how to lock your own bike down, so all of it is there when you get back. If you want comfort maps at your fingertips here are ones for:

• D.C.–http://ddot.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/ddot/publication/attachments/dc_bike_map_2012_full_version.pdf
• Arlington–http://www.bikearlington.com/pages/maps-rides/ …
• Montgomery County–http://mcatlas.org/bikestress/#

(If your part of the metro has one, let me know. I crowdsourced this list via Twitter after exclaiming that I knew about Arlington’s map, but where were the other major regional maps).

Step 5–Mix in Metrobus and Circulator and your county bus system (ART, DASH, RideOn, The Bus)

Don’t look down on the bus. Especially when the bus helps your wallet and actually saves you time. I live off of Georgia Ave. I like doing a few things and visiting people who live in Silver Spring. I also like being downtown quickly. The 70s buses help me do that quick and easy. I just know it’s 20 minutes in either direction and I’m thankful I don’t have to walk. One day there will be no delays and I’ll get a good seat, but I can’t beat the $1.75 in each direction. The 79’s especially great for taking an express route to where I need to go. The Washington Post has a great primer on how to use the bus for the first time. Also, ask if your destination has a free or direct or both shuttle. This is what makes Potomac Mills Mall even possible, as well as the National Harbor, although both now have public transit routes. I doubt they will ever be in the Metrorail system and VRE, the Virginia side commuter rail, just scratches the surface of the Potomac Mills area and not at a high frequency.

Step 6– Now take Metrorail. Or VRE or MARC, depending on which state your suburb is in.

Two #newtrains, passing in the wind… Speaking of Metrorail. As of this writing, you may have not heard the best things about Metrorail, the thing you probably think about when you hear the word Metro used in reference to the train or any transit around D.C. However, it’s hands down the best way to cross the rivers, especially with your own bike. Also, I’m using it to go to Capitol Hill (Eastern Market to be exact) and down to the Waterfront/Nats Park areas. It’s also become most convenient to cross town this way, instead of try and do it on bus (being underground is warmer). My storage unit is adjacent to West Hyattsville. Thankfully, because I have a life that’s more than just using the train to go places in the metro (but all about grabbing Amtrak at Union Station to go up and down the eastern seaboard and the yellow line for further flights out at National Airport), I don’t have to worry too much about this thing called SafeTrack.

However, if you live in any suburb, it’s either express bus to one of the major suburban junctions or it’s the stop in your suburb that you live close to. Unless you add the Virginia Railway Express (VRE) or the MARC train, depending on which state you live in or are communing to and from. Honestly, doing this to Baltimore or BWI Airport will save you some sanity and money. Please again look at the Metro map above, the one with the real distances , and decide if it’s really worth the extra money to ride down F/G street versus walk or bus those four blocks inside the District.

Also, I keep my SmarTrip Card around my neck and I load it with a cash amount as needed. If I was doing more riding both the bus and the rail system, I’d invest in a pass. If you know you’re primarily using one or the other or both as transportation, and doing it at least 3 times a week, then I’d go with one of the passes at the WMATA site. Also, the speciality ones do make great jewelry or bragging rights. You do need a different set of tickets for VRE and MARC, but you can go here and get tickets for everything transit and train related in the region.

Step 7–Uber and Lyft, too.

I’m trying to reduce my dependence on these two, by dressing properly for the weather and being less afraid of walking home alone before 9 p.m. However, for late nights, tight timelines when I think I’m walking or biking or busing the right direction, but I’m really just lost, and carting stuff home from the grocery (although I’m looking into one of those carts for my Giant/Target trips), Lyft and Uber have been my lifeline. Oh and when you have really good friends who live way out past Metro stops. This also applies when Metro is shut down and your bus drops frequency or stops running.

I’ve not done it yet, but I’ve heard you can buy trips in bulk as well.

Step 8–Car to Go, ZipCar or Enterprise Car Share.

I’ve only done one of these and that was so I could drive around a city that didn’t have as much transit on the opposite end of my trip. I have ridden in all but a Car to Go with people who are members of these services. Again, this is what you do when you need to go somewhere that’s not as car-free friendly like Rehoboth Beach, you need to haul a ton of things from a storage unit or boxes from IKEA (although I know someone who has carted a vacuum cleaner on Metro from Target) or there are really no other good options to get where you need to go.

Step 9– Reconsider Car-Ownership.

I only miss her at night, and when I’m tired and don’t want to put in the work all these other modes require. But then I think about the hurting I put on her on the streets and parking downtown…and the fact that I was already down to driving her only every other day or every two days even in Kansas City. I think she’s in a happier place with her new owner. You can only get your friends to drive you so much. You may want to become an Uber or Lyft driver yourself or have a business that requires you to haul things or a job that requires you to spot funds for site visits. You might get on a Home Depot/Apartment Therapy kick and it becomes a self-care activity. Your kids may just cause you more trouble on the bus and Metro than its worth, if they even come close enough to your house.

Also, if you don’t live in the District proper or you’re somewhere that’s still not well served by transit or you have a social or work life largely outside of the District, and you can park easily, as many folks not in what’s considered the Old City do, then by all means, do get a vehicle of your own (or figure out how to get your vehicle here).

Yes, this statement may throw out everything I just mentioned. However, I’m an advocate at the end of the day for a multi-modal future, not necessarily a car-free future. Also, some of you like driving in the demolition derby known as driving in the core of the District of Columbia (and to be honest, certain parts of close-in suburbs that will remain nameless). And some of you should volunteer yourselves as tributes, I mean Uber, Lyft, Postmates, Instacart, Door Dash or a litany of other delivery service drivers so those of us who wreck our vehicles every other year, who get anxiety behind the wheel (or sometimes traveling period), don’t have to drive.

The extra money  you make using an app could potentially pay off any expenses that come with having the vehicle. Do know again, that your vehicle can become more trouble than it’s worth. Maintenance, parking and fines are all higher here. That’s what ultimately tipped me to sell my car and not bring it to the District.

Finally, we are at the top of the pyramid! Your commuting and traveling equation may look different, but if you’re looking to go car-free for the first time or in a long time and you also want to save money and be efficient on how you get around, consider my method or create a sustainable one of your own!

Other Resources

• GoDCGo (The official transportation demand management site of the D.C. Government)–http://www.godcgo.com
• RometoRio (Great resource that predicts how much a particular mode or combination of modes costs)–https://www.rome2rio.com/
• Transit app (You will want this or Moovit or something to supplement Google and Apple Maps sometimes paltry route tracking and directional skills and mode combining on your phone)–https://transitapp.com

I’m Kristen. Six years ago, I started blogging here to make sense of the built environment around me. You can find me on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. You can find out more about me at my main website, www.kristenejeffers.com. 

The keys to my commute. Yes, that includes my headphones and my library card.

There’s a reason I walk around with my DC SmartTrip card hanging around my neck. And I post time-lapse Instagrams and such of the KC Streetcar working well. Why I wish I could park my car for good and why I relish walking in even 90 degree heat, if it means I’m able to propel myself to my destination. Or in the old days, walking just an 1/8 of a mile to a bus stop near my parents homes, that would take me straight downtown and open up the rest of Greensboro.

And it’s definitely why the root of this blog is my musings on wanting a train in Greensboro. Why I spent a year working in an official capacity for bike and pedestrian infrastructure improvements. Why I still will write these kinds of posts pushing for transportation options and most certainly equity. My parents used public transportation. They had cars too, but they also supported me taking Amtrak (including of course my first memorable trip from Greensboro to DC with my mom) and they supported my solo trips, which sometimes included cars and which sometimes did not.

This is what personally makes me disappointed with this call recently, even after all this maintenance is done, for DC’s WMATA (the umbrella that the rail and bus sit under) to shut down Metrorail even earlier at night and to not open it early. I’ve noticed that even in supportive forums online, people have noted that the system wasn’t meant to be a subway, a modern city enterprise.

Really? So the Nation’s Capital isn’t a modern global metro region. Yeah, the one with the three working airports, one with so many international air carriers, it makes my head spin. There are many people who have had at least one late night out and about where they lost track of your imbibing, and I’m sure they are VERY thankful that all they had to do is stumble and giggle onto a train, in lieu of stumbling and giggling into jail or worse. (I do want to remind folks that drinking responsibly is the best way to combat this, but still…)

And what about those fine bartenders, waiters, hosts and such. Maybe that was you 20 years ago, but you moved up in the world. Really, moved up, huh? Should we not be happy to be employed at anything, especially considering the kind of world we’ve been living in, for dare say my lifetime of 30 years. Or even better, the people who’ve always worked the overnight shift, the ones who make sure you can get your fresh kale smoothie you reluctantly drink because now you need to fix your health.

Sometimes when I go to see my friend Screech and the game runs late, hopping on the Green Line is my best bet. Well…it was.

I’ll stop stereotyping when you do. I’ll stop criticism when we do the right thing and start recognizing that our cities, not just DC, but all of them, can’t call themselves cities or even members of a metro region, where commuting is vital and necessary to prop up all these extra houses and Walmarts, empty or not, if we don’t have comprehensive transportation.

And comprehensive transportation includes either 24-hour trains, or 24-hour buses or 24-hour bikeshares. Or all three at once! And no car-sharing is not the same. Rates on even the cheapest option can easily surge. Having worked with a GPS sharing economy app, I often have to rely on GPS to get me to even the most familiar places for the first time, due to the pressure of getting a route and order right. But not a transit operator, who’s been drilled on the proper way of going and even better, has the benefit of a fixed route. Hardwired in the ground or painted on the side.

Don’t you like knowing exactly where you’re going when you travel?

Also, these things don’t go unnoticed by higher powers. In Boston, which already has seen service drops and even fare increases as it faces up to  maintenance issues, the Federal Transit Administration took them to task back in March for these actions, and failing to finish a report that would have highlighted impacts to poor communities and communities of color (which while not always the same, tend to be the same thanks to all the redlining we’ve done over the years and continue to do).

Does Metro, in the FTA’s backyard, in a city famous for its diversity coupled with its regal nature as our seat of government, think they’ll escape these kinds of criticism? Do they think that private cars, either as taxis, app-based services and possibly drunk drivers is a real solution? Unfortunately, thanks to the lack of grid in some areas and the flat-out lack of sidewalk in others, plus, speed levels that are much too high for a core city, biking and walking don’t always make sense.

We need all parts to work together.

I care so much now because as a handful of you know, I’ll be making the move from KC back to the DC Metro area in a few weeks. With my budget and with where I may be working, Metrorail may be a lifeline. I, like many, are choosing where to live due to proximity of transit service. Yes, you friend up there might drive downtown, but having sat in car traffic downtown, I can tell you that’s not always the solution either.

Plus, when I was in Toronto last year, I seamlessly switched between the night bus and the day train. Even if the solution is night buses, on express routes, at least that’s dedicated routes. And I know that many buses in the DC Metro are already running close to all night. But at what frequency? I could be ok with higher frequencies and official bus bridges if I knew that I would still get to my destination promptly.

No matter what, the core of my writing on communities has always hinged on strong transportation options. Let’s get back to doing that. And if you live in DC or the Metro region already, read this and submit your name to the petition at the end.

I’m Kristen. I’ve written here about cities and places and how we can make them better for almost 6 years. You can learn more about me here. And you can follow me here, here and here.

The Black Urbanist has created a community of architects, planners, engineers, community developers, journalists, and citizens committed to celebrating the urban form, as well as its diversity.

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Email me at [email protected] with your ad and how many weeks you want. I will then invoice you via Intuit Quickbooks. Invoices must be paid in full by midnight the Saturday before the Monday of your first ad.  ALL AD SALES ARE FINAL, but we can stop running the ad early if your position is filled or it’s canceled. We can also edit any ads for events that need to be rescheduled and change their run dates to be more relevant to the event.

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I’m breaking my inspiring person rules today, to highlight someone I’ve only met virtually. Yet, when I read their writing, I feel like I already know them. Plus, pretty soon, I plan to fix the fact that we only know each other through our blogs. That person would be Kaid Benfield, currently in transition from the NRDC to Placemakers.

This is Inspiring People and it’s what I do on Sundays here on The Black Urbanist to highlight people in the urbanism/local government/planning/placemaking/add your adjective here space to highlight how they inspire me as a person also in this space. I’m also dropping a book next Monday. A Black Urbanist-Essays Vol. 1 is my first stab at putting these thoughts on literal paper. I’ll be launching an e-edition via a site called Gumroad on December 1, which will present it as a PDF. Look for a print and mainstream e-book edition in the future. Either way, it’s a great way to support what I’m doing here at The Black Urbanist. Check it out here.

In 2009, I was just another blogger who occasionally wrote about smart growth issues. This blog hadn’t quite been thought up yet. Yet, there were a small minority of folks who I followed and occasionally heard feedback from. Kaid’s one of those people. Another reason I find him admirable is that one, he’s a fellow North Carolinian and two he’s a lawyer. Not a planner, architect, government official or anyone else you’d expect to be as well written on placemaking as Kaid is. Plus I’m including this excerpt that I’ve bracketed from his recent book People Habitat. I think it speaks for itself as to why I find him inspiring.

I invite you to take a look at his blogs, pick up his book (and mine too) and take a dive into someone who I can’t wait to have coffee with and discuss learning from our home state what it means to love the place you are born and the environment where you live.

I wanted to discuss a comment about cities that came up in the debate/ town hall last night. Note, this is not a post endorsing one or the other, although I’ll say that I’m with her. But the issue brought up is one that trips up a lot of people when it comes to talking about metropolitan policy and how black folks have been allowed to move about and take part in the environments that have been built and paved and provided for us.

First of all, the debate’s mention of urban policy and where black folks tend to live assumes a concentric city model, which looks like those diagrams of the earth where you cut it open and you have a ball in the center and rings around until you get to the crust, which is where we actually live.

This is the Burgess Concentric City Model. He applied it to Chicago first. However, maybe it should have been a rainbow instead…

The actual model goes into even more detail about human pathways, but I’m going to simplify it to three rings: the core, the suburban rings and the crust which is rural farm and natural areas. The core in this globe is the inner city. You have a business district, a city hall, maybe a county hall, the largest school, possibly the high school, a college or university and then you have either old money wealthy whites (or others of color who were able to maintain wealth since the city was first built). You also have the regional sports stadiums and other institutions marketed and intended for the entire region to use. If you have a major public transit system, all the routes lead to this area. When people come to visit your town, this is what they think of and this is where the things geared to them are located. Also, the name of this  inner core city, is often the name the entire region uses to define itself, when defining itself to people from the outside.

However, after World War II, when we had the second wave of suburban development, the department stores started to leave, along with others that catered directly to white folks, who were moving into the suburban areas. A few years later, black folks were allowed to  move out and onward, so essentially, all the people left in the “inner city” were the poor people of color, LGBTQA+ people and others deemed less American and undesirable.

This is where the bulk of the logic of that particular candidate comes from. Also, that candidate has participated in the development of cities for many years and from what I’ve been able to observe, subscribes to a inner core, then suburban rings that just have houses and a few services, and are restricted to certain types of people, then rural crust where all the farms and the things that sustain us (or the corporations that make all of our food, textiles and the like) are. This is probably the idea they have when they want to make the country great again. Basically make us all perfect round balls of metro areas. (Among other things…)

However, this was never quite the case anywhere. Why?

1. Some cities are built along a riverfront. This automatically rules out having a round ring of neighborhoods in many cities. This is what you see in Chicago, Detroit and St. Louis. The irony is that the model I just mentioned in its original form was applied to Chicago. Maybe it should have been a rainbow instead of a full circle.
2. Some cities grew in pairs or clusters. So there are multiple metro cores and farmland that became suburban rings and then all grew together to become one mega region. New York is really this, but with water separating the various cores and rings. Also, I grew up in the Piedmont Triad region of North Carolina. Not to be confused with the Research Triangle Region of North Carolina where I went to undergrad. Both started as triangles and are now adjacent amorphous blobs. Trying to make this a circle will only make your head hurt and you sound stupid.
3. Economics and family structures have always determined where people choose to live. People need to be close to the things that help them survive, like jobs and food. Wealthier  people get to have more of what they like nearby. Some wealthy people wanted farmland, others wanted cultural institutions. Those others, who are at the mercy of working a job, go wherever the job is. And then those who have chosen to raise children often build and move where they feel their family will get the most of the values they want to institute into their children.
4. Black families and sometimes Latinx and Asian families, basically anyone who was not considered white when it comes to schooling, real estate and access to public spaces and services, has always had to reckon with where slavery, then Jim (and Juan) Crow, then redlining, then urban renewal and now, mass incarceration and the aftermath of being incarcerated,  affordability or upward mobility allow them to go. For myself, my upward mobility and personal preferences dictate that I want to be near the cultural centers and also in areas where retail is clustered, which is becoming the inner cities again. But I’m a business owner just starting out, so I am on a budget. I’m also car-free, partly because of economics. Other friends, of all races and nationalities, are having children and want them to have their own safe yards, that they can manage and not have to worry about police or even neighbors shooting at their children. Because so many inner core areas closed schools or don’t provide similar public options, smaller towns in the metro regions, that are often written off as suburbs, are a more attractive option. Oh, and Target. It all really boils down to who’s good enough for Target. And who Walmart hasn’t left yet.

So what’s really going on and what should I make of this?

What I invite folks to do in the light of this particular comment and the work here, is to research the history of how your specific metro area was built, governed and developed since its inception. Each metro area, while it shares a few common elements, applies those elements differently. We need to know how our metros are made, because it’s going to take a ground-up effort to make things better. Also, you’ll sleep better knowing that living in the suburbs or inner city or on a farm or even in a shack (tiny house!) may not be a bad or shameful thing.

How Do You Start that Research?

1. Wikipedia. Seriously, the entries on your metro area will help you find basic information and also help you find primary sources and places to go to learn why your city has its shape and how people have made it have that shape over the years.
2. Historians and librarians in your metro area, as well as urban planners and others working in community design and governance— Basically anyone working to make sure everyone who lives in an area is accounted for and is part of the story of your city. They will help you make sure what you read is right and give you even more books to read and places to go to find information. They will also be able to point you to other people like…
3. Long-time community residents, suggested by the professionals above. This is where you get the real stories and the more nuanced stories of why people do what they do. Or, even better, you can talk to your older family members. Record those chats, as they are history. I love what the new podcast Historically Black is doing around black oral histories. StoryCorps, and even shows like This American Life and Stuff Your Mom Never Told You are also doing a great job of uncovering local and social histories as well. (I’m going to shamelessly plug my podcast with Katrina Johnston-Zimmerman here, Third Wave Urbanism as well, where we also talk about how metro areas are really made and average people).

Above all, let those of us who are professionals stress about where people actually live. No matter where you live and what your story is, you have value. Developers and builders and city leaders, remember that the next time you decide what needs to be built or torn down in your city.

Also, please make a wise decision about voting on November 8, 2016  and during other times when elections are called in your city. Especially when other elections are called in your metro area. These folks have the direct keys to your success as a city.

I’m Kristen! Six years ago, I started blogging here to make sense of the built environment around me. You can find me on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. You can find out more about me at my main website, www.kristenejeffers.com. 

My (late) Black North Carolinian dad was a key influence in my being interested in the city. We used to bike around our working-class neighborhood, walk to the neighborhood ballpark and go downtown to all the festivals. He also took me to more school buildings than I would care to share. My Black North Carolinian mom taught in some of those school buildings and encouraged me to write my first books, make my first crafts, dance on beat and have a moral center. Between the two of them and my years in Greensboro, Raleigh, Durham, Kansas City, Washington, D.C., and Baltimore, I grew up and into a love of architecture, streets, trees, buses, trains, and lots of other things in the environment. Now I bring this to you in a format that is straightforward about who I am, a Black urbanist, a young queer cis woman of African-American, specifically North Carolina, descent who likes all things built environment, especially when it comes to cities.

• A complete slam of suburban and rural living. I’m all for better design, communities, and planning, no matter if you are highly dense (urban) or you are unincorporated (rural).
• Consciously classist, sexist, queer/transphobic, xenophobic, ableist.
• The only expert analysis from a Black queer cis Southern woman on these issues.
• Your one Black (or Queer, Feminist) friend, colleague, preferred design team consultant, or constantly unpaid educator on issues of racism in urbanism and design.

• A place that centers Black Queer Feminist Urbanist thought, practice and ethics.
• My livelihood– support me by checking out my resource list, becoming a Patreon to support the information I share on my social media accounts, as well access my educational audio and video content.
• A learning experience.
• A chance to change the world.

Kristen E. Jeffers (she/her)  is the founder and editor-in-chief of The Black Urbanist multimedia platform, as well as an author, textile artist and designer, urban planner and activist.  She holds a Master of Public Affairs focused on community and economic development from the University of North Carolina Greensboro, and a Bachelor of Arts in communication with a concentration in public relations from North Carolina State University. She has presented at the annual gatherings of the Congress for New Urbanism, YIMBYTown, Walk Bike Places, CityWorksXpo, APA Virginia, NACTO, and to communities around the US and Canada, using her personal story to illustrate what land use and planning really means and really does, plus encourage practitioners, both young and old in best practices. She is a Streetsblog Network member and has also contributed articles to CityLab, Greater Greater Washington, [Greensboro] News & Record, Yes! Weekly, Grist, Next City, Better! Towns and Cities, Triad City Beat,  Urban Escapee, and Urbanful and appeared on several NPR affiliate stations (KCUR, WAMU, and WUNC)  as a commentator and expert.

• Listening to my podcast, Defying Gentrification

Are There Really Too Many Planners in Certain Metro Areas?

The Continuous Quest to Mentally Cope With Modern Civic Life as a Young Black Woman Professional

How Do You Define Your City? And Does Your City Define Itself in the Same Way?

Building on Theories and Practice of Black Urbanism in Our New World

Questions to Ask (and Traps to Avoid) When Considering a Career in Placemaking

The Quest for a Forever Home in an Era of Mass Gentrification

Place in A Time of Terror and Inequality

Why Road Gentrification Is Good Gentrification

Putting Place and Experience Back Into Retail

Why We May Never Have the Right Words for the Places We Live

Things that Should Never Be in Driving Distance

Whose Suburbs are We Talking About Again?

Can We Let the People Gentrify Themselves?

The Privilege of Urbanism, The Democracy of Placemaking 

Everything I Learned About Place, I Learned on Campus

The Common Man’s Legacy in A City

Coming Back to the Streets, Coming Back to Action

The American Expat, In America

Does it Matter Who Owns the Corner Store?

The Creative Class: Off the Record and On The Money

The One Key Reason Those Scary Housing Discrimination Maps Are Still True

Are There Really No Things to Do for Young Black Professionals in North Carolina?

LGBTQIA+ Led Support for Endometriosis and Similar Illnesses

Our goal is to keep the endo community up to date with information about how endometriosis can affect anyone.

endoQueer Founder, Les Henderson

On September 16, 2020, I, Les Henderson, gathered several folks together to talk about various aspects of living with endometriosis as an LGBTQIA+ person. Check out their presentations. Plus, if you are a fellow LGBTQIA+ #endoWarrior (patient, possible patient, angry body part haver), I’d love to have you join us in our special, #endoWarrior Facebook group. And everyone is invited to subscribe to our newsletter and follow us on Instagram where we share all kinds of information for healthcare providers, caregivers, and friends, as well as tips to keep those angry body parts in check!

Les Henderson (she/her/they) is the founder of endoQueer and host of the Be A Beacon Podcast.  As a Black masculine of center lesbian, her endo journey has been complicated due to erasure in medical and online spaces.  In 2016, she survived a spontaneous pneumothorax (lung collapse) that happened due to endometriosis. Les unfortunately experienced 5 more lung collapses between 2016-2022. She knew that she had to get out here and tell her story and create a space to help others. Her story has been shared by Vice, Cosmo UK and she has contributed her experiences to a few medical journals and books.

To book Les for your event or conference, please email [email protected] for dates and rates. Members of the press on a deadline who would like to speak with Les can also email [email protected] to set up a long-form press interview.

Last year, my wish/new years resolution was to maintain.

Overall, I think we succeeded in that. Downtown continues to grow. Even as beloved spaces elsewhere close, new ones spring right back up in their place, like a sushi bar right across the street from the bar I mentioned above. I’ve maintained employment. I’ve reconnected with family as family has passed on.

Therefore, as we look ahead into 2014, the word that stands out for me this year is simply:

MORE

How does more relate to good places? Here’s how:

More tiny houses

I was delighted to hear this story of how the Occupy Madison group managed to build a tiny house for a homeless couple. Far too many offshoots of Occupy have been blamed for being delinquent, whiny, and entitled. However, this group of folks actually did something about the problems facing our cities. They hope to build a whole village of these homes for people.

I also like tiny houses because they recognize that sometimes people can’t afford a certain amount of square footage, but that doesn’t make them incapable of owning their own home. We laugh at trailer parks, but honestly, at least those people have a roof over their heads. We used to laugh at apartments too, but I’m sitting in a luxury one.

More opportunities for youth to learn good citizenship

I’ve bled a lot of ink and blurred a lot of pixels about the cost of not engaging all of our youth and our citizens. The issue is near and dear to my heart, because I became engaged in placemaking and civic governance as a young child. My parents made sure I went to the library and they encouraged me to learn. So many people don’t have parents that do that, but there’s plenty of people in our community who can serve in that role for our youth. I want to find a way to do more of this myself, in a more productive and proactive way. I also think that if we don’t engage our youth, we will never be able to realize our placemaking dreams.

More parks

Thanks to where I work, I’m able to see a lot of new, cool things that are being built. I also have had a chance to see what’s planned for our new LeBauer Park, along with what’s been dreamed up thus far for the Union Square Park. I hope that these new parks, despite being public-private partnerships, hold true to the spirit of the public piece of the  partnership that is propelling them forward.

More books and reading and writing

I never imagined that by the end of 2013, I’d be walking to my very own local indie bookstore which stocks brand new books, smart magazines and used classics. I never imagined I’d be front page news and make news and have the bylines that I’ve had. In that spirit, I hope that Scuppernong revitalizes its block, not just with libations, but budding librarians. You’re seeing more posts from me here and who knows, I might whip up another book.

More microeconomies

As I talked about above with the support of tiny houses, some of our Occupiers have evolved into a group spearheading a new grocery co-op on the traditionally black east side of Greensboro. Meanwhile, opposition is growing for a Trader Joes (again) on a particular plot near the more wealthy communities of Greensboro. However, if it weren’t for Trader Joes offering some of the foods that make me stick my pinkies out while holding food, at a price that doesn’t make me feel like I’m breaking my pinkies, I wouldn’t be as proactive about healthy food. You already know the mind games I play when thinking about groceries. The more niches a market has, the better the market actually serves people and actually holds true to the notion of being free.

More transportation

I’m now part of a group called the Transit Alliance of the Piedmont, a group formed because of the need for real, not just realistic, regional transit. I hope to channel some of my dreams for transportation (more bus shelters, shorter headways, a serious rail plan, business support) into action in the coming year. We will have a website and some information up soon on how those of you in the Triad area can help. I’m also on the Bike Share Task Force led by Action Greensboro, another group working to bring new transit options to Greensboro.

2013 was one of the hardest years, from losing my father, to feeling alienated, to a major case of writers block. My hope is that my 2014 will be full of abundance, and that abundance starts with doing what I can to cultivate good places.