BY BECKY SLOGERIS

The BaltimoreTextbookA Guide to Where You Live

The BaltimoreTextbook

THIS BOOK BELONGS TO:

A Guide to Where You Live

You live in Baltimore.

Baltimore is a city.

Cities come in all shapes and sizes.

Some are big

New York City, New York

and some are small.

Greensboro, Alabama

Some are short

Paris, France

and some are tall.

Chicago, Illinois

Some are planned

Levittown, Long Island, NY

and some just happen.

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Every city is unique, but they have basic things in common. All cities have people. They have houses for them to live in and places for them to work and play. Cities should also be healthy and safe and have lots of different ways to get around.

How do all of these things shape Baltimore?

UNIT ONE

PeopleUNIT TWO

HousingUNIT THREE

DevelopmentUNIT FOUR

Health and SafetyUNIT FIVE Transportation

People

Vocabulary

CensusPopulation densitySprawl Homogeneous

HeterogeneousSegregation De jure De facto

UNIT ONE

PeopleCities should be built with people in mind. Can you imagine a city without any people in it? People make cities like Baltimore come alive.

How would you describe the people living in Baltimore to someone who has never been here before?

21

1890

434

,439

1880

33

2,3

13

1870

267,

354

1860

212

,418

1850

169

,054

102,

313

184

0

1820

1810

180

0

1790

1830

How do we collect information about the people living in Baltimore? A census is mailed to every home every 10 years that asks people questions about who they are and what they do.

One thing the census tells us is the population. Look at this graph. It shows how many people were living in Baltimore during each decade.

Looking at the Numbers

Population Growth

Which decade has the largest population? What happens to the population after that decade?

22

194

08

59,10

0

1950

94

9,7

08

1960

939

,024

1970

90

5,75

9

1980

786

,775

1990

736

,775

200

06

51,

154

2010

620

,00

0

1930

804

,874

1920

733,

826

1910

558,

485

190

050

8,9

57

23People

Sprawl happens when a city expands outward. People move away from the center of the city and buildings are built farther apart.

Thinking about Cities

Sprawl

Which part of this picture shows city sprawl?

24

25People

Between 1950 and 1990, 182,000 people left Baltimore and moved to the suburbs.

People move out of the city for various reasons. Some want more space or access to better schools.

The Great Debate

City vs. Suburb

26

Why do you think people would want to leave the city?

27People

Lessons from Jane Jacobs

Jane Jacobs was a writer and thinker about cities. Jane did not learn about cities from books or school. Instead, she learned about cities by watching people use them in everyday life.

While most people wanted to make cities perfect to live in, she liked the imperfection that existed. Having a diverse population was something she felt was important to cities.

People to Know

28

Population density is a way to measure the amount of people living in a place.

Low DensityHigh Density

draw 20 circles here draw 5 circles here

Cities typically have a higher population density than suburbs, because more people are living in a smaller space.

Thinking about Cities

Population density

29People

Heterogeneous describes a thing made up of different parts.

When different races and ethnicities live together, the community is heterogeneous.

Homogeneous describes a thing made up of the same parts.

When only one race or ethnicity lives together, the community is homogeneous.

Thinking about Cities

Heterogeneous & Homogeneous

Is your neighborhood heterogeneous or homogeneous?

30

Heterogeneous

Homogeneous

31People

The act of separating races and ethnicities is called segregation.There are different ways that we separate people.

Cities and the Law

Segregation

When a law keeps people separate it is de jure segregation. When people are separate without actual law it is de facto segregation.

32

In the United States, black boys and girls used to go to separate schools than white boys and girls. In 1954, the Supreme Court ordered the desegregation of public schools through Brown v. Board of Education.

Even though the law lets black and white boys and girls go to the same school now, they are often still separate.

What does your school look like? Are the students racially diverse? Why is going to school with people different than you important?

Cities and the Law

Brown v. Board

33People

Housing

All cities need to provide shelter for the people who live in them. Different cities have different kinds of housing available for residents.

What do the houses in your neighborhood look like?

UNIT TWO

Housing

Vocabulary

FormstoneGentrification Low-riseHigh-rise

SuperblockBlockbusting Vacant

In the 1930s Baltimoreans started covering the brick on rowhomes with Formstone, a material that looks like stone. People were told that the Formstone would keep water from leaking between their bricks and save them money with maintenance.

Today, Formstone is often removed to show the brick underneath. It is a lot of work and often costly, but it reveals the building’s original beauty.

Only in Baltimore

Formstone

38

Gentrification occurs when wealthier people begin to move into low income neighborhoods. Because they make more money at their jobs, they are able to afford to pay more to live there. Eventually, the people who lived there first get pushed out.

Big Word, Important Concept

Gentrification

How would you feel if you had to move because you couldn’t afford to live in your neighborhood anymore?

39Housing

Lessons from Le Corbusier

People to Know

Le Corbusier was an architect and city planner from France. He wanted to tear down existing buildings to make cities clean and orderly places. Le Corbusier’s plans had tall high-rise housing in large superblocks. While his ideas sounded good, they were not very successful in real life. The high-rise housing didn’t feel like home to most people and it took longer to walk places in the superblock.

40

Lessons from Le Corbusier

Low-rise High-rise

City Block Superblock

Which of the above did Le Corbusier prefer? Circle them.

41Housing

MCCULLOH HOMES

BALTIMORE, MD

Le Corbusier’s designs inspired high-rise public housing built in the United States in the 1960s.

42

UNITÉ D’HABITATIONMARSEILLES, FRANCE

By the 1990s they had become places that were not safe or healthy. Most of them have now been torn down.

43Housing

bike czar: the person in charge of making a city safe for bike riders.

blockbusting: a technique used by real estate agents to buy houses at a low price and sell them for more because of race.

census: a tool for cities to collect data about the people that live in them.

commercial zone: an area designated for businesses to sell goods.

de facto segregation: natural segregation without law.

de jure segregation: forced segregation because of law.

Glossary

eminent domain: when the government takes privately owned land for new development.

food desert: an area in a city without supermarkets or access to fresh and healthy food.

formstone: a material that looks like stone used to cover brick row homes.

gentrification: when a neighborhood changes because people with more money move in.

high-rise: buildings with many floors.

historic preservation: the act of saving places with important histories.

industrial zone: an area designated for factories.

lead: a poisonous substance often found in soil and the paint in old houses.

low rise: buildings with only a few floors.

mixed-use: buildings and areas that have more than one purpose.

population density: the amount of people in a place.

residential zone: an area designated for housing.

segregation: the separation of people by race or ethnicity.

sharrow: a symbol on the road to remind bike riders and car drivers to share the street.

slum: an area of a city with housing that is unsafe or falling apart.

sprawl: when a city expands outward.

superblock: a city block that is much larger than usual, combining multiple, normal-sized blocks.

tree canopy: the amount of land covered by trees.

urban renewal: when slum areas are torn down and replaced with new buildings.

urban theory: the study of how cities work.

vacant: when nobody is living in a house.

vandalism: destruction of places in the city through things like graffiti and broken windows.

zoning: the separation of buildings and land use into categories.

A very special thanks to:

Antero Pietila Breasia Chesnut Dan D’Oca Teddy Krolik Guna Nadarajan Jennifer Cole Phillips Keyonte Rose LeVar Jones

Where you live shapes who you are, yet learning about Baltimore is often absent from classrooms. In order to become active, change-making citizens, every student in Baltimore needs to have an understanding of the social, political, and economic forces at play in their city. The Baltimore Textbook is a guide to the city’s past, present, and future that will empower students and residents of all ages.