What is a “Great Neighborhood”? An Analysis of APA's Top-Rated Places

Abstract

Problem, research strategy, and findings: The American Planning Association's (APA) annual “Great Neighborhoods” program was established to define the “gold standard” of neighborhoods in America. Using census and other data covering the 80 APA-designated Great Neighborhoods to date (2007 to 2014), we quantitatively assess whether good neighborhood form may be in conflict with the social goals of affordability and social diversity. We find that APA's Great Neighborhoods represent a somewhat classic conception of the historic, gentrifying urban neighborhood: walkable, gridded, and losing social diversity. APA Great Neighborhoods are apparently not able to buck the trend that desirable physical qualities lead correspondingly to lack of affordability and social diversity.

Takeaway for practice: We argue that the APA should be sensitive to the connection between a strong sense of neighborhood identity and the potential for social exclusion in their Great Neighborhoods designation. The APA could give a special designation for neighborhoods that score well on the APA's criteria, but that also manage to retain affordability and social diversity. The APA could therefore use its Great Neighborhoods designation to recognize planning, policy, and design efforts in service of not only design excellence, but also social inclusion.

Keywords:

• neighborhood
• neighborhood planning
• social diversity

Notes

1 One neighborhood did not have boundaries marked on a Google Map and so it was excluded from our analysis, bringing the total number of APA GNs visually analyzed to 79.

2 2. We compiled and analyzed the WalkScores for the centroids of the 554 census block groups included in the APA GNs. The WalkScore algorithm assigns points (0–100) based on distance to amenities, weighted by category. For example, amenities within .25 mile receive maximum points, while no points are awarded for amenities further than 1 mile. Because we used the “Streetsmart WalkScore,” these distances were calculated based on street network rather than “as the crow flies” straight-line distance. Amenity weights are based on empirical research on walking behavior (e.g., Moudon et al., 2007). Grocery stores receive the strongest weight, followed by restaurants. A slightly lower weighting is assigned to banks, parks, coffee shops, schools, and bookstores.

3 The formal expression of the Simpson Diversity Index is:

A = [N (N – 1)] / [åi ni (ni – 1)],

where A is the diversity index; N is the total number of individuals (or housing units or households) for all categories; and ni is the number of individuals (or other characteristic) in the ith category. The Simpson -Diversity Index for unit type uses three categories: single-family detached, 1- to 4-unit attached, and 5+ units. For race and ethnicity, the index uses the variables White, Black, and Hispanic for 1970; for 2010, it uses non–Hispanic White, non-Hispanic Black, non-Hispanic other, and Hispanic. For income, the index uses four categories based on quartile income distribution.

4 The other most commonly cited words are “street” (489 times), “park” (481 times), “plan” (436 times), and “housing” (360 times).

5 Slight differences between percentages reported in Table 3 and percentages in Appendix B are due to rounding error.