national register nomination for boulevard park historic

in neighborhoods that were once occupied by working class people. They conclude that
the only defense against gentrification is the decommodification of housing, the
assumption that housing and decent neighborhoods are a right, not a privilege. 42
Nan Ellin, architecture professor and urban theorist, took a different approach to
the problem of gentrification in Postmodern Urbanism, and tied historic preservation
more explicitly to gentrification. Ellin defines postmodern urbanism in this way:
“Whereas modern urbanism emulated the machine to accommodate an industrial society,
postmodern urbanism seeks inspiration from pre-industrial townscapes to accommodate a
43
post-industrial fabric.”
Like writers in historic preservation, Ellin begins her study with the history of
urban design theory in Europe. She describes the effects of gentrification and
displacement of the poor in Paris in the postwar era, accompanied by new schools of
44
architecture that juxtaposed modern architecture with historic buildings.
42
Smith and Williams, Gentrification of the City, p. 222
43
Ellin, Nan, Postmodern Urbanism, New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 1996
44
Ellin, Postmodern Urbanism, p. 46-50
American
postmodern architecture had similar aims, but added elements of historic styles to modern
buildings, juxtaposing styles within a structure instead of between adjacent structures.
Like the urban historians, Ellin attributes the growth of historic preservation to the
negative reaction to urban renewal. She explicitly connects historic preservation to
gentrification by identifying the ways that both filled a common need for centeredness,
nostalgia, and the revalorization of the industrial past. Like Hamer, she criticizes the
30