Bibliography: Schindler, Sarah. “Architectural Exclusion: Discrimination and Segregation Through Physical Design of the Built Environment.” Yale Law Journal –. The Yale Law Journal, Apr. 2015. Web. 15 Sept. 2016. <http://www.yalelawjournal.org/article/architectural-exclusion>.
Schindler states in her thesis that architecture and design structure can lead to exclusion of minorities and the poor as it is not recognized by lawmakers and is difficult to change. There are many forms of architectural exclusion such as, Robert Moses’s bus blocking bridges, Atlanta’s MARTA restriction, and the Memphis Street close off of 1974. The problem is that it is difficult to find intent during construction, so many get away with it. A space in which people live can both restrict and inhibit people, usually by intent of the designers.
Detroit’s Eight Mile Wall. Notice the separation of communities
Schindler says that architecture can be a form of regulation. Often designers will create an area to accomplish political goals and planners can be, “facilitators of social exclusion and economic isolation”(line 42). The built environmental has the ability to shape behavior of its citizens, for instance highway division and common areas. Architectural restrictions does not even have to be race driven but can be as simple as making healthier food more accessible in a cafeteria and unhealthy food harder to obtain.With this example the author provides the idea of “Exclusionary amenities” being the features of a community that deter minorities and the impoverished. Architectural exclusion should be treated just as severely as and other type of exclusion.
A built environment can direct movement through techniques to exclude others.
Palo Alto Divided and Expansive Highway
For instance, Schindler provides the instance of Robert Moses’s low hanging bridges stopping bus flow, which stops minority and poor people who could not afford a car and have to take a bus. Included with this there have been non-existent sidewalks to stop access to poor, Palo Alto’s divided highway creating a barrier between rich and poor, and a lot of the times physical walls themselves like Detroit’s Eight Mile Wall.
Walls can be used legally to separate wealthy neighborhoods from the outside. Transits also play a part by the location of the stops. The lack of stops make it difficult for minorities to access “Leisure Venues that more affluent or more mobile persons freely enjoy”(line 132). Roads and their placement can split communities, divide social classes, and lead to a lack of safety for pedestrians. There can be roads that have dead ends, confusing direction, road size restrictions, and lack of parking in some areas without a permit. All of this results in driving minorities and the poor out of specific neighborhoods and tying them to their’s.