Residential Zoning by Race - Reducing Homeownership Options

by Carolyn Ristau

Residential Zoning by Race has show that in Pittsburgh there is a correlation between residential zoning districts, redlining, and race. Single-family zoning districts tend to be in areas graded good for investment and White neighborhoods. Multi-family zoning districts tend to be in areas graded bad for investment and Black neighborhoods.

On the face of it, the national conversation that zoning needs to move away from the exclusionary single-family zoning district to relieve the housing crisis suggests that this unequal pattern in Pittsburgh would put Black neighborhoods ahead of the curve in this needed reform. However, this assumption overlooks that actual impacts of multi-family zoning districts in Black neighborhoods. In fact, these zoning districts are a contributing factor to the well-documented historical and on-going lack of equity available to Black residents through homeownership.

The presence of multi-family zoning districts in Pittsburgh’s Black neighborhoods has enabled the reduction of homeownership options through demolition and consolidation. It also requires that new construction be built in ways that is not compatible with the existing built environment. For example, in the photo below, the existing buildings are built right up to the sidewalk, but the new housing had to be built 25 feet from the sidewalk.

Race should not be a determinant of whether you live in a single-family or multi-family zoning district. Policy changes are need to both single-family and multi-family zoning districts to decouple these districts from historically-perceived “good” and “bad” neighborhoods respectively.

More information on this impacts including additional graphics are available on the main project page.