Revitalizing the neighborhood: the practices and politics of rightsizing in Idora, Youngstown

Abstract

In recent years, growing academic attention has been placed upon the varied strategies of rightsizing employed by cities to address the interrelated dynamics of economic and urban decline and depopulation. Within this body of work, the focus has primarily been placed on the city-level. By focusing on the practices and politics of urban revitalization within the Idora neighborhood in Youngstown – a neighborhood widely heralded as a success story – this paper deepens understandings of how rightsizing is enacted within more micro-contexts. Drawing on demographic data, documentary analysis, and observation, it reveals the process to be complex in its manifestations. Placing the critical gaze upon the neighborhood level exposes actualities of urban reconfiguration in the context of stark deindustrialization, decline, and depopulation, elucidating the actors and practices involved, in addition to its politically charged and contested nature. It concludes with a discussion of the wider implications of this case study both in terms of the possibilities and pitfalls of rightsizing.

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