Robert Taylor Homes

Infobox Housing Project
building name = Robert Taylor Homes


caption = Last Robert Taylor Home, 5 September 2005
location = Chicago
coordinates = coord|41|48|49.4|N|87|37|40.18|W|display=inline
status = Demolished
constructed = 1962
demolished = 2007
governing body = Chicago Housing Authority
famous residents = Mr. T
Kirby Puckett
Deval Patrick

Robert Taylor Homes was a housing project in the Bronzeville neighborhood of the South Side of Chicago, on State Street between Pershing Road (39th Street) and 54th Street alongside the Dan Ryan Expressway.

History

The Robert Taylor Homes housing project was completed in 1962 and named for Robert Taylor, an African American activist and Chicago Housing Authority (CHA) board member who in 1950 resigned when the city council refused to endorse potential building locations throughout the city of Chicago that would induce racially integrated housing.

At one time, it was the largest housing project in the country, and it was intended to offer decent affordable housing. It was composed of 28 high-rise buildings with 16 stories each, with a total of 4,321 apartments, mostly arranged in U-shaped clusters of three, stretching for two miles (three kilometers). [ [http://www.flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=80516424&context=set-1786408&size=l Photo] ] The Robert Taylor Homes were also home at one time to such celebrities as Mr. T, Kirby Puckett, and current Massachusetts governor Deval Patrick.

Robert Taylor Homes faced many of the same problems that doomed other high-rise housing projects in Chicago such as Cabrini-Green. These problems include narcotics, violence, and the perpetuation of poverty.

Planned for 11,000 inhabitants, the Robert Taylor Homes housed up to a peak of 27,000 people. [ [http://www.thecha.org/housingdev/robert_taylor.html Robert Taylor Homes] , Chicago Housing Authority] Six of the poorest US census areas with populations above three people were found there. Including children who are not of working age, at one point 95 percent of the housing development's 27,000 residents were unemployed and listed public assistance as their only income source, and 40 percent of the households were single-parent, female-headed households earning less than $5,000 per year. About 99.9 percent were African-American. The 28 drab, 16-story concrete high-rises, many blackened with the scars of arson fire, sat in a narrow two-block by 2.5-milecite web |url= http://www.newurbannews.com/hopeVI.html|title= Hope VI funds new urban neighborhoods|accessdate=2007-07-26 |publisher= "New Urban News"|date= Jan.-Feb. 2002] (300 m by 3 km) stretch of slum. The city's neglect was evident in littered streets, poorly enforced building codes, and scant commercial or civic amenities.

Police intelligence sources say that elevated number of homicides was the result of gang "turf wars," as gang members and drug dealers fought over control of given Chicago neighborhoods. Its landlord, the Chicago Housing Authority (CHA), has estimated that $45,000 in drug deals took place daily. Former residents of the Robert Taylor Homes have said that the drug dealers fought for control of the buildings. In one weekend, more than 300 separate shooting incidents were reported in the vicinity of the Robert Taylor Homes. disputable Twenty-eight people were killed during the same weekend, with 26 of the 28 incidents believed to be gang-related. disputable

On June 25 1983, an infant, Vinyette Teague, was abducted from Robert Taylor Homes after her grandmother left her alone in the hallway for a few minutes to answer a phone call. An estimated 50 people were in the hallway at the time of the abduction, but police were unable to gather enough evidence to make any arrests. She has never been seen or heard from since. [ [http://www.charleyproject.org/cases/t/teague_vinyette.html The Charley Project: Vinyette Trudy Teague ] ]

Redevelopment

It was decided to replace all Robert Taylor Homes with a mixed-income community in low-rise buildings as part of a federal block grant received for the purpose from the HOPE VI federal program. In 1996, HOPE VI federal funds were granted specifically for off-site Taylor replacement housing. The Chicago Housing Authority moved out all residents by the end of 2005. On 8 March 2007, the last remaining building was [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5ZHYcStqac demolished] . As of 2007, a total of 2,300 low rise residential homes and apartments, seven new and renovated community facilities, and a number of retail and commercial spaces are to be built in place of the old high-rise buildings. The development costs are expected to total an estimated $583 million. Part of the redevelopment is the renaming of the area to "Legends South".

Research

Because of the standardized housing and near homogeneous demographics, the RTH cluster was an ideal location for studying the effects of urban living and lack of "green space" on the human condition. This type of research in environmental psychology was most clearly demonstrated by a group of studies done by Francis Kuo and William Sullivan of the [http://www.lhhl.uiuc.edu/ Landscape and Human Health Laboratory] (formerly the Human-Environment Research Laboratory) at the [http://www.uiuc.edu/ University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign] .

The history and economy of this housing development was studied by Sudhir Alladi Venkatesh in his book "American Project" (ISBN 0-674-00830-8). Venkatesh also profiled many the area, its residents and the Black Kings, a Chicago gang known for selling drugs, in his 2008 book "Gang Leader For A Day: A Rogue Sociologist Takes To The Streets" (ISBN 978-1-59420-150-9).

References

External links

* [http://thecha.org/housingdev/robert_taylor.html CHA's official Robert Taylor Homes site]
* [http://www.findarticles.com/cf_dls/m0GER/1999_Summer/55127438/p1/article.jhtml "Midst the Handguns' Red Glare - Chicago's Robert Taylor Homes, a public housing development"] , Whole Earth, Summer, 1999.
* [http://www.emporis.com/en/wm/cx/?id=100331 Robert Taylor Homes website at Emporis]
* [http://www.encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org/pages/2478.html Encyclopedia of Chicago entry on Robert Taylor Homes]
* [http://urbansemiotic.com/2006/05/17/falling-from-the-robert-taylor-homes/ "Falling from the Robert Taylor Homes" by David W. Boles, May, 2006]
* [http://www.dislocationfilm.com "Dislocation"] , a film by Sudhir Alladi Venkatesh, Professor of Sociology and African-American Studies at Columbia University, which "chronicles the lives of tenants in one building as they move through the six-month relocation process" according to the website's description.
* [http://libraries.mit.edu/archives/mithistory/blacks-at-mit/taylor.html A history of the building's namesake Robert Taylor]
* [http://cbs2chicago.com/topstories/local_story_280201511.html Robert Taylor Homes Cease To Exist] , cbs2chicago.com