December 2021 Update
It has been another busy month for Rethink Coalition. As we wrap up our first year as a formal, nonprofit organization, we want to thank everyone who has given their time, treasure, and talents to help us. Your generous support and encouragement have made all the work possible and will be critical in 2022. Again, thank you, and here's to the great work to come in 2022!
Rethink Happenings
An Evening with A'Lelia Bundles. Last month, Rethink hosted A’Lelia Bundles, great-great granddaughter of Madam C.J. Walker -- author, journalist, Emmy Award-winning television news producer, and academician -- for conversation about the impact of Indianapolis’s highway infrastructure on her family and others in the city’s Black community, and how we can build for a better future. Bundles’ friend and fellow Hoosier Justin Garrett Moore joined by video to share his thoughts. Garrett Moore is the inaugural program officer for the Humanities in Place program at the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation in New York City, where he focuses on advancing equity, inclusion, and social justice through place-based initiatives and programs, built environments, cultural heritage projects, and commemorative spaces and landscapes. You can hear Bundles’ and Garrett Moore’s presentation here.
Rethink submitted comments to INDOT’s Landscape Plans for the North Split. Things Rethink is advocating for include (1) the use of evergreens in the tree plans and their placement as a visual buffer for the highway, (2) better protection for pedestrians and cyclists in the underpasses, and (3) putting neighborhood names on the bridges to serve as gateways into the historic communities near the highway. You can learn more about INDOT's landscape plans here.
Understanding the Issues
The Indy Chamber weighed in on infrastructure in its December 3 news update, Dress Rehearsal (see the Hitting the Road section), which featured Rethink and the Arup Study. They ask two key questions for infrastructure development: (1) What if we expanded the criteria for successful infrastructure to look at economic impact, development potential, quality of life and issues of equity and inclusion? and (2) What return does the community get for the huge investments we make in infrastructure assets? Rethink, the Indy Chamber, and other partners will be digging into these questions as we build on the research presented in the Visionary Study.
What is redlining? What does it have to do with the I65/70 Inner Loop? A recent article by Tom Gallagher in the Indianapolis Business Journal explains the history of the redlining concept and its implications for cities. As Gallagher writes, "Redlining, which influenced lending practices until the 1968 Fair Housing Act made its precepts illegal, had far deeper consequences than any single bad appraisal or refused loan. It resulted in a systematic and fundamental restructuring of our cities to favor the privileged and divert opportunities for wealth from those deemed unworthy." It also played a role in the placement of highways, including the I65/70 Inner Loop, as local historian Jordan Ryan has illustrated by overlaying a map of the Inner Loop with the redlining maps of Indianapolis. See the Visionary Study and Executive Summary for more information about redlining in relationship to the Inner Loop. You can Gallagher's article here (needs IBJ access).
Rethink In the News
Phil Gulley featured Rethink Co-Chair Charlie Richardson as a “Shining Light” in his December Indianapolis Monthly Column, Back Home Again. Gulley, a Quaker pastor, author, and humorist, writes that despite as bad as 2021 was, a few Hoosiers renewed his faith in humanity. Richardson is one of them. As Gulley describes, most folks Charlie’s age have “tottered off to Florida to play golf.” Not Charlie. This Bedford-born man is staying put to help right a historic wrong in how highways decimated Black communities in the 60s and 70s and can be rebuilt better. Gulley concludes by saying, “May his tribe increase.” Amen.
News from Other Cities
Dallas is building another deck park over a highway. Last month, the Dallas City Council unanimously approved the development of a five-acre deck park that would span I-35E near the Dallas Zoo, modeled after Klyde Warren Park in Uptown Dallas. When the highway was built in the 1950s, it cut through the Tenth Street Historic District in Oak Cliff and led to the demolition of dozens of homes and businesses. Tenth Street is one of the city’s oldest neighborhoods, founded by former slaves after the Civil War. Featuring lawns, a playground, water features and an area for food trucks, the new park is designed to foster economic development and reconnect neighborhoods divided by I-35E.
The planned southern Dallas deck park, over Interstate 35E near the Dallas Zoo, would include an activity lawn and pavilion as shown in this rendering. (City of Dallas)
Detroit is replacing a freeway with a pedestrian-friendly boulevard. For decades, an expressway interchange has fractured Detroit’s walking and bike routes, making it difficult to travel safely in parts of the city without a motorized vehicle. Detroit is replacing the freeway that's reached the end of its life with a pedestrian friendly boulevard that will reconnect downtown to surrounding areas. Detroit joins the ranks of cities including San Francisco, Seattle, Milwaukee, and Boston in choosing to remove problematic roadways. Even more cities could soon follow suit. Click here to read more.
The Human Toll Project: The Impact of Freeways on Communities. An exhibit at the Hennepin History Museum in Minnesota shows how construction of freeways across the country divided and destroyed communities, with effects still felt today. The Human Toll Project, which runs through October 2022, uses pamphlets, maps, photos, newspaper clippings and other materials to show how intertwined elements of systemic racism shaped interstate routing decisions—not just in the Twin Cities, but throughout the country. It also offers an opportunity to appreciate the benefits of integrated, healthy, and economically viable neighborhoods. Rethink is raising funds and hopes to create a similar exhibit focused on Indianapolis. Click here to read more about the impact of freeways on communities.