Document Type
Article
Publication Date
11-24-2015
Keywords
Sustainability, riskscapes, environmental injustice, inequitable development
Abstract
This paper examines the spatial and temporal trajectories of Seattle’s industrial land use restructuring and the shifting riskscape in Seattle, WA, a commonly recognized urban model of sustainability. Drawing on the perspective of sustainability as a conflicted process, this research explored the intersections of urban industrial and nonindustrial land use planning, gentrification, and environmental injustice. In the first part of our research, we combine geographic cluster analysis and longitudinal air toxic emission comparisons to quantitatively investigate socioeconomic changes in Seattle Census block-groups between 1990, 2000, and 2009 coupled with measures of pollution volume and its relative potential risk. Second, we qualitatively examine Seattle’s historical land use policies and planning and the growing tension between industrial and nonindustrial land use. The gentrification, green cities, and growth management conflicts embedded within sustainability/livability lead to pollution exposure risk and socioeconomic vulnerability converging in the same areas and reveal one of Seattle’s significant environmental challenges. Our mixed-method approach can guide future urban sustainability studies to more effectively examine the connections between land use planning, industrial displacement, and environmental injustice. Our results also help sustainable development practitioners recognize that a more just sustainability in Seattle and beyond will require more planning and policy attention to mitigate obscured industrial land use conflicts.
Publication Title
Sustainability
Volume
7
First Page
15718
Last Page
15753
Required Publisher's Statement
Published by MDPI AG, Postfach, CH - 4005 Basel, Switzerland
www.mdpi.com/journal/sustainability
doi:10.3390/su71115718
Recommended Citation
Abel, Troy D.; White, Jonah; and Clauson, Stacy, "Risky Business: Sustainability and Industrial Land Use across Seattle’s Gentrifying Riskscape" (2015). College of the Environment on the Peninsulas Publications. 23.
https://cedar.wwu.edu/hcop_facpubs/23
Subjects - Topical (LCSH)
Environmental justice--Washington (State)--Seattle; Sustainable urban development--Washington (State)--Seattle; Gentrification--Environmental aspects--Washington (State)--Seattle; Pollution--Risk assessment--Washington (State)--Seattle; Urban geography--Washington (State)--Seattle; Land use, Urban--Washington (State)--Seattle
Geographic Coverage
Seattle (Wash.)
Genre/Form
articles
Type
Text
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Language
English
Format
application/pdf
