Linking Zoning Asymmetries and Divergent Gentrification Patterns in U.S. Metropolitan Areas

• In Event: Impacts of Local Land Use Policies

Abstract

In recent years, two urban issues have gained major traction in both scholarly and policy debates- gentrification and land use regulation. Much of the research on gentrification has documented its housing-related consequences, highlighting its effects on demographic change. At the same time, a growing body of work highlights how restrictive residential zoning contains housing supply, shaping access to opportunity, exacerbating economic and racial inequalities. Yet little is known about how these two forces interact across spatial scales.

This study merges data from the National Zoning and Land Use Database (NZLUD) with the 2000 and 2020 U.S. Census to investigate how land use regulation at the metropolitan (non-central city) and principal city levels influences the geography of gentrification across the 50 largest U.S. metropolitan areas. Specifically, we focus in particular on zoning asymmetries between central cities and their suburban counterparts, analyzing how these regulatory differences mediate demographic shifts and housing market dynamics over time.

Preliminary findings suggest that zoning asymmetries between principal cities and surrounding suburbs play a critical role in shaping the suburban expansion of gentrification. In metropolitan areas where principal cities enforce more restrictive zoning while surrounding suburbs adopt more permissive policies, gentrification increasingly extends outward, with suburban neighborhoods emerging as new sites of reinvestment and demographic transformation. These findings underscore the importance of multi-scalar land use governance in shaping metropolitan patterns of gentrification and suggest that zoning policy alignment, or misalignment, across jurisdictions has profound implications for urban equity and opportunity.

Authors

• Hyojung Lee, Seoul National University
  Presenting Author

• kfir mordechay, Pepperdine University
  Non-Presenting Co-Author