Roadmap

Cities the atlas plans to cover

Version 5 covers fifteen cities at research depth. The list below names the cases the atlas intends to add next, organized by tier. Each entry carries research anchors drawn from the scholarly record so any contributor can pick up the thread.

If you know one of these places, we welcome your pull request. Follow the authoring conventions in /methodology and the editorial rules in the repository's docs/editorial-rules.md. The repository lives at github.com/pedropipehitter/urban-renewal-atlas.

For the data-center displacement roadmap covering twenty-four cases across eight US regions, see /roadmap/data-centers.

Tier B

4 cases

Strong v6 cases. Substantial archival record, identified organizing lineage, and in most cases a live present-day fight the essay can land on.

  • Seattle, WA

    Central District and Chinatown/International District

    Community
    African-American (70 percent plus of the CD through the early 1970s); Japanese, Chinese, and Filipino-American in ChID
    Displacement
    I-5 demolished approximately 4,500 homes citywide.
    Resistance
    Rare multiracial coalition: Bob Santos's InterIm CDA and the Four Amigos coalition.
    Live 2026
    Sound Transit light-rail siting through ChID; Africatown CLT.
    Sources
    Taylor, Forging of a Black Community; Santos, Humbows, Not Hot Dogs!

  • San Francisco, CA

    Manilatown and the International Hotel

    Community
    Filipino manong; Chinese elders
    Displacement
    1968 eviction notice issued to approximately 150 tenants. A nine-year fight ended on August 4, 1977 when 400 riot police removed the last residents.
    Resistance
    The fight produced San Francisco rent control in 1979.
    Sources
    Habal, San Francisco's International Hotel; Curtis Choy documentary.

  • Milwaukee, WI

    Bronzeville

    Community
    African-American
    Displacement
    I-43 construction through the 1960s (figures vary widely and need verification).
    Resistance
    Father James Groppi and the NAACP Youth Council led 200 consecutive open-housing march nights, producing the 1968 Milwaukee open-housing ordinance.
    Sources
    Jones, The Selma of the North; America's Black Holocaust Museum.

  • Phoenix, AZ

    Golden Gate Barrio

    Community
    Mexican-American
    Displacement
    Approximately 6,000 residents displaced and roughly 1,600 houses lost for Sky Harbor Airport's westward expansion in the 1970s and 1990s. Introduces airport expansion as a distinct mechanism.
    Sources
    Phoenix Historic Preservation "Community Expansion" report; ASU Chicano/a Research Collection.

Tier C

5 cases

v6 or later. Longer research horizon. Each carries a distinct mechanism the atlas wants to document (treaty violation, subaqueous displacement, airport expansion, smaller-city renewal) rather than repeat the freeway pattern already covered.

  • Allegany Seneca Nation

    Kinzua Dam

    Community
    Senecas; 600 plus displaced; 10,000 acres, one third of the reservation
    Displacement
    The Kinzua Dam was completed in 1965 in violation of the 1794 Treaty of Canandaigua.
    Sources
    Bilharz, The Allegany Senecas and Kinzua Dam; Seneca Nation Onöhsagwë:de' Cultural Center.

  • Celilo Falls

    Columbia River Tribes

    Community
    Multiple tribes; continuous Indigenous settlement for an estimated 15,000 years
    Displacement
    The Dalles Dam closed on March 10, 1957. Technically distinct mapping challenge: a subaqueous place.
    Resistance
    CRITFC (1977) is the direct organizational descendant; legal lineage through U.S. v. Oregon and the 1974 Boldt Decision.
    Sources
    Barber, Death of Celilo Falls; Ulrich, Empty Nets.

  • Stockton, CA

    Little Manila and Chinatown/Japantown

    Community
    Filipino, Chinese, and Japanese-American
    Displacement
    Downtown redevelopment and the Crosstown Freeway (early 1970s).
    Resistance
    Active organization: Little Manila Rising (Mabalon/Delvo).
    Sources
    Mabalon, Little Manila Is in the Heart.

  • Tampa, FL

    Central Avenue and The Scrub

    Community
    African-American and Afro-Cuban
    Displacement
    Mid-century renewal plus late-1960s I-275 construction.
    Sources
    Tampa Bay History Center; USF Special Collections civil rights exhibit.

  • Richmond, VA

    Jackson Ward and Navy Hill

    Community
    African-American; 7,000 plus displaced (approximately 10 percent of Black Richmond)
    Displacement
    Richmond-Petersburg Turnpike (I-95, 1958) cut Jackson Ward in two.
    Resistance
    Rare contemporary victory: the Richmond Crusade for Voters coalition defeated the Navy Hill arena in 2020. Reconnect Jackson Ward now proposes a cap-and-lid over I-95.
    Sources
    Richardson, Built by Blacks; Reconnect Jackson Ward.

Submit your city

Every place in this atlas rests on a research record the community built. If you live in one of the cases above, or if you know a case the list does not name, open a pull request. The scaffolding checklist in the repository's CLAUDE.md lists every file a new city or place touches. The editorial rules are strict and non-negotiable; the research standard is high; the time commitment is real. The work honors it.

Open an issue to propose a case or submit a pull request.