Curbed Boundaries: An Analysis of Home Front Material Culture within the Context of Individual vs. Municipal Investments in Contemporary Oakland, CA

This project investigates the material evidence of individual and City investment in the built landscapes of Oakland, California. Through virtual pedestrian survey, we have analyzed 1000 randomly selected home fronts, implementing a five-facet rating scale to document evidence of resident investment in diverse socio-economic areas. Results suggest that while residents throughout all areas of Oakland invest materially in their homes, they do so differently.  Those in higher income areas invest in categories such as plant-life and atmosphere relative to the value of their property. The investment of those in lower income areas is unrelated to home value. Personal investment was compared to city investment to test for bias in use of replacement strategies within negatively characterized neighborhoods as opposed to refinement within positively characterized neighborhoods, thus leading to gentrification and a denial of the worth of individual investments not directly related to property values.