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Economic Geography: You're describing the Favored Quarter phenomenon, and yes, it's real. More investment has historically gone into the wealthier and whiter sector of a city's suburbs.

However, in DC, the Favored Quarter is expanding. Formerly less invested areas like eastern Montgomery County are getting the infrastructure and development.

More importantly, that doesn't mean nothing is happening in these other areas, or that nobody is interested because they're all poor black people. It just means blogs like GGW should work harder to highlight the challenges, opportunities and controversies in those areas, and to encourage projects that span outside the Favored Quarter, like the Purple Line.

As for the Metro history, it's true that the earliest plans were heaviest on Favored Quarter destinations. According to Schrag's book, activists (mostyl African-American leaders) in the mid-city area (like Shaw and Columbia Heights) lobbied for a line in their neighborhoods, largely on economic justice grounds, and got it.

Instead of writing off some areas and their leaders, we should work to improve decisionmaking and push for more and better investment in neglected parts of our region.

by David Alpert on Dec 29, 2008 12:10 pm • link • report