THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY VOLUME XXVII SEPTEMBER 1921 NUMBER 2 THE NEIGHBORHOOD: A STUDY OF LOCAL LIFE IN THE CITY OF COLUMBUS, OHIO R. D. MCKENZIE ABSTRACT City structure. Cities are usually classified according to size. They may be also classified according to the nature and organization of their leading industries. Land valuations in the forms of business, industrial, and residential utilities, largely determine the structure of the modern city. Every city has its central business district, located near the geographical center of the city. Sub-business districts tend to form at street-car crossings and around neighborhood institutions. The basic industries are usually located around the outskirts of the city's corporation, while manufacturing establishments employing women are usually located near the center of the city. Real estate values distribute a city's population into various residential sections of different economic and social status. Racial and nationality bonds tend to subgroup the population within the various economic areas. Mobility of population. The term implies the extent to which the individual varies his environment, either by change of residence or by use of secondary means of communication. The mobility of modern life facilitates disorganization of traditional group and institutional structures. It is a measure of progress, but at the same time aggravates many of our political and social problems. Change of residence is much more frequent among the lower economic classes in Columbus than among the well-to-do. But dependence upon local institutions is considerably greater in the poorer neighborhoods than in the better residential sections, on account of inability to use secondary means of communication. PART I. LOCAL LIFE WITHIN THE CITY I. CITY STRUCTURE Columbus is a city of about 210,000 inhabitants, according to the latest census. There are forty-three other cities in the United States, which, from the point of view of population, fall in the same I class. Of these cities eleven are in the New England states, eight in the Middle Atlantic, seven in the East North Central, two in the West North Central, two in the Mountain, and five in the Pacific states. Inasmuch as the modern city is largely an industrial institution it is important to know the nature of a city's leading industries. Eighteen of the cities in question have for their main industry the production of iron and steel products, eight have textiles and clothing, four lumber, three boots and shoes, three baking and confectionery, two publishing and printing, two preserving and canning, one rubber goods, one furniture, one jewelry, and one cotton-seed oil.❜ These cities may again be classified according to the relative importance of their leading industries. Nine of the forty-four cities of this group are characterized by the national importance of their major industries. For example, Patterson, Fall River, Lowell, and Lawrence, all of which are located in Massachusetts, belong to the textile and clothing group and have their industries organized on a nation-wide sale of products. Similarly, Akron with its rubber goods, Grand Rapids with its furniture, Youngstown with its iron and steel products, represent the type of city with a single dominant industry organized on a national scale. The majority of the cities in this group, however, are not characterized by a single outstanding industry but possess numerous small industries of approximately the same size, the larger part of their business being limited to local trading areas. Cities with this type of industrial life may be called diversified cities.4 Columbus The estimated population of Columbus for 1916 was 209,722. It belongs to the third group of American cities, those having a population of 100,000 to 300,000. There was a total of forty-four cities in this group in 1916. General Statistics of Cities (1916). 2 This classification was made from the Census of Manufactures, Vol. I (1914), and is based on census returns (1910). Undoubtedly in several instances the leading industry of 1910 is not the leading industry of today. The industry employing the greatest total number of employees was taken as the leading industry. 3 Cities in which the major industry employed more than twice as many workers as the industry next in order, and more than the total listed for the classification, "all other industries" I have classified here, as "single-industry cities." 4 See C. A. Beard, American City Government (1912), pp. 26-29, for a classification of types of American municipalities. belongs in this latter class. It has three relatively important C types of industry: foundry and machine-shop products; the 2 construction of cars, locomotives, and heavy machinery, and the manufacture of boots and shoes. Most of our great cities are circular or star shaped unless directly modified by geographical peculiarities. This structure is due to the inherent nature of city development, when uncontrolled by conscious design. "Whatever the type of city, growth consists of movement away from the point of origin, and is of two kinds; central, or in all directions, and axial, or along the water courses, railroads and turnpikes which form the framework of cities. " Columbus is shaped like a Greek cross. Its two leading thoroughfares, Broad and High streets, intersect at right angles near the junction of the Sciota and Olentangy rivers. High Street, the business backbone of the city, runs north and south for a distance of about nine miles within the corporation limits. Broad Street, on the other hand, runs east and west, or nearly so, and forms the arm of the cross. This street comprises part of the old Lincoln Highway. Topography has had something to do in determining the rough outlines of the city's structure. The junction of the two rivers just mentioned furnishes the basis for the crosslike appearance of the city. Expansion has followed the lines of least. resistance along the south side of the Sciota River and the east bank of the Olentangy. The distribution of business, industry, and population within the confines of any large city is determined by the operation of economic forces which tend to produce certain similarities of structure with respect to all big cities. Generally speaking, the utility of land in the city falls into three classes: business utility, industrial utility, and residential utility. The areas devoted to these purposes are separated by more or less definite lines and are themselves 1 Columbus, like almost every other city of its size, manufactures articles which are sold throughout the entire country, also in foreign lands, but Columbus is not dominated by any particular industry, nor does it have the habit of advertising in any of the national journals such as the Post, Literary Digest, etc. Richard M. Hurd, Principles of City Land Values (Record and Guide, 1903). Adapted as a reading in Marshall, Wright, and Field, Materials for the Study of Elementary Economics (1913), p. 620. |