page_title: Gentrification in Philadelphia
section_title: University City and Mantua
hierarchical_section_title: Gentrification in Philadelphia / Neighborhoods / University City and Mantua
caption_attribution_description: en:Drexel University Main Campus building Ross Commons. Photo taken in 2006 by ImGz.
context_page_description: Gentrification is the improvement of a neighborhood as new, and typically more affluent, people move in.
  It is often criticized because the current residents have limited options to buy or rent equivalent housing in alternative areas at the same price. If they stay, prices for products, services, and taxes rise and existing social networks are disturbed. Gentrification is the opposite of white flight—when residents voluntarily move away as a neighborhood declines.
  In Philadelphia, various neighborhoods, each with an characteristic class and ethnic makeup, are being shaken as newcomers move in. The impact of gentrification has been felt most in a number of neighborhoods around Center City such as lower North Philadelphia, Francisville, Northern Liberties, Fishtown, Kensington, Fairmount, Center City West, Hawthorne, University City, Point Breeze and Grays Ferry.
context_section_description: In 1872, the University of Pennsylvania moved to the west of the Schuylkill River, a mile and a half west of Center City, an area known as West Philadelphia.  Drexel University constructed its main building nearby at 32nd and Chestnut Streets in 1889. This northern part of West Philadelphia is Powellton Village and Mantua. The northeast border is Mantua Avenue, the first street west of the Schuylkill River, the bank of the river being taken up by the Pennsylvania Railroad, and more recently, the Schuylkill Expressway.
  By the late 1880s, Mantua  was a predominantly white, working-class neighborhood.  In the 1940s, however, "white flight" occurred due to many factors including redlining, deindustrialization, and suburbanization.  As in many other areas of Philadelphia, "white flight" resulted in Mantua becoming a primarily African American neighborhood. By the 1970s, the neighborhood had declined, and was the site of the 1978 MOVE shootout.  In 2014, the median household income was less than $17,000, more than half of Mantua residents lived below the poverty line, and 96% percent of Mantua's children under five lived in poverty.  Improving Mantua has become a priority for city leaders, as the neighborhood has been plagued with violence and many blighted properties.  In 2008, the Mantua Tower, a public housing project, was demolished.  The Tower will be replaced with low density public housing.
  The area to the south and west was developed by the University of Pennsylvania (Penn). The campus experienced growth after World War II as a result of the GI Bill. The site of the Philadelphia Almshouse, later named the Philadelphia General Hospital, became the campus of the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) in 1974.  The area occupied by Drexel, Penn, and CHOP is known as University City. Other participants in this development included  Philadelphia College of Pharmacy and Science, Presbyterian Hospital (Philadelphia), and Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine working together to build the University City Science Center.
  Development of University City was the result of both government policy and economic drivers. Land for new facilities was relatively cheap. Developers built housing to accommodate student housing. In so doing, existing residents were pushed out. The areas to the west and northwest of University City remain blighted.
  Penn's first significant but controversial expansion into the community was done with the aid of the federal slum clearance program. The Housing Act of 1949 allowed Penn to rebuild West Philadelphia under the Slum Clearance and Community Development and Redevelopment program.  An exact number of the people displaced isn't known, but figures range from 5,000 – 10,000. Soon after that, the West Philadelphia Corporation, consisting of Penn, Drexel University, An earlier Housing Act would give the institutions generous grants to building academic centers, and soon enough, West Philadelphia became Urban Renewal Areas 3, 4, and 5. Area 3 consisted mainly of the Black Bottom neighborhood, and while described by newspapers as "20 devastated acres of rundown bars and garages and warehouses," it was still home to hundreds of families who soon found themselves without a home.
  In retrospect, early federal attempts at urban redevelopment were destined to fail. According to the annual business review from Federal Reserve Archival System for Economic Research, 800,000 units of public housing have been erected; however, according to a research from Harvard University, Title I and III under the program were later discredited generally for not solving the housing problem and yet, fostered a worse form of slum in high-density projects.  University City did not include public housing projects, unlike Hawthorne in South Philadelphia.
  In the 1990s, opposite to Philadelphia, however, University City experienced a significant move-ins. According to The Pew Charitable Trusts, up till 2014, well-educated white millennials took up 40% of the population within University City, Philadelphia. Besides, University City 
caption: Main Campus building Ross Commons
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