How the Cross-Bronx Expressway Has Affected Pediatric Asthma in the Bronx" (2012)

Fordham University Masthead Logo DigitalResearch@Fordham American Studies Senior Theses American Studies 2012 The rC oss-Bronx Double Cross: How the Cross- Bronx Expressway has Affected Pediatric Asthma in the Bronx Catherine McNamara Follow this and additional works at: https://fordham.bepress.com/amer_stud_theses Part of the American Studies Commons Recommended Citation McNamara, Catherine, "The rC oss-Bronx Double Cross: How the Cross-Bronx Expressway has Affected Pediatric Asthma in the Bronx" (2012). American Studies Senior Theses. 24. https://fordham.bepress.com/amer_stud_theses/24 This is brought to you for free and open access by the American Studies at DigitalResearch@Fordham. It has been accepted for inclusion in American Studies Senior Theses by an authorized administrator of DigitalResearch@Fordham. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The Cross-Bronx Double Cross: How the Cross-Bronx Expressway has Affected Pediatric Asthma in the Bronx By Catherine McNamara Fordham University AMST 3500. American Studies Senior Seminar Profs. Julie Kim and Oneka LaBennett Senior Thesis December 15, 2011 1 Abstract This paper will address the effect that the construction of the Cross-Bronx Expressway, in conjunction with specific government policies and practices, has had and continues to have on the inordinately high rates of pediatric asthma in the Bronx. Existing research on the subject tends to take a very segmented view. There has been much research done in the individual fields of the history of the Cross-Bronx Expressway and the Bronx’s subsequent demographic change; more recently, studies have taken note of the Bronx’s high asthma rates, the effect of various pollutants on children’s lung function, pollution rates in the Bronx, and the difference in asthma rates among different races/ethnicities. All of this work has been done separately, each confined to its own particular field. This paper examines the findings in each of these fields and shows how all of these perhaps seemingly unrelated factors could actually be working together, affecting asthma in the Bronx. The overall goal of this paper is to show that the Cross Bronx Expressway and its aftereffects have contributed in part to the disproportionately high rates of pediatric asthma in the Bronx; as a result of these findings, I can argue that at least some portion of the Bronx’s asthma burden is a consequence of the decisions of policy makers and government bureaucrats, and could therefore have been avoided. 2 I. Introduction Throughout major cities in the United States, pediatric asthma rates are rising. This increase is occurring both in the number of children who are diagnosed with asthma, as well as in the number of asthma attacks experienced in children who already have the condition.1 Noticing this trend, researchers have created several subtypes of asthma to make analyzing and combating it easier.2 Rising asthma rates are of particular concern in the Bronx, which is afflicted with some of the nation’s highest pediatric rates. In the Bronx, asthma mortality rates are “about three times higher … than the national average. Hospitalization rates are about five times higher. In some neighborhoods in the Bronx it is estimated that 20% of the children have asthma.”3 The Bronx also has some of New York state’s highest pollution rates: “Bronx County is one of the ten counties in the state that exceed current federal air quality standards for fine-particle pollution.”4 For 2011, the American Lung Association’s “State of the Air” campaign, which provides detailed information on air pollution levels in all cities in the United States and then uses this information to assign each city a grade, awarded the Bronx an “F” for daily particle pollution exposure.5 The Bronx experienced a surge of decay and disrepair in the second half of the twentieth century, causing it to be known generally as the poorest of New York City’s five boroughs. While there is no single cause of this deterioration, a large factor was the construction of the Cross Bronx Expressway. Built between 1948 and 1972, the six-lane expressway was the brainchild of Robert 1 Ruth A. Etzel, “How Environmental Exposures Influence the Development and Exacerbation of Asthma.” Pediatrics: Official Journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics 112, no. 1 (2003): 233. 2 These classifications include “allergic asthma, exercise-induced asthma, asthma caused by bacterial and fungal infections, asthma in the elderly, and others. These different types of asthma have different triggers and may respond differently to treatments and interventions” Rae Zimmerman, “Asthma and Air Pollution: A Literature Review,” in South Bronx Environmental Studies: Public Health and Environmental Policy Analysis, 65. 3 Ibid. 4 Manny Fernandez, “A Study Links Trucks’ Exhaust to Bronx Schoolchildren’s Asthma.” New York Times, October 29, 2006, accessed August 2, 2011. 5 “State of the Air: New York, Bronx County,” American Lung Association. Accessed August 2, 2011, http://www.stateoftheair.org/2011/states/new-york/Bronx-36005.html. 3 Moses, meant to run through the middle of the Bronx and connect the George Washington, Triborough, and Bronx-Whitestone bridges. To accommodate the Cross Bronx Expressway, thousands of Bronx residents were displaced from their homes. The chaos brought by the expressway’s construction prompted many of those residents who could afford to leave to do so, leaving only the poorest residents. Not only is the Bronx the poorest of New York City’s five boroughs, its residents also report much higher than average rates of asthma, particularly children. In fact, “some neighborhoods in the Bronx are about three times higher than the national average,” and “in some neighborhoods in the Bronx it is estimated that twenty percent of the children have asthma.”6 Air pollution in general has been identified as a large contributing factor in the development of asthma, and recently more attention has been paid specifically to diesel exhaust particles, which “is of particular concern to residents of the South Bronx because a large number of diesel trucks drive in and out of the area as a result of activities such as waste transfer stations and other commercial activities.”7 The bulk of these trucks travel on the Cross Bronx Expressway, which cuts straight through residential areas of the borough, putting residents directly in harm’s way. The overall goal of this paper is to show that the Cross-Bronx Expressway and its aftereffects have contributed in part to the disproportionately high rates of pediatric asthma in the Bronx; as a result of these findings, I argue that at least some portion of the Bronx’s asthma burden is a consequence of the decisions of policy makers and government bureaucrats, and could therefore have been avoided. The first section of this paper addresses the history of the United States government’s involvement in the housing market and industry, as well as that of so-called “urban renewal” programs that arose in cities (for this paper’s purposes I will focus on New York City) in the mid- 6 Zimmerman, “Asthma and Air Pollution,” 64. 7 Ibid, 67. 4 twentieth century. This section allows me to show how, thanks to U.S. government agencies, discriminatory policies became the norm in the housing market and urban planning. The following section provides a brief history of the Cross-Bronx Expressway and its immediate consequences and reverberations throughout the Bronx. With this section I demonstrate how Robert Moses, creator of the Cross-Bronx Expressway, used those prejudiced and unfair policies of the HOLC and FHA in his relocation of Bronx residents displaced by the Expressway’s construction, causing those neighborhoods to deteriorate. The next section provides data on asthma rates in the United States and in underprivileged areas and demographics, particularly in the Bronx; this information shows how the demographic overhaul and housing degradation brought by the Cross-Bronx Expressway has impacted the Bronx’s high asthma rates. In the following section, I recount my visits to various playgrounds that Robert Moses built alongside the Cross-Bronx Expressway, on extra land that had not been taken up by the Expressway. I interviewed several parents who had brought their children to the playgrounds, to gauge the general awareness of the issue of pediatric asthma among the Bronx community. With this section I illustrate how another contributing factor of the Bronx asthma problem is the lack of awareness of the issue as well as how to combat it. In the final section of my paper, I pull all of the preceding sections together in my final argument, establishing how each of these factors, all caused in a way by the Cross-Bronx Expressway, have contributed to the widespread problem of pediatric asthma in the Bronx. II. History of US public housing & NYC “urban renewal” Before the Great Depression, popular opinion held that the U.S. government had no business or responsibility in providing shelter to its citizens; until that point, the federal government’s only involvement in this sphere was “a survey of slum conditions in large cities in 1892, the creation of a Federal Land Bank System in 1916, and the construction of munitions and arms workers’ housing 5 during World War I.”8 Unlike the government housing programs that emerged in the mid-twentieth century, these instances were for the sole benefit of the government: “neither the result of a conscious effort to help the poor nor of an increased reform spirit.”9 These established priorities are telling for the future “urban renewal” efforts seen in American cities in the mid-twentieth century, when policymakers claimed to be working for the betterment of those poor living in the “slums,” but the actual effect of these efforts was to exacerbate the problems of city slums and spread urban blight.

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