Gentrification Trends in New Transit Oriented Communities: Evidence from 14 Cities that Expanded and Built Rail Transit Systems

Over 25 billion dollars were spent between 1970 and 2000 in fourteen major cities in the United States on the construction of new rail transit lines. This massive investment in rail transit construction and expansion allows me to study the consequences of local public goods improvements for communities nearby new stations. This paper uses a fourteen city census tract level panel data set covering the years 1970 to 2000 to document significant heterogeneity in the effects of rail transit expansions across the fourteen cities. Communities receiving increased access to new “Walk and Ride” stations experience greater gentrification than communities that are now close to new “Park and Ride” stations. I thank two reviewers and seminar participants at MIT, USC and Wharton, and Nate Baum-Snow, Dora Costa, Ed Glaeser, David Luberoff and Bill Wheaton for helpful comments.