Washington, D.C.'s Streetcar Suburbs: A Comparative Analysis of Brookland and Brightwood, 1870-1900
Washington, D.C.'s Streetcar Suburbs: A Comparative Analysis of Brookland and Brightwood, 1870-1900
Loading...
Files
Publication or External Link
Date
1979
Authors
Prince, Thomas Eugene
Advisor
Groves, Paul
Citation
DRUM DOI
Abstract
The evolution of public transportation systems in the
large American cities of the late nineteenth century culminated
in the innovation of the streetcar. Such transportation
changes affected urban structure and by the last
quarter of the century had produced a distinctive residential
area, the streetcar suburb. Washington, D.C. had a number
of such suburbs, some the result of subdivision development
associated with the extension of streetcar lines to link
existing village suburbs to the downtown core, others the
product of concurrent residential subdivision and streetcar
development. Such suburbs were predominantly middle-class,
white, residential areas.
An examination of two Washington, D.C. suburbs:
Brightwood and Brookland, indicated distinct physical,
social, economic, and demographic structures in these
village suburbs in the early 1880's. After the subsequent
introduction of streetcar links to downtown Washington--an
employment core characterized by much white-collar
government employment--the two suburbs became increasingly
similar in terms of the chosen measurements. By the end of
the century, there was little in their structures to indicate
the very different paths they had taken to the same end.