The City of Madison Community Development Authority has submitted plans that outline its intended development goals for phase one of an approximately $300 million project to the Triangle neighborhood bordered by South Park and Regent streets and West Washington Avenue, according to the Wisconsin State Journal.
From the 1950s to 1970s, five distinct districts were constructed in this area. Due to the growing age of the neighborhood, it was deemed necessary for renovations, according to Housing Development Specialist and the CDA’s Redevelopment Project Manager Dan Johns.
This project also is driven by the community’s desire to increase affordable housing and promote inclusivity, according to University of Wisconsin Professor of Urban Planning Kurt Paulsen. Phase one of this project entails the construction of 164 one-bedroom units, a five-story building embellished with an underground parking lot, a CDA management office and other residential amenities spaces. In future phases, the CDA plans to redevelop all 336 units they currently hold, according to the Wisconsin State Journal.
While the CDA is in the beginning stages of its project, the Bayview Foundation — a nonprofit organization providing affordable housing to low-income residents — has implemented a three-phase project to serve the Triangle community, which began with the community engagement process in 2019, according to Bayview Foundation Executive Director Alexis London.
“The first building will probably be available for new residents to move into in August, and then every month after that there’s another building coming online,” London said. “So, all those units will be occupied by, I would say early 2025.”
While serving the same general community, the CDA and Bayview’s work are designed for different populations. While Bayview works heavily with intergenerational, immigrant households, the CDA provides one-person households for people with disabilities, according to Johns. He attributed the simultaneous occurrence between the two projects for allowing the CDA to adopt certain practices in regard to community engagement that have aided them in their process.
In early stages, the communities under the CDA and Bayview’s purview have all expressed concerns in regard to the possibility that urban development would displace residents, according to Johns and London. This fear is driven by the history the neighborhood has with past redevelopment operations.
“One thing we heard loud and clear from our CDA Board and from the residents is that they only want to move once, and that there should be a home for every resident today who wants to remain at the Triangle in the long-run,” Johns said.
The Housing Act of 1949 allocated loans to cities to redevelop urban areas and construct affordable housing, according to The Shared Humanity Project. But in practice this is credited for allowing the displacement of Black and immigrant ethnic residents, according to Paulsen. In 1963, the city razed the Triangle neighborhood, effectively displacing approximately 300 families, according to the Wisconsin State Journal
For Madison, residents of the Triangle neighborhood were subjected to discriminatory housing markets that still affect housing ownership at present, according to Paulsen. The occurrence of a racial house ownership gap is still apparent today — 15% of Black households own their homes in comparison to 53% of white households, according to the Wisconsin Public Forum.
“The kind of wholesale destruction and harm of cities in the ’40s and ’50s with urban renewal and highways accomplished the goals of segregation,” Paulsen said.
Both the CDA and Bayview’s projects stray from the destructive practices previously executed in the name of urban renewal. Importantly, no resident will be or has been displaced as a result of the CDA and Bayview’s projects, which they ensured through the application of a phased developmental approach, according to Johns and London.
The CDA took after the Bayview Foundation in regard to the adoption of this strategy aimed at preventing resident displacement by securing a household for any resident influenced by the development. For Bayview, the project’s heavy emphasis on community engagement — including community meetings, interviews, focus groups and door-to-door surveys — prompted the phasing design, according to London.
Residents targeted by previous urban renewal initiatives were forcibly relocated without earning any compensation for their acquired property, however, these projects were transparent with the residents, according to Paulsen.
“We had to be extremely careful when we talked about the redevelopment that we were ensuring that people understood that their housing is protected,” London said. “Their housing is here for them as long as they want to live here, and their rents will not go up unless their income goes up … that was a huge fear which is completely understandable.”
In the future, Bayview will work to finish the last year of the final phase of their project, and the CDA continues to work toward their developmental goals. While these two projects are at different stages, they both work cohesively to promote connections within the community. Bayview exemplifies this with the community center station at the middle of the project, which serves to provide facilities and services to parents and individuals in need, London said.
Similarly, the CDA works toward the ultimate goal of supporting the below average median-income residents and to the specific needs of each neighborhood, according to Johns. Short-term goals of the CDA pertain to the conclusion of phase one of development around 2026, but the entire project may take until approximately 2036 to be fully realized, according to the Wisconsin State Journal.
