Case Study of Factors Affecting Urban Residential Construction in St. Louis

Across the country, renewed public and private investment in urban areas is converting blighted neighborhoods into residential developments. An interesting question is what factors draw investors to areas that have been declining or are abandoned. The explosion of publicly available data on the Internet has made possible the examination of some of the factors that may contribute to an urban neighborhood’s revitalization or redevelopment. Using a database of information compiled from the City of St. Louis Community Information Network, this research sought to identify factors common to St. Louis neighborhoods where building activity was greatest in 1997, the most recent year for which building permit data were available.