Newark, Ironbound, New Jersey
The city of Newark has a long history of pollution and environmental injustice from the Dutch settlements that decimated Native Lenape people along the Passaic River to the dramatic despoiling of the meadowlands through the industrial revolution to today’s concentrated pollution impacts from global goods movement, regional waste and other intersecting injustices. This industrial history together with a legacy of racialized planning, lax environmental regulations, residential racial segregation and economic disinvestment has resulted in disproportionate impacts on some of Newark’s most vulnerable low income communities and communities of color. The spaces where environmental degradation and marginalized communities of color and low income people come to coincide are fertile spaces for gaining insight into the social and political processes that are often hidden from society. These invisible places are the products of an unequal, throwaway society that lives a comfortable existence at the expense of sacrifice zones, referred to as environmental justice communities. The communities living in these marginalized spaces are fighting not just for a clean and healthy environment, but for the ability to shape the conditions of their environment and be shaped by it in positive, empowering ways.
Zooming into the field that the 2018 Studio 05 engaged with was the Ironbound Neighborhood of Newark. The Ironbound neighborhood, located in Newark’s East Ward, is in close proximity to major industry and transportation nodes including the largest seaport on the east coast and the state’s largest garbage incinerator. The neighborhood’s name, “Iron-bound” is derived from its location, which is enclosed on all sides by railroad lines and the Passaic River. Today, the area is home to a vibrant and diverse population of over 50,000 people, from around the world, a majority are people of color.
Today there are a network of nonprofits and organizations that stewards the maintenance and resiliency of Ironbound. One of them is the Ironbound Community Corporation. The Ironbound Community Corporation (ICC) is a community based organization that has been an active voice for environmental justice for over three decades. ICC is committed to intersectional, community organizing and social justice advocacy strategies on a range of issues that impact local residents, including immigrant rights, economic empowerment, housing rights and environmental justice.
ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE: RACE, CLASS AND THE ENVIRONMENT
To begin to articulate and digest the complex ecosystems of Newark Ironbound, the architecture students of the School of Constructed Environments partnered with students in the School of Public Engagement to rethink new tactics to re-imagined the neighborhood.
The Environmental Justice: Race, Class and the Environment taught by Prof. Ana Baptista focused on a critical exploration of the origins of and solutions to environmental racism and injustice. The class included examination of the evolution of the Environmental Justice Movement, the political economy of environmental inequalities, environmental history and practices, institutionalized racism and urban development patterns that contribute to the manifestation of unjust environmental conditions in low income and communities of color in the United States.
Throughout the course, students considered: What can be done to correct these inequalities?
The result of the course is a series of toxic tours and guest lectures to enrich class readings and discussions.
Localizing Ironbound
Student Designers include :
Erin Abraham, Corey Andrus, Ivee Barton, Becky Cho, Emma Costello, Alexander Guerra, Andrew Harvey, Jong Hee, Fabienne Chantai Hierz, Sunghwan Jean, Naser Kalhori, Atacan Kutlu, Ann Le, Vivian Lee, Meredith Moore, Sruthi Pawels, Vaishnavi Reddy Tangela
From a range of engagements with communities, nonprofits, and organizations, the students provoked an intersectional approach to environmental justice that can inform a range of potential collaborative projects to help illuminate the rich history of advocacy by the organization as well as the future-casting articulation of alternative futures that are possible.
The inspirations and stories seen and heard provoked projects that create new form of production publics, green infrastructures, food production spaces, and reclamation. These new futures overlay a global understanding of resilient alternatives seen into the localized neighborhood Ironbound.
