Huston-Tillotson University Heritage Festival

Busy day... I began the morning by going out apartment finding, and by sheer luck the first place we looked at was nigh utopian. Simply perfect. It's in an upscale, trendy, yuppie neighborhood with lovely old buildings that have been extremely well preserved and/or renovated. Then I went to East Austin for an assignment. East Austin has undergone a lot of what's known in the city planning field as "gentrification," meaning the city or investment firms buy up failing properties, clear out the "riff-raff" and start setting up franchises, lofts, and Starbucks as far as the eye can see. I don't pretend to know the full depth of the situation at hand, but I know what I see: the yuppie Austin is meeting the old Austin and devouring more land every year. Black businesses and households are vacating one by one, and going where? I don't know. Probably to Riverside, where the crime is rising all the time. Not a nice place to live. What's a city to do?

Worlds of difference, only a few miles apart.