Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management

Ingrid Gould Ellen

Brian McCabe

Historic preservation efforts typically invite controversy, especially in high-cost cities.  Advocates of historic preservation loudly trumpet the benefits of protecting the historic assets of a city, while critics charge (equally loudly) that preservation freezes cities and constrains their vital growth and development. Unfortunately, decisions about which properties and neighborhoods to preserve are typically highly politicized and rarely take into account a rigorous and thorough assessment of the costs and benefits. Yet such an assessment is critical as city leaders make choices about which properties and neighborhoods to protect and preserve.

Our aim here is to provide a balanced overview of the costs and benefits of preservation, through a series of empirical analyses in New York City.  We focus on the establishment of historic districts in particular, which cover far more properties than individual landmark designations and tend to invite more controversy.  We consider the degree to which historic districts discourage new construction and alterations, the degree to which they raise prices and rents, and the degree to which they accelerate demographic changes in neighborhoods and affect patterns of economic and racial segregation.  In brief, we find that the establishment of historic districts discourages new construction within districts but not alterations, increases prices within districts but not rents, and invites increases in the socioeconomic status of the population living in historic districts but not racial changes. 

We end with a set of procedural suggestions for how New York, and cities more generally, might make decisions about historic districts in ways that enhance their benefits and minimize their costs.