Dimensions of
Coastal Gentrification
The diminishing significance of the commercial fishing industry coupled with the rising influence and importance of tourism is indicative of a broader phenomenon, coastal gentrification.
Coastal gentrification is a complex and multifaceted process and cannot be characterized by a single cause and effect. A variety of forces restructure community values, priorities, and identities away from maritime industries towards a greater emphasis on tourism and recreation (6). The process can manifest in seemingly unlike ways in different places, but there are usually shared dimensions of change. In this story map, we focus on transformations in infrastructure, community composition, the economy, and cultural identity.
Infrastructure provides the physical foundation for what types of activities can and cannot occur. The types of infrastructure that exist at moments in time can reflect which industries are actively contributing to the local economy as well as their economic importance. Community composition characterizes what types of people live in an area. Through tracking changes in community composition, one can begin to understand how and why people come to and leave a place. The economy reflects how a town and its residents generate wealth. Changes to the economy can be seen in tax revenue, employment statistics, industry revenue, and other indicators of economic activity. Cultural identity can represent a community’s physical and emotional connection to a place. By examining changes in cultural identity, one can gain insight into what holds value in a community. Through viewing changes within these dimensions, it is possible to see how a coastal community slowly transitions from a productivist space to a consumptive one (6, 7). We trace these changes using the data sources listed at the bottom of this page.
The Dimensions
Data Sources
As we explore the story of change in Beaufort, North Carolina, we draw on the following data sources. Additional information about these sources may be found on About this Project.
Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps
1885 - 1924
The Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps are a large collection of detailed records of United States’ cities and towns from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. These maps detail information about individual buildings and their uses.
Town of Beaufort, Land Use Plans
1976 - 2006
A land use plan is a collection of policies that serves as a community’s blueprint for growth, and these plans are informed by voices from the community through surveys and town meetings. These documents outline Beaufort’s community composition, economic base, existing land use, and future visions.
Historical Newspapers
1925 - 1944;
1948 - 1960
Beaufort began publishing a local newspaper in 1912, a digital collection for printed newspapers exist for The Beaufort News and The Carteret News Times for this time period.
Other Area Specific Studies
2005 & 2012
Social scientists and anthropologists have studied fisheries and community dynamics, collected oral histories of how fishers’ lives are impacted from the changes in these fisheries, and examined how Beaufort’s cultural identity and infrastructure shifted over time.