Seeking Spatial Justice

Abstract In 1996, the Los Angeles Bus Riders Union, a grassroots advocacy organization, won a historic legal victory against the city’s Metropolitan Transit Authority. The resulting consent decree forced the MTA for a period of ten years to essentially reorient the mass transit system to better serve the city’s poorest residents. A stunning reversal of conventional governance and planning in urban America, which almost always favors wealthier residents, this decision is also a concrete example of spatial justice in action. This book argues that justice has a geography and that the equitable distribution of resources, services, and access is a basic human right. Building on current concerns in critical…