Massive investments in bike infrastructure have got more people moving in Memphis, but they have also affected social inequality

In the past six years Memphis, Tennessee has undergone a cycling revolution, creating more than 100 miles of bicycle lanes and greenways. Despite the beneficial environmental implications of such a scheme, is bike oriented development just a way of reinforcing the status quo of social inequality? Kevin T. Smiley, Wanda Rushing, and Michele Scott find that while such bike schemes are likely to spur economic development and raise property values, these economic benefits are most likely to go to developers and may result in further racialized gentrification

Memphis: Cotton Fields, Cargo Planes, and Biotechnology

In Memphis, writes Wanda Rushing, each new wave of development strategies tends to reproduce old patterns of inequality