John Rahill

John Rahill

My photograph depicts the luxury apartments on the waterfront and part of the first park I visited. Everything in the photograph looks brand new. The pavement has no cracks, the grass is manicured and a deep green, and the apartments are glimmering in the afternoon sun like Beach condos. If someone saw this picture, they would not expect the greater neighborhood to be predominantly mediumlow income hispanic. The view from the balconies is straight across the harbor to downtown Boston, a truly exquisite perspective on the city. The map, taken from the Boston Research Map online tool is the percent of white residents in East Boston, taken from the 2010 census. The map demonstrates how insignificant the white population is in East Boston. The dull, yellow color (015% white) is visible on almost all inland regions. There are only a few pockets of orange, (1540% white) including the area where the photo was taken, which is the large bottom left region. It’s also interesting to compare the percent of white people in East Boston compared to downtown Boston and Charlestown, where almost every region is dark brown. The photograph and the map illustrate how much of anomaly the new apartment development is, but is a sign of what East Boston may become if gentrification continues.