Tent City
September 28, 2009 6:41 PM Subscribe
Multiple stories (1, 2, 3, 4, 5) from and about Tent City, a homeless encampment in Nashville, Tennessee.
I can see that spot from my office and I had no idea it was there. This completely changed my view.
posted by aburd at 7:15 PM on September 28, 2009
posted by aburd at 7:15 PM on September 28, 2009
I can see that spot from my office
Can you tell me the intersection, approximately? (I was just wondering what it would look like in Google Maps satellite imagery.)
posted by twoleftfeet at 7:47 PM on September 28, 2009
Can you tell me the intersection, approximately? (I was just wondering what it would look like in Google Maps satellite imagery.)
posted by twoleftfeet at 7:47 PM on September 28, 2009
Can you tell me the intersection, approximately? (I was just wondering what it would look like in Google Maps satellite imagery.)
I'm pretty sure it is right here.
posted by aburd at 8:31 PM on September 28, 2009 [1 favorite]
I'm pretty sure it is right here.
posted by aburd at 8:31 PM on September 28, 2009 [1 favorite]
.
A touching portrait, thanks for posting. So the show is really over? The sequence of posts made it a little unclear whether the camp had been successfully shutdown or not, with the third link showing officers putting up notice, but the fifth suggesting that municipalities have grown more lenient as the recession's deepened. Regardless, I can only wonder at what the future will hold. As one man said, "I don't ever want to live indoors again.". The sense of needing a place that feels like home, and of otherwise having really nowhere to return to. The nuclear family has combusted and the american dream of a picket fenced plot's a bust, I have only hope and terror for the nonconventional living arrangements that the future's destitute masses will have to make do with.
posted by kaspen at 9:08 PM on September 28, 2009
A touching portrait, thanks for posting. So the show is really over? The sequence of posts made it a little unclear whether the camp had been successfully shutdown or not, with the third link showing officers putting up notice, but the fifth suggesting that municipalities have grown more lenient as the recession's deepened. Regardless, I can only wonder at what the future will hold. As one man said, "I don't ever want to live indoors again.". The sense of needing a place that feels like home, and of otherwise having really nowhere to return to. The nuclear family has combusted and the american dream of a picket fenced plot's a bust, I have only hope and terror for the nonconventional living arrangements that the future's destitute masses will have to make do with.
posted by kaspen at 9:08 PM on September 28, 2009
I'm trying to read the sign on street view at 88 Hermitage. I'm pretty sure it says "Vocational ----?"
posted by sourwookie at 9:09 PM on September 28, 2009
posted by sourwookie at 9:09 PM on September 28, 2009
sourwookie: I chose the address 88 Hermitage randomly (well google helped). I just wanted to get to that view of the river there and neglected to remove it from the link.
posted by aburd at 9:28 PM on September 28, 2009
posted by aburd at 9:28 PM on September 28, 2009
When I try to drag the little orange guy from Street View into that park, he just runs away.
posted by twoleftfeet at 9:38 PM on September 28, 2009
posted by twoleftfeet at 9:38 PM on September 28, 2009
I think I stumbled upon an early salvo in the coming "How can we deal with this unsightly problem?" wars by communities against tent cities. I was flipping channels and ran across a story on CNN (I think) about a tent encampment that housed a large number of homeless men who also just happened to be...registered sex offenders. Comments from idiot locals about child molesters hiding in public woods ensued.
posted by Thorzdad at 3:56 AM on September 29, 2009
posted by Thorzdad at 3:56 AM on September 29, 2009
I drive up and down 24 there semi-regularly. I don't think you can see much from the interstate.
posted by jquinby at 7:02 AM on September 29, 2009
posted by jquinby at 7:02 AM on September 29, 2009
You see homeless people in downtown Nashville congregate in the little square across from the downtown library and a couple of other spots near and around Broadway but you don't see them much anywhere else, whether because of law enforcement or other reasons.
I had no idea any of this was here in Nashville either -- even though I pass by that exact spot twice a day. I assume that there are lots of hideouts and camps in the woods along the river -- Highway 70, which leads east five or six miles from where the map shows Tent City as being (or having been), is predominantly industrial land, vacant lots, and warehouses, with lots of forested thickets interspersed that could house potential encampments.
I feel for these folks. The rains here in the past month have been particularly heavy. I don't know how they held on. And now the city has given them the boot in the face. The Wall Street Journal piece mentions some homeless people being afraid of roaming dogs. That's definitely a reality. I've never seen as many stray dogs anywhere as I've seen here.
From the Wall Street Journal article:
Nashville estimates that on any given day, the city has 4,000 homeless people and 765 shelter beds. But more housing could be available soon. Tennessee will receive $53 million in federal stimulus money to help pay for the development of affordable rental housing across the state.
Well, it's one thing to say that x amount of dollars will be set aside for housing "across the state," but how many other people will be looking for spaces in that housing, assuming that it actually ever gets built? And how many units will actually be built?
posted by blucevalo at 7:56 AM on September 29, 2009
I had no idea any of this was here in Nashville either -- even though I pass by that exact spot twice a day. I assume that there are lots of hideouts and camps in the woods along the river -- Highway 70, which leads east five or six miles from where the map shows Tent City as being (or having been), is predominantly industrial land, vacant lots, and warehouses, with lots of forested thickets interspersed that could house potential encampments.
I feel for these folks. The rains here in the past month have been particularly heavy. I don't know how they held on. And now the city has given them the boot in the face. The Wall Street Journal piece mentions some homeless people being afraid of roaming dogs. That's definitely a reality. I've never seen as many stray dogs anywhere as I've seen here.
From the Wall Street Journal article:
Nashville estimates that on any given day, the city has 4,000 homeless people and 765 shelter beds. But more housing could be available soon. Tennessee will receive $53 million in federal stimulus money to help pay for the development of affordable rental housing across the state.
Well, it's one thing to say that x amount of dollars will be set aside for housing "across the state," but how many other people will be looking for spaces in that housing, assuming that it actually ever gets built? And how many units will actually be built?
posted by blucevalo at 7:56 AM on September 29, 2009
The message I take away from this is that if you're poor, the government would prefer that you go die. They certainly don't want to help.
posted by five fresh fish at 8:41 AM on September 29, 2009 [1 favorite]
posted by five fresh fish at 8:41 AM on September 29, 2009 [1 favorite]
The Wall Street Journal piece mentions some homeless people being afraid of roaming dogs.
That's a lack of creative thinking right there. Them's good eatin'!
posted by tspae at 8:54 AM on September 29, 2009 [1 favorite]
That's a lack of creative thinking right there. Them's good eatin'!
posted by tspae at 8:54 AM on September 29, 2009 [1 favorite]
Apropos of nothing, perhaps the idea is to have mysterious private police forces remand the homeless.
What a strange story. At least when the government runs the police, you know who is in charge and what the power structure is. A creepy-ass police corporation that won't tell anyone who they are and what they plan to do? That's 10x scarier!
posted by five fresh fish at 10:13 AM on September 29, 2009
What a strange story. At least when the government runs the police, you know who is in charge and what the power structure is. A creepy-ass police corporation that won't tell anyone who they are and what they plan to do? That's 10x scarier!
posted by five fresh fish at 10:13 AM on September 29, 2009
What a strange story. At least when the government runs the police, you know who is in charge and what the power structure is. A creepy-ass police corporation that won't tell anyone who they are and what they plan to do? That's 10x scarier!
The virtues of ethics and education and the temperance of non-evangelistic religion has pretty much exited the upper echelons of the Federal government, so we're down to the influence of money and the race to the bottom. I guess I should start mapping out my retirement using Snowcrash.
posted by crapmatic at 5:39 PM on September 29, 2009
The virtues of ethics and education and the temperance of non-evangelistic religion has pretty much exited the upper echelons of the Federal government, so we're down to the influence of money and the race to the bottom. I guess I should start mapping out my retirement using Snowcrash.
posted by crapmatic at 5:39 PM on September 29, 2009
We had a huge tent city where I live... over a mile long stretching down the river. And then the city came in, kicked them all out, and tore down their camp.
posted by bradth27 at 8:37 PM on September 29, 2009
posted by bradth27 at 8:37 PM on September 29, 2009
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