This thesis examines how highway construction reshaped housing value trajectories in Chicago and contributed to long term patterns of inequality in wealth attainment. While highways are often framed as neutral transportation infrastructure, historical scholarship demonstrates that their placement frequently intersected with racialized patterns of urban development. This study investigates whether proximity to highway infrastructure is associated with different patterns of housing appreciation by comparing neighborhoods along the built Dan Ryan Expressway, a historically Black string of neighborhoods along the proposed but ultimately canceled Crosstown Expressway corridor.
Using historical maps and census geography, census tracts intersecting the two highway corridors were identified for analysis. Median home value data were obtained from the National Historical Geographic Information System (NHGIS) for 1950 and 2000. Results indicate that neighborhoods located along the Dan Ryan corridor experienced slightly slower housing value appreciation than neighborhoods along the Crosstown corridor where highway construction was halted. Although the differences are modest and should not be interpreted as causal estimates, the findings suggest that large transportation infrastructure along with grassroots resistance may shape long term neighborhood wealth trajectories.By placing housing market analysis alongside the history of Black activism and placemaking, this thesis demonstrates how struggles over infrastructure became a central arena through which communities fought to defend neighborhood stability and assert control over urban space.