The age of DumBro
DumBro: Why Every Neighborhood In America Seems To Have An Idiotic Name
Neighborhood rebrands like SoBro and LoSo used to be quirky — now they're a real problem.
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The Lede
If you've relocated to an up-and-coming American city in the past decade, you've likely had to decipher a code. Developers and business associations have long slapped pithy names on fast-growing parts of town, and tenured residents have long rolled their eyes at them. These unholy mashups would be fine if they were dumb yet harmless inventions — but they're the calling cards of developers and new arrivals as they try to wipe the slate clean on existing neighborhoods and remake them in their image.
Key Details
- As cities bend over backward to attract a certain type of middle- and high-income worker, they often end up looking the same. Now they're sounding the same, too.
- Names have long been a neat little trick of advertising devised by "real estate agents and developers, or community groups like neighborhood associations."
- Neighborhood names are also shorthand for your rent or mortgage payments. A 2018 study found that areas with "Hills," "Island," and "Village" tended to have the highest household incomes.
