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@chris_crash
The reasons that parks, and other spaces for kids to do things for free go away, often to make room for new flats, is an American policy called "Spacial Deconcentration". It was dreamed up at a meeting police chiefs, high ranking military, national guard, FBI and select politicians after the LA and other race riots in the US. There was one issue on the table, how to limit political damage, and re-occurance of race riots, and decimate the base of political "black power" groups (like the Black Panther Party).
They met for a while and came up with a solution, they would simply move all the poor people out of the inner city slums, into suburban slums, with limited transport links. This was a perfect solution, as it would be harder for riots to brake out in the out skirts, and they would be easier to contain as there would be less people rioting, and the slums would be easier to contain. Also it would be harder for the "political groups" to get a base in the community, as they would need to cover allot more miles, and the community projects that won the BPP support would have to be set up in many parts of the city, not just the centre.
The only problem was how are they going to get people to move out. Simple, they would wipe out all the social projects (parks, swimming pools, sports centres, ect) and where possible replace them with new high rent housing complexes, or other things more attractive to the middle classes (art galleries, cinemas, wine bars, ect). They would build new social housing projects out in the suburbs that had been in demand during the "white flight" in the 50's and 60's. This would lower the property value of the older suburban "ranch" houses, making the areas even less attrictive to ricer people, and more affordable to the poor.
The project worked wonders, it was tried out in smaller cities, then moved to larger ones on its success, now NYC is one of the few American cites yet to be fully "deconcentrated". The plan was adopted by other nations, france took it to heart, and even the recent damaging riots in paris, where more esaly contained because the housing projects are so spared apart. It has been being used in the UK as well, but brits have not taken to it as whole heartedly as the americans.