Gentrification by Fire
Climate change and its most extreme consequences are pushing up the price of homes throughout much of the American West, as fires and flooding carve into existing housing stock and restrict the amount of land suitable for future building.
Over several harrowing weeks in October 2017, the Tubbs Fire swept over this city’s eastern hills to destroy about 5,600 homes, an estimated 5 percent of the region’s already threadbare housing stock. Twenty-two people died in the flames.