Living on the Edges: Understanding Spatial Relationships between Urban Characteristics and Homeless Encampment Locations in Salt Lake City, UT

Keywords: homelessness, urban geography, encampments, displacement
Abstract Type: Virtual Guided Poster Abstract

Abstract

Cities often struggle with efficiently and effectively providing resources to members of their community experiencing unsheltered homelessness. Salt Lake City (SLC), Utah has been lauded in past years for its policies used to reduce homelessness, but in recent years there has been a sustained increase in the number of people experiencing homelessness in SLC. In addition to this increase in homeless populations, SLC continues to police homeless encampments through often violent, traumatic displacement events, making it difficult for encampments to remain in the city where the majority of homeless services reside. Encampments in seven U.S. census tracts were monitored for a period of 18 months to explore the spatial relationships between the locations of encampments in SLC and urban characteristics that are correlated with those areas. Preliminary findings indicate that 10.67% of block faces in the study area experienced an encampment over the study period (2020-2021), and that displacement events initially reduce the number of visible tents but rapidly become reestablished in the same areas, sometimes surpassing the previous encampment size. By examining these spatial patterns we can better understand what kinds of spatial features help explain where and when people tend to establish urban campsites, and by extension what areas of SLC might be more likely for future encampments and additional homeless services. Targeting these areas for city or nonprofit resources instead of displacement events will help support unsheltered SLC residents and potentially make encampments in SLC safer and healthier places.