HOMELESS INTERSPERSION IN URBAN SEATTLE: THE POWER OF ROUTINES IN MAINTAINING A DIVIDED POPULATION

Seattle has been a site of growing homelessness for over a decade and now, it exists in a state of interspersion, where the homeless and the homed live spatially proximate but socially distant. In response, Seattle has employed a policy of regular homeless encampment sweeps and the socio-spatial exclusion of the homeless from increasingly gentrified spaces. In light of this background, this study seeks to understand how Seattle's homed residents have adapted to the increasing homeless presence, as well as how Seattle's homeless denizens have responded to their increasingly gentrified surroundings. Through nine qualitative interviews with homed and homeless individuals in Capitol Hill, WA, this essay suggests that a process of routine acclimatization maintains a state of relatively peaceful interspersion between homed and homeless residents. By tacitly learning each other's schedules, homeless and homed residents are able to share the same spaces at different times or in different ways, thus avoiding each other socially while remaining spatially proximate. These findings may imply that, in response to growing homelessness, cities may be able to adopt policies that foster understanding and apathy between the homeless and homed, which may in turn generate a relatively tolerant state of interspersion between the two demographics.