LOST IN AUSTIN

Austin is a city suffocating from endless growth, a disenchanted former resident reports.

For all its fame, this celebrated Texas town has gone sadly astray, writes Hannaford, a British-born freelance journalist now based in New York. It is a victim of its own success, having succumbed to the same forces of rampant overdevelopment, gentrification, racism, gun proliferation, homelessness, and environmental decay that are turning other American cities into enclaves almost exclusively for the wealthy. And in his estimation, there’s little or no political will to stop it. Hannaford barely recognizes his erstwhile home of 20 years, once a progressive, funky, laid-back, culture-rich haven for creatives and misfits. While it grew into its (manufactured) reputation as a live music capital, Austin lured and was inundated with new residents and tech corporations, then did its utmost to destroy all the characteristics that had made it so appealing. Austin is now the 10th-largest city in the U.S., with all the ills that come with it. Hannaford chronicles the development of each issue in meticulous detail (albeit from a strongly left-of-center perspective), including the effects of climate change exacerbated by corporate and political disregard. The evidence he presents is damning. Although he apportions credit to what Austin is trying to do right, he fears that it may be too little too late if things continue as they are in this increasingly homogenized city lodged in a deep red state. Happily, he offers more than a litany of malfeasances. Hannaford also invests his book with personal anecdotes, arresting profiles, and the vivid stories of a diverse group of citizens and undocumented immigrants. Nonetheless, the ultimate impression is that of a city steadily losing its distinctiveness and livability.

A model of first-rate reportage.