Postwar Public Housing Historic Context

In 2025, MnDOT’s Cultural Resources Unit hired Hess Roise to prepare a statewide context for postwar public housing as a part of MnDOT’s ongoing efforts to broaden their suite of historic context studies.

The context begins with a history of housing America’s lowest-income residents, culminating in the legislation that enacted the modern public housing movement. It follows the development of public housing in Minnesota, from large urban developments to small-town scattered-site housing and high-rise towers for senior citizens. The context also situates Minnesota’s public housing within broader postwar legislative changes, demographic shifts, and the sociocultural attitudes that shaped this property type and the attitudes surrounding it.

The context includes criteria for evaluation, establishing a framework for MnDOT’s Cultural Resource Unit and other historians to assess the potential National Register eligibility of this varied group of properties.