In Auburn Court, a housing complex near the University Park development, 45 of 60 new units will be affordable.

Coveted Classrooms

Across Cambridge, increased housing costs are pushing out lower-income residents. They, in turn, are being replaced by wealthier homeowners and renters who tend to have fewer children.

In many areas of the city, this trend has especially hurt the public schools. In the last decade the district has seen a major decline in enrollment due in large part to parents opting to send their children to private schools.

Cambridgeport is no exception to this pattern, but the trend may be somewhat less worrisome for the neighborhood because it is home to two of the city's most popular elementary schools: the Cambridgeport School and the Graham and Parks School.

The schools' popularity may also carry the added benefit of creating neighborhood solidarity. Residents with elementary-aged children say those schools are a central part of their sense of community.

Josie P. Patterson, who has one child at Cambridgeport and another at Graham and Parks, says her neighborhood involvement has come by way of the schools.

"For me, Cambridgeport has really fulfilled that--it's very much my social life," she says.