1 comments about Downtown, Inc.: How America Rebuilds Cities.

1. Here we have a very interesting investigation about the stories of the american cities and specially its downtowns, how they have growned, its shinning past and its following falldown. We can learn about very brilliant redevelopment projects that are intending to rebuild and to regain once again progress and live to some parts of the modern cities that have been in a great depression since long decades of desinvestments. It is very important to take in accounts the stories very well written by the authors about how the joining between public and privates forces is the only way to rebulit american ( and everywhere) abandoned downtowns!

1 comments about Repairing the American Metropolis: Common Place Revisited (Samuel and Althea Stroum Books) (Samuel and Althea Stroum Books).

1. Review by Tigran Hasic (Reproduced by permission from the Nordic Journal of Architectural Research)
   
   Just when you thought that what you are looking at is nothing more than another book on anti-sprawl in America, along comes Douglas Kelbaugh's new book "Repairing the American Metropolis". This refreshing work is written with formidable ease of style, recherché lucidity and academic strength, as well as many years of practical experience. In a nutshell, this book offers a completely new reconsideration of contemporary American architecture, design, planning and policy making, as well as ways how to revitalize and repair our cities. All of this evolves in a metropolitan sustainable vision where cities would be ecologically, socially and spatially acceptable again. Aristotle's axiom that `we come to the cities to live the good life' could not be more correct in the context of this book.
   
   Repairing the American Metropolis is a follow-up to the author's highly successful earlier book Common Place: Toward Neighborhood and Regional Design. This earlier work, illustrated by a number of workshops and charrettes, is a tour-de-force about how we can develop community and create sustainable places in face of fragmented growth and development. Kelbaugh's work on charrettes has been cited and copied around the USA and abroad as a model for community design. The new book continues on the same line of thinking but lifts the whole discussion to an even higher intellectual level, but in an understandable and overwhelmingly logical and persuading manner.
   
   Backdrop for the whole discussion lies in the fact that America is becoming more and more a suburban nation, as portrayed and discussed in the book Suburban Nation: The Rise of Sprawl and Decline of American Dream by Andres Duany, Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk and Jeff Speck. With more than 50% of population living outside of the city, we are witnessing the breakdown of community and civic life, people-friendly neighbourhoods - cities as we used to know and love them.
   
   It is not surprising that Peter Calthorpe, one of the founders of New Urbanism in America is thinking on the same lines as Kelbaugh. Calthorpe and Kelbaugh wrote the national best seller in urban design in 1998 entitled "The Pedestrian Pocket Book", in which they have argued for walkable neighborhoods, pedestrian communities and transit oriented development (T.O.D.) as well as for bringing back the sense and quality of place. They are not pushing for the disappearance of the automobile but rather for designing livable communities and repairing the old ones, while realizing that too much traffic not only destroys the urban quality of place but also damages the occupant of the car. Many of these ideas were later incorporated into New Urbanism. Along with Andres Duany, Peter Calthorpe and others, Kelbaugh has been one of the pioneers of this movement.
   
   The discourse in this book evolves around the notions of community, sustainability and the role of design. The book is divided into five sections that flow tightly and move all the time from the general to the specific and backwards: suburban sprawl, Critical Regionalism, typology, New Urbanism and public policy. Kelbaugh presents the case of the high costs of sprawl, how Critical Regionalism can be an answer to the growing forces of homogenization, commodification and banalization. It also addresses the importance of architectural typology to sustainable urbanism. He blends all chapters in a historical, architectural, design, planning, policy and sociological discussion that flows together well and that can be read well as separate parts as well as one single work.
   
   Andres Duany, one of the founders and spiritual leaders of the New Urbanism movement could not put it more correctly when he says that this book is "The most sophisticated critical presentation of the New Urbanism to be found anywhere." What he was actually referring to is a highlight of the whole book, Chapter 4, New Urbanism vs. Everyday Urbanism and Post Urbanism. Much less critical and openly assertive than some other proponents of New Urbanism, Kelbaugh nonetheless gives a sophisticated and strong critique of CIAM and failures of The Modernist architecture and planning principles that destroyed good urbanism and created zoned and fragmented communities dominated by vehicles and inhumane urban design. That notwithstanding, he comes up with a brilliant critique on New Urbanism, restating its principles in a highly intelligent way. At the same time he defends New Urbanism. Vicious attacks on modern architecture as failing on multiple levels - human, aesthetic, social and environmental - are not to be found here, but rather a lucid and realistic analysis of the state of the city.
   
   It is unquestionable (even the worst critics of New Urbanism cannot deny it) that the movement has revived enthusiasm for the city's potential and possibilities. It represents the antithesis (despite occasional lapses into gated communities) of community isolation, alienation, and spatial fragmentation, all in favor of livable places. Finally in Chapter 4 he presents the Three Paradigms: New Urbanism, Everyday Urbanism and Post Urbanism. Basically what Kelbaugh argues very convincingly is that New Urbanism ("idealistic, civic and structuralist") is not the "only game in town". There are "competing emerging urbanist paradigms" that have gained momentum at this moment in history. Aside from New Urbanism and the conventional suburban development that continues to enwrap the American metropolis - Everyday Urbanism ("informal, populist and non-structuralist") and Post Urbanism ("heterotopian, sensational and structuralist") exist in parallel, side by side.
   
   In the final chapter (Chapter 5) on Public Policy, Kelbaugh sets out a new metropolitan agenda where he points to a need for new and reformulated public policy. He presents seven policy initiatives for immediate action in America: (1) Get development priorities right; (2) Get automobiles under control; (3) Get transit on track; (4) Get planning; (5) Get more granny flats and live-work units (6) Get funding and taxing right; and (7) Get governance right. These are ready-made nostrums that, if adopted, would stop urban sprawl, create environmentally sustainable cities, public life, calm traffic and regenerate the urban, social and cultural realm. Instead he sees them as `enabling strategies' that could help local government to address problems and seize opportunities.
   
   The American project since WWII has been to opt for mobility and freedom while the European ideal has been place and urbanity. Unfortunately the European suburbs are not testimony to that fact. Although this book has not focused on the international context, it still has relevance to the European situation. The European metropolis will also have to go through a number of revitalizations (especially in the suburbs) as a consequence of all the eradications and negative changes left behind after the WWII. Kelbaugh's book represents an important primer in that respect.
   
   At times written in an overwhelmingly provocative, compelling and convincing style, this book reminds one of the colossal and influential work on urbanism and town planning, Jane Jacobs The Death and Life of Great American Cities. Kelbaugh's reasoning and ideas places him in the forefront of the current American and international urbanism debate. Repairing the American Metropolis is certainly one of the finest books on the subject that has come out in the last decade, written in a crisp, readable style accessible to architects, planners, urban designers, decision makers, real estate developers and laypersons alike.
   
   Douglas Kelbaugh is the Dean of the Taubman College of Architecture and Urban Planning at the University of Michigan, and former principal in Kelbaugh, Calthorpe & Associates in Seattle and in Kelbaugh & Lee in Princeton, New Jersey. In the foreword, Alex Krieger of Harvard Graduate School of Design describes it as "a fundamental reconsideration of contemporary American architecture and planning." Professor Kelbaugh's, in many respects dialectical work shows a person who understands today's realities, the constraints that we are faced with in our cities, options we have, and the need to proactively return to the authentic qualities of community and dwelling. He sums it up well by saying at the end of his book:
   
   These changes and reforms are essential because the alternatives are stark, and the consequences of inaction are apocalyptic. It will be worth both our grittiest and noblest efforts. And as we repair and revitalize our architecture, neighbourhoods, cities, and regions, we may build common places for ourselves along the way.

1 comments about Urban Planning Today: A Harvard Design Magazine Reader (Harvard Design Magazine).

1. URBAN PLANNING TODAY is part magazine, part newsletter, and part book report on the latest problems and debates facing urban planning. Here various contributors provide articles on projects from different backgrounds and goals in urban and regional planning, juxtaposing development strategies and issues with criticism and legal notes. Any with an interest in successes, failures, and evolving perspectives will welcome this addition to a college-level collection strong in urban studies.
   
   Diane C. Donovan
   California Bookwatch

1 comments about Branding New York: How a City in Crisis Was Sold to the World.

1. You often hear in academia that cultural analysis should be better integrated with political economy. Usually this means that the latter should disappear beneath 'political' readings of popular cultural texts. But Branding New York actually achieves this feat, showing how neoliberal New York arose after the fiscal crisis of the mid-seventies through a cultural project that defined New York City as the stomping ground of the 'new class' (i.e. 'yuppies', epitomized by the readership of New York magazine) and a safe space for business and tourists. This counterrevolution required real work, not so much because the forces opposing it were well organized (they were not) but because such phenomenon as graffiti (which Greenberg writes sympathetically about as an effort by inner-city youth to assert their right to the city and to be heard), crime, exploitation films like 'Escape from New York', and even serial killers kept interfering with the image makeover (even the cops got into the act--angry about budget cuts, they produced leaflets warning tourists to stay away from 'Fear City'). Greenberg shows the way elite organizing drives to remake NY as a desirable locale for financial business (not its main function in an earlier era when it was dominated by manufacturing) converged with the cultural struggle through the I Love New York campaign, a wildly successful logo and jingle which was underwritten by governmental agencies (its first iteration had a slightly touching, desperate undercurrent, as Broadway casts donated their labor in an effort to lure enough tourists to keep their shows going; a later version just emphasized all the tax breaks and other favors businesses could now receive).
   The cultural work that Greenberg describes has now become the 'common sense' predominant in New York, notwithstanding 9-11 (which she devotes a coda to). Much--perhaps a majority--of the city languishes in low paying jobs, lousy schools, a public transit system still getting cut even as population and ridership increases, etc. But New York is now a 'great place to live' for a predominantly white, relatively affluent class, and a great place to do business for financial and real estate interests that get a sympathetic ear from city government beyond the wildest dreams of the seventies. A new cultural struggle will need to be waged if the city is to be remade as a genuinely inclusive space that lives up to the potential of its multicultural population. Greenberg's book should be read closely by anyone interested in doing so.

3 comments about Housing Policy in the United States: An Introduction.

1. Purchased the book for a class . . . seems to be a good book that provides a cursory overview of residential housing policy in the US.



2. If you're searching for an introductory one-volume treatment of this subject that is also well written and researched, you'd be hard-pressed to top this book. That's not to say that I don't have quibbles; the book could have contained more critical insight and still would have worked fine as an introductory level text.
   
   For example both the Low Income Housing Tax Credit and the public housing chapters (chapters 5 and 6) seem to take the inherent value of "deconcentration" and "mixed income" at face value, at a time when both notions are finally beginning to receive long overdue critical attention from social scientists (besides William Julius Wilson), not just planners, pundits, and politicians. It turns out that these notions are highly problematic in their actual application. As Edward Goetz and others have pointed out about the HOPE VI program for instance, "the program is not so much about improving the conditions for previous residents as it is about reclaiming urban neighborhoods for middle- income families." This is a stronger statement than Schwartz makes on p. 118 of the book where he observes instead that the program "does not necessarily improve the lives of all the residents of the original public housing."
   
   It is also neither fair nor balanced for Schwartz to neglect to mention that the 1937 U.S. Housing Act, as one of its many compromises, ITSELF required segregated housing projects (in the book he suggests that segregated public housing was more of a local phenomenon). He also overemphasizes the role of elected officials in Black neighborhoods who he says did not want integrated housing because it would have affected their political base. Does he mean to honestly suggest that the black desire to hold on to what limited political power it possessed during the Jim Crow 1930's is somehow to blame as much for segregated public housing in America as the actions of people such as Rep. Henry Steagall (the House sponsor of the bill) of Alabama? Schwartz's simple and direct discussion of racism in the FHA earlier in the book is better and more honest.
   
   Then there's the simple but honest critical question that Schwartz doesn't really tackle: at a time of record profits in the secondary mortgage market (discussed in pages 56-62), how is it that housing affordability problems continue to exist and in some cases even worsen in city after American city?
   
   On the plus side, the fair housing chapter (chapter 11) is excellent, as is the "stubborn facts of housing policy" section of the last chapter. Also, Schwartz's summary of HUD's programs for the homeless and disabled is one of the most concise I have read.
   
   In the end my nitpicks do not detract from the fact that Schwartz has written the most accessible and comprehensive introductory text on American housing policy out there. By explaining the often byzantine laws and rules governing housing finance, he has performed a much-needed public service. And by clarifying why housing matters (and will continue to matter) in the way that he does, he is positively contributing to a growing and much needed debate.



3. Professor Schwartz has written simply the most complete book on public housing available today. It's easy to follow, and covers every aspect of the public policy and finance behind the shaping of our urban landscape. This is not only an excellent classroom text, but useful for anyone interested in learning more about the growth -- and possible decay -- of our great American cities.

No comments about Geo-Space Urban Design.

No comments about The New Downtown Library: Designing with Communities.

No comments about Blue Monday: Stories of Absurd Realities and Natural Philosophies.

No comments about Heat Islands: Understanding and Mitigating Heat in Urban Areas.

1 comments about Designing Public Consensus: The Civic Theater of Community Participation for Architects, Landscape Architects, Planners, and Urban Designers.

1. I found this book to be very helpful to my work as a consulting planner. The stories are excellent reminders of the battles hard fought. I agree that projects are better for the public process they go through. There has not been a good book on this subject, so Ms. Faga has written a great book for students, professionals and community activists alike.