City expansion is always hopscotch

George A. Pieler writes about Jane Jacobs at Ionarts:

Jane Jacobs, as most of her obituaries note, could never be typecast as left-vs.-right (politically) or planner-vs.-libertarian (in urban design). The New Urbanists tried to claim her but she kept her distance...(italics added)

"Keeping one's distance" is an intriguingly spatial way to put it when the subject is different views of how to plan cities.

Options to explain the statement:

1. Perhaps Jacobs simply wasn't a "joiner," and so maybe never sent her $200 to the New Urbanist mothership, CNU.

2. As well, there is a vast generational gap between Jacobs and NU activists such as Duany , Calthorpe et al. We're talking two generations — a good 40 years — between the cohorts. That puts a damper on things in the real world of human beings.

3. Another possibility is that even with all her knowledge Jacobs may not have been all that well-informed about the New Urbanism.

4. Brilliant as she was, she may have had a blind-spot about suburban growth, its historic inevitability and the potential to create fine places at the urban edge. I happen to live in one of those: a street-car suburb of the 1920-30s now firmly in the heart of Seattle, andgrowing more urban each year, so I am sensitive to the evolution of suburb into city.

•••

I see the two — Jane Jacobs and New Urbanism — as seamless, an historic continuity and that Jacobs must  have generally supported it; there could be no good reason not to. Others will claim otherwise for their own political purpose and try to use her name to attack NU; these Modernist enemies will use even the tiniest trowel — and that's all they can find — to undermine New Urbanism because they are too dull to understand how it doesn't force them to compromise their "design integrity." The critic we love to scorn for example, doesn't disappoint us. (Ourousoff's article today is so pathetic and filled with inaccuracies that I will not spend my valuable time on earth addressing it.)

So is there any truth to it? Did Jacobs really have an antipathy to new urbanism?

The closest thing I have been able to find so far — more links sought — is an interview in Reason, where Jacobs says:

....the New Urbanists want to have lively centers in the places that they develop, where people run into each other doing errands and that sort of thing. And yet, from what I've seen of their plans and the places they have built, they don't seem to have a sense of the anatomy of these hearts, these centers. They've placed them as if they were shopping centers. They don't connect. In a real city or a real town, the lively heart always has two or more well-used pedestrian thoroughfares that meet. In traditional towns, often it's a triangular piece of land. Sometimes it's made into a park.

Her major objection seems to be that New Urbanist developments "don't connect." That's a fair criticism. And putting aside the obvious fact that only a very small amount of suburban development is New urbanist, it ignores time — the actual process by which cities develop -- and that includes Manhattan, I believe: So far as I understand all expansion of American cities was by hopscotching, leaving empty fields until owner-by-owner growth filled in the empty places to make one seamless city. Cities only become seamless over time as the private market determines —purely a function of the serendipity of ownerhip — when a particular parcel is subdivided from farm or forest. Neighborhoods are only connected over a period of decades. At any one time, there will be passed-over lands as developers push out beyond to the easy-to-build on spots. That's the way it has always been, so far as I understand.

So does anyone have anything to add as to
1. What Jacobs actually believed about New Urbanism?
2. My own understanding of the hopscotch nature of urban growth?

Comments

[Chris]

My answer to NU critics is simple: what's your alternative? Hell yes, I want neighborhoods to connect. I'm sure Duany and his mother does too. Who doesn't? We're doing the best we can.

My problem with NU developments is that they lack my idea of medium-density urban heaven, 15th Ave E on Capitol Hill, Seattle. Or Greenwich Village. But I think it's probably impossible to create that. It has to evolve. Self-organizing emergent systems and all that. The obvious problem with suburbs is there's no possibility of those forms evolving. They're set in stone. No interconnected streets, etc.

I think any gardener knows this. When you plant a new bed you've got big gaps of just mulch. A couple of years later it's all filled in and bursting out.

[Andrew Salzberg]

Here's Jane Jacobs talking about New Urbanists and suburban infill. Text pulled from an interview with James Howard Kunstler in Metropolis Magazine March 2001:
(http://www.kunstler.com/mags_jacobs1.htm)

JHK: But we are stuck with all this stuff?

Jane Jacobs: Yes now that’s the next thing. I do not think that we are to be saved by new developments done to New Urbanist principles. That’s all of the good and I am very glad that New Urbanists are educating America. I think that when this takes hold and when enough of the old regulations can be gotten out of the way—which is what is holding things up, that there is going to be some great period of infilling. And a lot of that will be make-shift and messy and it won’t measure up to New Urbanist ideas of design—but it will measure up to a lot of their other philosophy. And in fact if there isn’t a lot of this popular and make-shift infilling, the suburbs will never get corrected. It’s only going to happen that way. And I think that it will happen that way.

JHK: I have the greatest admiration for the New Urbanists. The hardest work for them to do is the urban infill.

[george pieler]

Glad this simple observation provoked an interesting discussion!

As the Metropolis Magazine interview makes clear, Jacobs very much appreciated the value of New Urbanist principles, but knew that top-down planning based on those principles was an entirely different matter: one might say she wished to see those principles animate an organic, evolutionary revision of suburbia, not a flood of New Towns in the middle of nowhere. In cities I know (Chicago, Washington) her prediction is partly coming true, as some older suburbs acquire higher densities and urban-style amenities like restaurants, arts venues, and renovation of older housing stock (plus teardowns--another subject).

George Pieler

[David Sucher]

"...top-down planning based on those principles..."
versus
"...those principles animate an organic, evolutionary revision of suburbia..."

I think we are misleading ourselves. She may have well suggested something like that -- and this may go to the heart of my criticism not of Jacobs but of her readers -- but such a distinction doesn't hold up in the contemporary world.

Take a suburb. Any suburb in the USA. Their commercial areas all have great potential for in-fill development. But nothing will happen until the zoning codes are re-written to prohibit front-yard parking and require build-to lines and allow mix of uses. The first two are inherently top down requirements while the third is simply a remoival of a restriction.

Such distinctions between "top-down" and "organic" make no practical or historic sense. It's a distinction which can lead to great political debate but no building. TRo change the suburbs you must change the zoning codes -- that's "top-down." No?

[Andrew Spicer]

In Dark Age Ahead Jane Jacobs has a few pages where she writes about intensification of suburbs. "Sprawl can become less wasteful only by being used still more intensively. If that happens, suburban sprawl will turn out to have been an interim stage, a transition between land in agricultural use and land densely enough occupied to support mass transit, to form functional and inclusive communities, to reduce car dependency, and to alleviate shortages of affordable housing."

She then goes on to wonder what sort of force could cause this, notes that a contrived artificial force wouldn't work and then suggests a bursting housing bubble could create an economic force that requires it.

I would see this as an organic transformation, although you're right that it can't take place without a regulatory intervention in the sense of relaxing the zoning rules. And, furthermore, she says "Rules and regulations will be absolutely necessary to overcome suburban sprawl decently -- but not the same rules and regulations that created and encouraged sprawl." (This is on the previously-mentioned page 153.) She follows with a few pages on what form these rules might take.

[Benjamin Hemric]

I agree with George Pieler's post. (Very nicely -- and succinctly -- said!)

That Jane Jacobs was skeptical about New Urbanism doesn't surprise me. As I've previously implied in another City Comforts thread, it seems to me that New Urbanism has as much -- or more, maybe -- in common with the suburban Garden City movement that Jacobs reviled than with the Great Cities urbanism of Jane Jacobs.

In both the Garden City movement and New Urbanism, idealistic planners essentially ignore "messy" self-organizing real cities -- and trying to understand what makes them thrive and prosper in order to help THEM thrive and prosper -- in favor of focusing instead on ego-centrically pleasing (for planners), highly planned utopian communities in the countryside (which essentially attempt to "decant" the populations and vitality of great cities into the countryside).

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David wrote:

Her major objection seems to be that New Urbanist developments "don't connect." That's a fair criticism . . . [but] it ignores time —- the actual process by which cities develop -- and that includes Manhattan, I believe: So far as I understand all expansion of American cities was by hopscotching, leaving empty fields until owner-by-owner growth filled in the empty places to make one seamless city. Cities only become seamless over time as the private market determines —- purely a function of the serendipity of ownerhip —- when a particular parcel is subdivided from farm or forest. Neighborhoods are only connected over a period of decades. At any one time, there will be passed-over lands as developers push out beyond to the easy-to-build on spots. That's the way it has always been, so far as I understand.

Benjamin writes:

1) I don't think it is the empty space between communities per se that bothered Jacobs about New Urbanism. (I think Jacobs grew up in a streetcar suburb herself -- see further below.)

Rather I think it is the "fact" that New Urbanist communities seem to be (a) out in the middle of nowhere for no reason but to, perhaps, sap the vitality of true cities (b) have been planned, like Garden Cities and other utopian communities before them, with very little real understanding about how true cities actually work, and (c) are conceived as centrally planned communites ("top-down") instead of self-organizing communities ("organic"). They seem to be the kind of communities she criticises where individuals have very little leeway and the only plans allowed are those that are officially approved by one's neighbors or by governement planners. (on the other hand, "City air makes men free.")

2) However, I think Jane Jacobs would also disagree with the way you characterize urban growth. True, not each and every lot is built up before the next one is but, generally speaking, CITIES (like NYC -- "Manhattan") do not grow helter skelter but have, historically speaking, grown as the new neighborhoods have grown out of the older ones (with not much, if any, open space between them).

True, sometimes a community will grow large enough to swallow another entire community (e.g., "New York" swallowing Greenwich Village and, eventually, Harlem), or two communties will eventually merge one with the other. But in terms of one particular community, city growth is essentially the new neighborhoods growing directly out of the older neighborhoods -- organic growth.

It isn't really until the auto age that you see communities (suburban developments) separated by very large open spaces. To a certain degree, this also happened during the rail road /street car era, but not to the same degree. Jacobs herself grew up, I believe, in such a streetcar suburb of Scranton. In one interview she talked about how she and her father used to take the streetcar into Scranton even though, as a physician he also had a car (which he used mostly for making house calls).

And, in a sense, this is reflected in the three theories of urban growth discussed by sociologists and urban geographers: 1) the ring theory (essentially describing city growth in the pre-industrial era); 2) the sector theory (essentially describing city growth during the era of street cars and railroads); and 3) the poly-nodal theory (essentially describing post WWII urban development -- the most cited example being post WWII Los Angeles).

- - - - - - - - - - -

David wrote:

"...top-down planning based on those principles..."

versus

"...those principles animate an organic, evolutionary revision of suburbia..."

I think we are misleading ourselves . . . such a distinction doesn't hold up in the contemporary world.

Such distinctions between "top-down" and "organic" make no practical or historic sense. It's a distinction which can lead to great political debate but no building. To change the suburbs you must change the zoning codes -- that's "top-down." No?

Benjamin writes:

To my way of thinking, trying to instigate, shape and control urban development via rules (like zoning rules), various government programs, and tax incentive programs, etc. is "top-down" planning.

Removing rules (or making zoning rules less restrictive) is not "top-down" planning, but allowing for organic development.

- - - - - - - - -

David wrote:

Take a suburb. . . . Their commercial areas all have great potential for in-fill development. But nothing will happen until the zoning codes are re-written to [1] prohibit front-yard parking and [2] require build-to lines and [3] allow mix of uses. The first two are inherently top down requirements while the third is simply a removal of a restriction.

Benjamin writes:

It seems to me (and I think it would seem to Jacobs too) that this way of thinking represents the warped perspective of someone living in an over-regulated era. Great cities and great urbanism don't require rules and regulations to make them happen. (Although, admittedly, some MINIMAL building rules and regulations have always been necessary.) Actually, it's usually an overly intrusive gov't and overly intrusive rules and regulations (i.e., "planned" urbanism -- an oxymoron) that are creating the problems in the first place. (And I believe I've read Jacobs saying something along such lines -- that it's the rules and regulations that are getting in the way and preventing good urbanism.)

In Manhattan, one didn't need regulations to get builders to build out to the building line -- they did it automatically because it made economic sense. It is only with government assisted urban renewal (with taxpayers ultimately footing the bill) and with zoning bonuses for plazas, etc. that Manhattan has become potmarked with enormous dead storeless block fronts, and anti-urban "plazas" and open spaces. They make such "utopian" uneconomic building developments possible (and profitable).

Rules and regulations for cities are like those for economies. Some basic rules are necessary to prevent both chaos and tyranny. But great cities, like strong healthy economies, are not the product of "planning" and highly manipulative rules meant to guide it, but of basic rules (meant to keep people out of each others hair) that allow for organic, self-generated growth.

[Brian Miller]

Benjamin: I agree with David. Regulations can be wrongheaded, but the private guidelines of big chains are not only developed in response to public regulations.

What you experienced with the building line in New York City may be true (perhaps uniquely true, as Chicago is full of suburban shopping plazas with giant parking lots out front) but I agree with David vis a vis the need for regulations to REQUIRE the build to line in most of suburban America. From here in the trenches, it's a major major battle to even get pad buildings up front (they might block views of the 60,000 square foot blank walled box at the rear of the site, because the 45 foot tall sign and the fact that said box is the only remaining grocery store in the area aren't enough visibility, don't you know?) and to assume that "the market" will simply build street walls and rear and side parking lots is very optimistic.

[george pieler]

This thread gets more interesting not less.

It seems to me there is one line of micro-analysis that rather avoids the debate on fundamental principles (built-to-line requirements), and another getting bogged down in nomenclature. 'Zoning' per se is not top-down, nor is land use planning, but both are heavily prone to becoming rigid, top-down, perhaps we should say central-planning dogmas which I think none of us wants. The question is whether the tools of govt/public policy are employed with a light hand allowing ample flexibility for creativity, originality, and 'organic' attention to history & tradition in creating the built environment and all the connective tissues (transport, walkways, public spaces, and so on) that make things 'work'. What 'works' will not be the same over time, which is why Jane Jacobs provides a model of analysis not a template to duplicate mindlessly. The market will do most of the work IF the regulatory environment focuses on a few core values (as in functional integration of areas in a community, due regard for the context of the existing community, and crime prevention) and lets the flowers bloom, so to speak. The private sector provides the dynamic force, the public authorities the moderating or arbitrating element.

[Benjamin Hemric]

In my previous post in this thread, I wrote the following:

Great cities and great urbanism don't require rules and regulations to make them happen. (Although, admittedly, some MINIMAL building rules and regulations have always been necessary.) Actually, it's usually an overly intrusive gov't and overly intrusive rules and regulations (i.e., "planned" urbanism -- an oxymoron) that are creating the problems in the first place . . . In Manhattan, one didn't need regulations to get builders to build out to the building line -- they did it automatically because it made economic sense. It is only with government-assisted urban renewal (with taxpayers ultimately footing the bill) and with zoning bonuses for plazas, etc. that Manhattan has become potmarked with enormous, dead, storeless block fronts, and anti-urban "plazas" and open spaces. They make such [uneconomic] "utopian" . . . building developments possible (and profitable).

In my previous post in this thread (part of which is quoted above), I was essentially talking about the truly urban areas of true cities (areas that were built-up during the horse and buggy era, or during the railroad / streetcar era) and not about areas that were built-up during the automobile era, like the semi-suburban parts of cities or genuine suburbs. In the compact, high-density areas of true cities, it is indeed economic (good business) to have mixed uses, build out to the building line and to have no front yard parking (!). Regulations weren't / aren't needed to make this happen -- it's been happening all along throughout history without regulations.

However, in auto-dependent, semi-suburban and genuinely suburban areas, it is true that having a store built back from the street with parking in front, or having a store built in the center of a big parking lot is not uneconomic. But, this wasn't really true, I don't think, until the development of auto-dependent suburbs.

Furthermore, it seems to me that Jacobs believes (and I agree with her) that it was various gov't interventions (e.g., direct and indirect subsidies of the auto culture, overly restrictive "suburban" zoning rules -- especially those for residential areas, etc.) that are largely responsible for the creation and continued maintenance of automobile-dependent settlements in the first place. I also think a good case could be made for the idea that without overly restrictive residential zoning, for instance, suburban and semi-suburban areas would be naturally densifying and becoming more urban anyway (e.g., two-family, mother-daughter houses on the same lot, small apartment houses replacing an assemblage of single-family homes, businesses opening up in residential neighborhoods, etc.).

Here's a Jane Jacobs quote from someone on the TradARch list -- who happened, by the way, to offer it up as proof that Jacobs would agree with his pro-regulation stance and would disagree with Leonard Gilroy's characterization of Jacobs' beliefs in the "Wall St. Journal" (which was also the focus of a TradArch thread). However, I don't think the quote helps his case:

"In her latest book, she wrote, 'Rules and regulations will be absolutely necessary to OVERCOME suburban sprawl decently -- but not THE same RULES AND REGULATIONS THAT CREATED AND ENCOURAGED SPRAWL.' " (Emphasis is mine -- B.H.)

So it seems to me that Jacobs is saying that, rules and regulations will be necessary to undo (decently) the damage done by previous rules and regulations -- hardly a ringing endorsement of rules and regulations in general.

[george pieler]

Beautifully put, Benjamin, and personally I agree on all points.

For anyone interested, three letters on Jane Jacobs, including one by me, appeared in the Financial Times weekend edition of May 6/7. At least two of them are rather though-provoking.