...to consider this post Has urban architecture declined? and this followup: Declining Urban Exteriors.
But you know me well enough -- intellectually I am fairly predictable: Will I agree with Tyler Cowen and Matthew Yglesias? Do you?
UPDATE: It's interesting to read what intelligent well-meaning non-specialists see & say about the built environment. I'll spend a bit more time with their posts but I am tending to think that neither fellow places enough emphasis on the distinction between site plan and architecture i.e. between the way a building is placed on a plot of ground and the materials & finishes the builder uses to construct it. This distinction is the essential, fundamental one to understanding American cities and yet it appears to be underplayed as a factor by these two otherwise perceptive bloggers. In fact, if I read them correctly, they are not even aware that there is such a distinction.
The punch line in understanding an old district of a city -- and that can mean anything built prior, really, to 1950 -- is that it was not built for cars. Modern cities -- the ones which people find charmless -- are built around the automobile site plan. The problem (nasty cities) has little to do with the factors cited by Cowen and Yglesias and all to do with the manner by which people get around in our era -- the car -- and around which means of transportation we build each and every structure.
Of course you know that; you've read this blog before; in fact you knew it before you read this blog.
Other people taking note of this issue -- which is good news -- are:
Internet Commentator: Architectural Decline?
Foreign Dispatches: Declinism and Modern Architecture
Mike Linksvayer - Sturgeon's Architecture
Kalblog: More Wealth Equals Less Beauty?
The Rhine River: Old European Streets
Andrew Spicer's Weblog - The Decline of Urban Beauty
UPDATE 2: Please take note of Reid's excellent Comment; I couldn't agree with him more.
My observation is that good urbanism can make up for bad architecture. At least, bad architecture seems more fixable than bad urbanism.
Putting it another way, give me an overly busy, cheaply-built, EFIS laden piece of crap properly sited (built up to the street) with wide sidewalks and street trees / parking vs. an architectural masterpiece with a massive parking-lot setback any day.
Posted by: Reid | Aug 04, 2004 at 12:10 PM
I think too often even architects don't get the distinction between site plan and architecture. Site planning used to be taught in architecture schools, but there doesn't seem much evidence of it these days.
Posted by: ian | Aug 04, 2004 at 01:02 PM
Well, if we really wanted to talk about problems with modern-day architects and their poor site planning we would have to talk about those architects' oen ideas as to what exactly their job is. Many seem to consider themselves artists, and as such it is not their job to consider their surroundings, as their piece of art should stand on its own.
A quote from user 'mwfeaver' on Café l'urbanité(http://p196.ezboard.com/fcafeurbanitefrm7):
"I attended a public lecture given by Thom Mayne a couple months ago. He was an interesting speaker, but I left with the impression that his goal is merely to design monoliths. For him, any attempt to integrate his work with its surroundings would be an attack on his artistic freedom. The people attending, mostly admiring architects, seemed to agree with this notion. I see no reason why any design would be any less spectacular if it were not surrounded by acres of parks and other unused spaces that only serve to disconnect the structure from the community."
Posted by: Hans from Toronto | Aug 07, 2004 at 02:43 PM
I think some architects fear the "Contextual" label so they intentionally ignore the surroundings of a particular project. Hence we end up with attitudes as expressed by Thom Mayne.
Posted by: Rich | Aug 10, 2004 at 07:27 AM
I think it was Bill Bryson who referred to that arrogant refusal to pay any respect to a building's surroundings as "Fuck you" architecture.
The points about site planning are well-taken; nevertheless, I think Tyler Cowen brings up some valid points as well. In Santa Cruz, where I live, our downtown shopping district has acquired a number of new buildings recently--built right up to the sidewalk, parking lot in back, just what the new urbanist doctor ordered. And they're nice enough, compared to a shopping mall or a WalMart... one of them's even beautiful, IMHO. But the others look very feeble indeed, especially when compared to the magnificent brick buildings we lost in the 1989 earthquake.
Partly I expect it's because the new buildings haven't had time to weather. A building needs a patina, and in another ten or twenty or fifty years, these might have them. Partly it's because the new buildings are a bit out of scale; they're mostly five stories, and the older ones were three. This problem, too, will sort itself out over time, as more buildings go in, and trees on the street grow taller, and people who live here become accustomed to the new roof lines.
But even taking all that into account, I still get the distinct sense that the exteriors of these buildings were not thoughtfully designed. There is a bit of decoration here and there, but most of the exterior is plain and bland. The materials used look cheap, often phony. Such decoration as there is often only extends up to the top of the ground floor. Why?
Here's a bit of speculation: Perhaps architects imagine that people who are renting storefronts don't want the building to outshine the store?
Posted by: Evan | Aug 16, 2004 at 01:17 PM