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05.11.08
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RFK Jr. Makes the Case for Cities
From Time's 100 Influential People essay on Michael Bloomberg by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr: "I've long argued that one of the most critical environmental issues is the challenges of making our cities attractive, enriching and safe places to live. The best cure for destructive sprawl is to build cities people don't want to abandon, places where they can live healthy, fulfilling lives in densities that don't devour our landscapes, pave our wilderness and pollute our watersheds, air and wildlife. To achieve this, we need to invest in urban schools, transportation, parks, health care, police protection, and infrastructure that makes cities great magnets with gravity sufficient to draw back the creeping suburbs.
"There is a moral as well as an environmental imperative to attend to landscapes that are home to so many. For more than 8 million New York City residents, the environment is not a Rocky Mountain meadow with pronghorns graving beside an alpine stream. It's their transit system and office buildings and the parks where they children play."
He compliments Bloomberg for showing that "a city can be both great and green" with his "visionary" PlaNYC.
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05.10.08
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Jane's Walk
From All About Cities... This weekend volunteer neighborhood residents are offering guided tours of their communities to the public in a national celebration of the late Jane Jacobs and of cities.
As Jacobs said, to understand cities and to know what will work, “you’ve got to get out and walk.”
One U.S. city is participating -- Salt Lake. Participating cities in Canada include Vancouver, Winnipeg, Calgary, and Toronto,
What a really good idea.
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05.08.08
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Global Google
70% of Google's traffic comes from outside the U.S, according to Irene Au, User Experience Design Director at Google. She is speaking now at Serious Play.
She is describing Google's field research in India and other countries and the dramatically different needs the people there have. (How do you design Google Maps in a nation where the streets have no names?)
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05.05.08
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Start Thinking the Impossible
From The Observer comes this..."Given that Zimbabwe has for a long time been staging a drama before a worldwide audience, it's amazing that anyone felt it necessary to mount an arts festival. But someone did 10 years ago, and the Harare International Festival of the Arts (HIFA) has been running ever since. Perhaps when the world is looking in your direction and counting down to economic and civil collapse, the only thing to do is to build a giant stage and start thinking the impossible.
"This week audiences have been flooding into Harare for the annual six-day event, and the capital has been engulfed in a refreshingly bright and effervescent carnival atmosphere."
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05.03.08
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The Post-American World
Still in Liverpool and surfing blogs tonight, I ran across Business Week's Bruce Nussbaum's review of Fareed Zakaria's new book, The Post-American World.
Here is a portion of what he wrote:
"What Fareed does in his new book is show this diffusion of power and authority is taking place around the world, as the US declines and "the rise of the rest," as he puts it, occurs. He argues that the era of the US as 'hegemon,' the center of of an economic/political/social/cultural system, is over...
"When the US was the overwhelming power, everyone else had to learn American culture. The big change in the 21st century is now the US has to learn everyone else's culture. It needs to share power, build coalitions, create legitimacy, in order to lead and prosper. It has to stop being the Voice of Authority and learn to Curate a Global Conversation--or many of them."
Attending a conference dominated by Europeans during the past few days, I am reminded of how much we have to learn. The language may be English, but the cultures are decidedly different.
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05.01.08
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Interculturalism: Moved by Public Space
Observations from the morning session in Liverpool from the Intercultural Cities Conference...
Five very good presentations and no time for questions. That is the problem of too many conferences. Where are the timekeepers?
Nonetheless, here are the ideas from the first two presentations that intrigued me that I hope to find time to follow on with panelists this afternoon…
The civic is made out of the work of overcoming difference without weaponry. - Saskia Sassen
We must be able to invent new instruments to deal with difference and in their making we will be inventing the new civic. - Sassen
Concerns about national security and national unity have merged into one and spawned the question of who belongs? - Ash Amin
It is unrealistic to expect us to “know our neighbor” and much more so to “love our neighbor.” The best we can hope for is “thrown togetherness” or “tacit publicness.” Chess between strangers in public spaces is a good example of this and it produces “studied trust.” If we want to deal with interculturalism productively, it is critical to repopulate public spaces.” Bazaars and community gardens are examples. Urbanism with a light touch is called for. Urban conviviality should be the ambition rather than the necessity of empathy. There are simply limits to how much interpersonal contact we can expect. - Amin
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05.01.08
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Racial Disparity in Death Sentences
From Tuesday's New York Times, this article examines the statistics of death sentences in Harris County, Texas. Definitely worth a look.
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05.01.08
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Moving Beyond Race and Multiculturalism
The Intercultural Cities Conference is now underway in Liverpool, sponsored by the European Year of International Dialogue, the British Council, the Council of Europe, among others. I'll be chairing the first session with an amazing group of panelists including Saskia Sassen (The world in one city); Ash Amin (In search of the good city); and Gregg Zachary (Mongrelize or die: Realizing the diversity advantage); Bhikhu Parekh (Rethinking multiculturalism); and Leonie Sandercock (Intercultural place-making).
Although I come to the topic with some exhaustion, given the past few weeks of heaving and sighing over Rev. Wright who "challenged" America by insisting that "different is not deficient" (will we ever grow up?), I am eager to hear what these panelists have to say. They are an unusually provocative group of thinkers.
I'll provide highlights and links throughout the day.
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04.26.08
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Peak Water
Aquifers and rivers are running dry. Find out how three regions are coping from Wired.
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04.25.08
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Welcome to Povertyville
Want to understand the relative number of people in poverty? Watch this short, powerful video.
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04.25.08
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Calling for Riots in Denver
Recalling the Democratic Convention in 1968, conservative radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh called for riots at this year's convention in Denver.
I wonder what Rush would do if, indeed, his words provoked action. Let's see... since cities and the metro areas they anchor generate 80 percent of our nation’s employment, 80+ percent of our GNP and produce 86 percent of our tax revenue, if he destroys our cities, he and his listeners are going to be flat out of luck (and economic opportunity).
What a completely dumb, destructive way to make a political point.
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04.25.08
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Is Getting Smaller Finally in Vogue?
First, it was Youngstown Mayor Jay Williams calling for his town to shrink its service area to fit its smaller population. Then it was Harvard professor Ed Glaeser last Friday advising Buffalo to do the same. And now Detroit Free Press deputy editorial page editor Stephen Henderson is admonishing Detroit to fall in line and recognize a new reality: 139 square miles for fewer than a million people is just too big.
Henderson put it bluntly. "Here's the stark truth, unpopular as it may be. To survive, Detroit has to get smaller. Way smaller -- as in more compact and efficient, and less strained to provide services across a sprawling, 139-square-mile landscape with a population density that is, on average, less than half what it was 50 years ago," he wrote.
"We tend to talk about Detroit's dramatic population loss in terms of raw numbers -- the popular obsession with rankings and the magic sense of urban identity associated with having a million or more residents.
[But]"...Detroit's troubles are as much about losing density as they are about losing people.
"In 1960, when Detroit had more than 1.6 million residents, 71% of the city's census tracts had 10,000 or more people per square mile; only 6% held 5,000 or fewer per square mile.
"But by 2000, when the population had dipped just below 1 million, 20% of the census tracts had 5,000 or fewer per square mile, the kind of density you see more frequently in suburbs. Only 23% of the city had 10,000 or more people per square mile."
And then he gets to the punch line: "So as the city lost people, huge swaths of Detroit also lost the kind of residential density that generates the tax revenues needed to support services across such a huge geographic area. The result is city resources that are just stretched too thin to be effective."
Henderson raised the provocation far more urban leaders should be asking.
"If there are only two houses on [a] block, the city still needs to police it. A fire station still must be within a reasonable distance. And fixed infrastructure costs -- lighting, sewers, street paving and the like -- don't change much. And now the taxes generated by those two houses don't come close to covering service costs."
Good for Stephen Henderson. The question now is how to do it.
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04.22.08
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How Much Is It Worth to Live Two Miles Closer?
Find out here.
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04.21.08
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Another Take on Ed Glaeser's Advice to Buffalo
Charity Vogel didn't much like Ed Glaeser's admonition to Buffalo to think small. Instead, she urges Buffalo to follow Richard Florida's advice to think big -- as in, mega-region of Rochester, Toronto and Buffalo. Glaeser was asked specifically about the potential of mega-regions, and he response was, essentially, not much.
Read Vogel's response here.
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04.16.08
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The Brooklyn Vibe
"We think of the Brooklyn Flea as a community-oriented shopping stroll, a life as art kind of thing," was the way Eric Demby, a co-organizer of the market, described the vibe at his new creation. "Of course, the reality is that it's a place for people to buy stuff."
See the audio slide show of the Brooklyn Flea Market opening here.
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04.15.08
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Calthorpe on Transit-Oriented Development
Reconnecting America has a terrific audio interview with Peter Calthorpe on transit-oriented development.
In it, Peter debunks the strange myths about Portland, Oregon with these comments:
"We all tend to discount Portland, but I was there yesterday and as I traveled around I thought, I came to Portland in the Sixties and it was a dump. The idea that anybody would want to live in Portland was a bizarre fantasy at the time. Everybody says, Well it's a special case, you can't transfer it. But the reality, of course, is that Portland has few assets. It doesn't have a strong economic base. It's not a Seattle with Boeing and Microsoft. It's not a Bay Area with Silicon Valley. It's not NY. It's not LA. In a way, it's overcome many barriers that many regions don't have to overcome, in terms of economic health, and it's done it by creating a more livable environment. And livability thereby becomes a very important part of economic development."
Calthorpe also said that TOD has failed in creating jobs centers, except in central cities.
That begs the question... Why aren't more jobs focused on transit centers -- or in central cities?
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04.15.08
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A Good Reason to Shop
Earth Day is Tuesday April 22. In observance, apparel retailer Banana Republic will be donating a percentage of all in-store and online sales for April 22-27 to support The Trust for Public Land's Parks for People initiative to create parks and conserve open space in American cities. Banana Republic also will be encouraging customers to donate to TPL. And customers in San Francisco and New York City, will have the opportunity to volunteer directly at a nearby park or playground. More information here
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04.13.08
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A Contrarian View of How to Tackle Housing Crisis
Reality-Based Community considers "the lunacy of [the proposed Senate bill] subsidizing housing in any way with the earth heading for a world climate disaster.
"This part of the bill allows homebuilders who are losing money now but made profits back to 2004 to get back taxes they paid in their good years... so it's a subsidy to the fattest cats most complicit in building too many houses, each too big...
"But that's not the worst part of it. We have a housing bubble breaking, and a lot of people are suffering for it, but we also have a global warming bubble, and the suffering that one is going to dish out, left unchecked, is on another whole level of misery.
"One more time: we have global warming because we're using too much fossil fuel, and we're using it (i) to drive among houses, shopping, and work that are too far apart to reach any other way, and (ii) to heat and cool houses that are much bigger than they should be. Why is this happening? In large part, because for seventy years, the US has subsidized housing, especially suburban housing, and made it look a lot cheaper than it really is compared to the other things we could be buying. Subsidizing the providers of X get you more of X, because they sell it for less and people buy more. "
There is more worth reading here.
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04.07.08
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Car Patrol
Matthew Yglesias has this post at Atlantic.com:
Quoting Peter Moskos' Cop in the Hood on the devastating impact car patrol has had on police work:
"Car patrol eliminated the neighborhood police officer. Police were pulled off neighborhood beats to fill cars. But motorized patrol -- the cornerstone of urban policing -- has no effect on crime rates, victimization, or public satisfaction. Lawrence Sherman was an early critic of telephone dispatch and motorized patrol, noted, 'The rise of telephone dispatch transformed both the method and purpose of
patrol. Instead of watching to prevent crime, motorized police patrol became a process of merely waiting to respond to crime.'
"The big rise in crime rates over the course of the 1960s and 70s rapidly became more grist for the mill of America's ideological battles, but a lot of what we can do to reduce crime seems to involve basically
un-ideological management tweaks. Unfortunately, cities have been very slow to respond to research with actual shifts in policy. But there's tons of evidence to suggest that cops doing patrol work need to spend less time responding to calls and much less time in their cars. Beyond the factors noted above, when you're driving a car you need to be watching the road or you're cause an accident. But to do effect patrol you need to be watching what's happening in the neighborhood, not just
breezing past it."
Chicago's new police superintendent has said Chicago cops are getting out of their cars this summer to go back to the neighborhoods on foot or on bike. He expects it to quell summer violence in Chicago's tougher neighborhoods. (Interesting to note... this ex-FBI exec turned top cop is also on a mission to get his force into better physical shape. Walking and biking ought to help.)
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04.04.08
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Counting on Quality of Life in Houston
Quality of Life is the subject of Houston's indicators project. There are eight categories of indicators:
1. Air Quality
2. Billboards (I love this one)
3. Green Buildings
4. Litter and Graffiti
5. Parks and Open Space
6. Tax Delinquent or Abandoned Lots
7. Trees
8. Water Quality
As Mayor Bill White's term winds down, he is putting new emphasis on Houston's livability. Ann Lents, who has headed Center for Houston's Future, is leaving her post to act as the volunteer head of the effort. All around Houston, there is a new sense that the old laissez faire approach to development and business is not enough to insure Houston's future.
In response to those who believe indicators projects have no influence, the people who compiled this one agreed that is, indeed, the case with many such projects. But as the most recent indicators report confesses, "There are no generally accepted standards for some of the indicators in this report. Rather than a mechanistic view of influence, a biological view of the Houston metro region as an organism that adapts to external forces as well as internal dynamics seems a more appropriate context for viewing the potential impact of the report. No one is seen as having a complete picture of the biological system, but rather each individual goes about his daily business using a few simple rules that enable him to function while understanding only part of the total system much as geese flying in formation need only pay attention to the goose in front of them. In this context, the role of indicators is to inform people as they go about their business."
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04.03.08
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The Geography of the Foreclosure Crisis
The remedy for the home mortgage mess may inadvertently be another subsidy for sprawl and gas guzzling lifestyles.
The biggest declines in housing prices and the most widespread foreclosures are in Florida, California, Nevada and Arizona. And for the most part, the mortgage problem is mostly concentrated in the suburbs, rather than in central cities.
In only a couple of cities -- Detroit and Cleveland -- is the housing price decline in the center as significant (in terms of percentage) as it is in the suburbs.
The story in yesterday's USA Today on Denver and the accompanying map were shockers. Consider this: "Last year alone, Denver averaged one foreclosure filing for every 32 households, the product of a building boom that collided with high-risk loans and thousands of borrowers willing to stretch their finances too far to buy a house. In the first half of last year, the city had one of the nation's worst foreclosure rates."
Watch for the April 9th launch of the new website from the excellent Center for Neighborhood Technology that calculates the cost of housing and transportation by neighborhood in 52 metropolitan areas across the United States.
The Center for Neighborhood Technology's research shows that the cost of transportation can vary from 14 percent of the average household's budget in compact transit-rich communities, to 28 percent or more in less dense areas far from employment and other amenities. Working families have a greater burden - for some, transportation costs may approach 50 percent of their household income.
In other words... subsidizing sprawling development is not smart on the part of government and buying in to it is not so smart for homebuyers.
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03.31.08
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The Power of the T-Shirt
In Houston for the NCAA basketball tournament this weekend (where my University of Memphis Tigers rolled over their competition), I spent three days in a t-shirt.
Two of those days, I spent in U of M blue with the single word "Memphis" featured prominently on the front. Not only did that blue t-shirt make me an instant part of the Tiger tribe, it also started numerous conversations around town. Blue shirts were wildly outnumbered by Texas orange shirts, but by wearing our shirts, we were all signifying that we belonged to something bigger than ourselves.
It was interesting to see the U of M players proudly holding their jerseys post-game with the word "Memphis" sticking out. Each one of them did it, showing solidarity with each other, their fans and the city.
On Saturday, there was no game, so I switched to another t-shirt, this time displaying a presidential candidate's name. It happened to be the date of the Texas convention, so many similar t-shirts were being worn around Houston. They sparked conversations, honking horns, even serious debate. I got two eyewitness accounts from the convention -- instant news, much better than blogs. And I met a nice young couple in an unlikely bar selling pie in a converted auto repair shop. She was French and proceeded to explain why the French system of voting was better than our own. One day in Houston with the right t-shirt and I become an instant member of the tribe.
Anyone who has walked through an airport lately has seen those dismal, limp, horribly bland t-shirts and sweatshirts sold in the bookshops. They all look alike except for the name on the shirt.
Who wants to be part of an interchangeable tribe? To be successful, tribes need passion, personalities, and a cause to fight for. They need a big, embracing narrative that draws people in.
If your city doesn't have its own tribe -- not the people who get paid to be enthusiastic, but authentic members there because they care -- then you're missing a big opportunity to connect people deeply to place in a way that doesn't cut people out but deals people in.
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03.31.08
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80 Percent of Poor Americans Work
Nice story in my hometown newspaper on just how hard it is for poor people in America and what a long step it is to transcend poverty.
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03.25.08
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Congressman Earl Blumenauer on the Road
I can't think of anyone I'd rather have whispering in the ear of a presidential candidate about cities than Oregon Congressman Earl Blumenauer. It's good to know he's on the road with Barack Obama. Blumenauer has been chief Congressional advocate for livable cities.
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03.21.08
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Planes Not Flying
This morning Richard Florida was labeling LaGuardia a "living hell," based mostly on its dismal design. (I would add its lack of easy train connections to Manhattan.)
The sad joke in Chicago is that if it snows, hundreds of flights are canceled at O'Hare. And this morning -- the first day of Spring -- was no exception. Except today was different. I was left in Chicago with a ticket to the NCAA tournament tonight in Little Rock. Driving was out of the question. The trip would take too long. American conveniently let me know that maybe -- maybe -- they could get me there some time Sunday afternoon (perhaps by halftime of Game Two).
I finally asked for a refund and re-booked out of Midway tomorrow morning on Southwest.
If this were a some time thing, that would be one thing. But air travel in the U.S. is perilously close to becoming an unpredictable, maybe-we'll-go/maybe-we-won't situation that is totally unsuited to the needs of business travelers. (Ok, this weekend, I am not a business traveler, but most days, I am.) How much time do we have to build in to be sure we'll get there? It's getting ridiculous and grossly unproductive. No wonder companies that can afford it are moving to private jets -- thereby cluttering up the system for the rest of us.
Now, I get to haul it to the airport in the dark slush at 5 a.m.
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03.20.08
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A Place to Be More of You
While waiting to meet Culture of the Future founder Jody Turner for breakfast this morning, I flipped through the New York Times and found this item in a story by Paul Vitello on voters in the heart of Pennsylvania: "Peter Contacos, 42, the fourth generation of his family to own and operate Coney Island Lunch, a downtown Johnstown business that survived two floods and the loss of thousands of regular customers when Bethlehem Steel eliminated 15,000 jobs in the 1970s and '80s, will not vote for Barack Obama, 'because his name is Barack Hussein Obama -- case closed.' Mr. Contacos, an avid hunter who proudly displays pictures of himself with a magnificently maned lion he killed in Botswana, said he considered Mr. Obama 'a terrorist.'"
When Jody arrived, she quickly flipped open her MacBook to show me the cool presentation she gave at GlobalShop 2008. It was all about the future and how we are attempting to reconnect with body, mind and community. It was our first meeting, even though we have worked together long distance on a remix project. (She confessed she had thought I was African-American until we met this morning.) And while she had many exciting ideas (as she always does), one thing Jody said struck me as profound. As we talked about how cities must raise their performance to satisfy an increasingly mobile and demanding population, she said, "People seek places where they can more of themselves."
As she said that, I grabbed my notebook and jotted it down. It seems the central question for cities. How can they, indeed, be places where people can be more of themselves? And that begs a larger question: Which people? Mr. Contacos? Or Jody Turner? Can any city, in fact, be a place where both Mr. Contacos and Ms. Turner can be more of themselves? Or will cities put a premium on particular kinds of people they want to attract and keep?
Tough questions.
And then I thought about the almost 8 hours of focus groups I sat through the night before testing the most persuasive arguments for and against cities... how very different from one another participants looked when they walked into the room but how much they found to agree on. They readily agreed that cities are the economic engines of our nation and without strong cities America would be only a shadow of itself. And yet, even in the midst of a tough economy with all the worries that go with that, participants said cities were about much more than the economy or money or jobs. They are about culture and diversity. They are demonstrations that Americans of different ethnic backgrounds and religious beliefs can live together in harmony, and that is something to be proud of.
Now, connect that idea to the second most desired attribute by college-educated 25-34 year-olds in our 2006 survey with Yankelovich. Right after "clean and attractive," respondents said they want a city that gives them an opportunity to live the life they want to live.
In this city, can I be more of myself?
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03.16.08
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The Big Sort
I am reading Bill Bishop's fabulous new book, "The Big Sort." Scheduled for release in May, the book documents the increasing geographic divisions among Americans of different political beliefs, values, religions and expectations. Like-minded people increasingly tend to live near like-minded people, thus amplifying the beliefs people hold. (It's the same effect church-related schools have had on their students.)
From the 1950s through the mid-1970s U.S. communities were growing more politically integrated. People with college degrees were evenly distributed. But by 1980, places stopped becoming more alike and began to diverge. The economic landscape, indeed, became spikier as the relationship between education and city growth strengthened. The cities that grew the fastest and the richest were the ones where people with college degrees congregated.
And contrary to the obvious conclusion of Robert Putnam's social capital theory, the cities with generally low social capital became the most prosperous.
Bill is a featured speaker at the upcoming CEOs for Cities national meeting in Pittsburgh May 13-14. We'll be writing much more about his observations here.
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03.15.08
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The Power of College Basketball
I often think about the things that make a city feel like home... the things that make you proud of your city. .. the things that draw you back even when a job takes you elsewhere.
Today was another example of the ability of sports to do that, certainly in Memphis and, no doubt, in many other cities, as men's college basketball conference play winds down and NCAA tournament pairings are announced tomorrow.
Here's an entry this afternoon from The [Memphis] Commercial Appeal blog commenting on an article on number two University of Memphis Tigers' win over Tulsa to clinch the C-USA title.
"GO TIGERS!!!!!!!! Today made me proud to be a Tiger fan and proud to live in Memphis. That last one has been hard lately, but the TIGERS are #1 all the way to the dance. :)"
It's not eloquent, but it is heartfelt.
As I walked to the game with my blue Tigers sweatshirt on, I hurriedly walked past a man who, it turned out, was also headed to FedEx Forum. We walked the five blocks together, chatting about the season, the tournament and what comes next. When we neared the Forum, he introduced himself, I introduced myself, and we felt the solidarity that comes so easily to sports fans.
Urban leaders need to find all the ways they can to encourage in their city pride, solidarity, excitement and reasons for strangers to connect. And they certainly need to find ways to keep their wandering citizens connected to Home.
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03.12.08
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The Cost of War
The war in Iraq will ultimately cost U.S. taxpayers an astonishing $2 trillion, perhaps more. It didn't buy a weakened enemy as intended, so what would that money have bought for Americans?
Read Bob Herbert's column last week in the New York Times. And then re-read it.
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03.12.08
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Caught in the Middle
How is America's Heartland faring in the age of globalization? Not very well, according to the evidence compiled by Richard Longworth in his new book, "Caught in the Middle."
What had been the nation's powerhouse of agriculture and industrial might began fading 40 years ago due to the integration of world markets and increasing global competition, managerial failures, a lack of innovation and entrepreneurship, and high cost labor.
However, the region remains blessed with rich farmland, plentiful fresh water, great research universities, expertise in agriculture and manufacturing and the example of Chicago, which has managed to evolve into a global city.
Getting past the belief that if we just have a "fighter" in the White House or in the Mayor's office, all those jobs will come back is an important step in moving forward. Look to the future not to the past. Midwesterners must embrace education and a different kind of education, one that is not based on mechanistic industrial values but on thinking and adaptability -- learning to learn. And then we must use our ingenuity and acquire a more entrepreneurial attitude (draw upon our immigrant pool with their much higher rates of business start-ups) toward our assets.
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03.10.08
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School of Everything
Launched in the UK, The School of Everything aims to create a new bottom-up education system, making it easy for anyone to find a teacher (once the site is populated with willing teachers), advertise their teaching services and arrange a teaching session. The Young Foundation's Launchpad is mentoring the team of entrepreneurs behind School of Everything and supporting the commercial and operational development of the business.
It's an interesting concept that builds on Charlie Leadbeater's work for CEOs for Cities, Remix. Charlie's new book, We Think, was released last week in the UK.
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03.08.08
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Awearness from Kenneth Cole
The AWEARNESS Blog, a product of fashion designer and retailer Kenneth Cole, provides daily updates under four socially-aware pillars of discussion: Social Rights, Well-Being, Political Landscape and Hard Times. The blog hopes to raise awareness around the issues that fall under these four areas in a dynamic and engaging format. In addition to regularly updated news and commentary under these topics, the blog also includes Q&As, original content from Kenneth Cole and contributions from staff members of Kenneth Cole Productions.
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03.08.08
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The Endless City
The Endless City, a new book edited by the London School of Economics' Ricky Burdett and design curator Deyan Sudjic, aims to put urban expansion into perspective. The growth of cities, they argue, is not just a problem for local government agents or urban planners. Instead, urban growth is inseparable from major political and economic forces including globalization, immigration, employment, social exclusion, and sustainability (themes that track closely with the issues currently being debated in the run-up to the U.S. Presidential election.)
Amen to that!
The book will ship March 31.
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02.29.08
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Politics Are Hot
From today's Columbus (OH) Dispatch: "Regardless of who they adore (or ignore), central Ohio teenagers can agree on one thing: Politics are hot."
Now that young Americans have been politically activated, what will urban leaders do to capitalize on their interest? How will they put them to work in their own communities? What are the underlying motivations of their activism that urban leaders must tap to make them a force for cities?
Those are questions we are exploring with our new network of urban enthusiasts. Learn more here.
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02.26.08
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Americans Agree: Invest in Public Transportation
As talk of infrastructure heats up among governors, it is worth mentioning again a study conducted last October by Public Opinion Strategies. In response to the question, "Which of the following proposals is the best long-term solution to reducing traffic in your area?" 75% of respondents said, "Improve public transportation." Another 26% said, "Develop communities where people do not have to drive as much." Only 21% answered, "Build new roads."
Respondents also said their community is not doing a very good job of providing public transportation. Only 35% said their community was doing a good or excellent job. By comparison, 59% of respondents felt their local community was doing a good or excellent job of providing parks and protecting open space.
To reduce energy use, 90% of respondents want to regulate the car industry to make vehicles more fuel efficient, 88% want to provide improve public transportation, and 88% want to require homes and other buildings to be more energy efficient. 83% believe walkable communities ought to be our response. Only 16% approve of increasing gas taxes to discourage driving.
One more point: 81% of voters want to redevelop older areas rather than building new. (And only 4% are undecided on this question.)
Americans are becoming more sophisticated in how they think about infrastructure. Are our leaders as progressive?
(And a note: Public Opinion Strategies describes itself as a Republican polling firm.)
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02.23.08
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Downtown Boston Coming into Its Own
The Big Dig is done, and the promised transformation of downtown Boston is within reach. Read about it in today's NYT.
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02.16.08
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Bringing the Family Closer
One of our favorite urban writers, Haya El Nasser, reported this week in USA Today on "active living communities" that are striving to become multigenerational to serve the desires of families who want live closer to parents, children and grandparents.
It feels like back to the future, doesn't it? This is what real neighborhoods used to look like. (And many still do.) I had the privilege of living on the same block with my grandparents for much of my childhood. Our neighborhood had plenty of kids. But we also had plenty of people whose kids had come and gone. Plus, I got to live around the corner from the library, movie theater, grocery store and pharmacy. And I could walk to school.
My young world was far bigger than the average youngster's world today who must depend on mom to take her everywhere. Multigenerational (and mult-use neighborhoods? They ought to be the standard. Anything else should feel strange.
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02.10.08
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Job Growth Where Bush Didn't Want It
NYT reports that during the seven years of the Bush Administration, federal government employment has risen more rapidly than private sector employment -- not because government employment is growing at an unusually fast clip but because private sector gains were modest, even in an economy recovered from the 2001 recession.
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02.06.08
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Mayor Serious about Cycling
Couldn't resist this posting this from the Chicago Tribune on Mayor Daley...
"The mayor introduced an ordinance Wednesday that would slap fines ranging from $150 to $500 on motorists who turn left or right in front of someone on a bicycle; pass with less than three feet of space between car and bike; and open a vehicle door into the path of a cyclist.
"Daley, an avid rider, said he personally has been involved in unhappy encounters with motorists, providing them with 'a few choice words' and 'salutes' that he said were delivered 'in the Chicago way.'"
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02.03.08
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World City Bike Strategies
Is sustainable transport just a dream in U.S. cities?
World City Bike Strategies has issued the first of a cycle of six New Mobility Advisory Briefs in the "Reinventing Transport in Cities: 2007 - 2012" program. The Briefs are examining in depth a selection of promising but complex approaches to achieving major improvements in terms of environment, life quality, and economic impacts on cities in a very short time frame (two to four years).
Let's hope urban leaders pay close attention.
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02.02.08
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The Opposite View
The web is a wondrous thing. Here's a photo from The Atlantic columnist Andrew Sullivan's blog today. It is a view from his window looking south to Trump Tower, the Chicago River and State Street. It is taken three blocks north of the photo I took today from my new home looking north to these same buildings. Small world? Getting smaller every day.
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01.27.08
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Good Jobs - The Be-All, End-All
Catching up on this week's reading, I found Bob Herbert's NYT column headlined "Good Jobs Are Where the Money Is." And he had very tough words for the Administration (and, by association, the House) on the economic stimulus plan.
"Economic alarm bells have been ringing in the U.S. for some time. There was no sense of urgency as long as those in the lower ranks were sinking in the mortgage muck and the middle class was raiding the piggy bank otherwise known as home equity.
"But not that the privileged few are threatened... it's suddenly time to take action.
"There is no question that some kind of stimulus package geared to the needs of ordinary Americans is in order. But that won't begin to solve the fundamental problem.
"Good jobs at good wages -- lots of them, growing like spring flowers in an endlessly fertile field -- is the absolutely essential basis for a thriving American economy and a broad-based rise in standards of living.
"Forget all the CNBC chatter about Fed policy and bargain stocks. For ordinary Americas, jobs are the be-all and end-all. And an America awash in new jobs will require a political environment that respects and rewards work and aggressively pursues creative policies designed to radically expand employment."
Herbert suggests starting by rebuilding our infrastructure. Certainly, insulating and greening our buildings is another. Building and rebuilding our transit lines is yet another.
But Herbert is so right. Doesn't it seem odd that not a word has been heard about the creation of good jobs during the economic stimulus discussion?
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01.27.08
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Housing Slump Market by Market
The Wall Street Journal ran a chart this week with a city by city report on change in housing inventory, months supply, price change, employment outlook and loan payments overdue.
Just to take two measures -- months supply and price change -- the report is interesting.
Miami-Ft. Lauderdale topped the list of months supply with 29 (!) and a 12.4% drop in prices in the past year.
Detroit has a 19 months supply and had an 11.2% price drop.
Las Vegas has an 18 months supply and a 10.7% price drop.
Orlando is close behind with 17.5 months supply. (Price change was N.A.)
Tampa has a 16 months supply with an 11.8% price drop.
With the exception of Detroit, note that all of the cities in the top 5 are sunny cities (with Phoenix, Jacksonville and Atlanta ranking next).
Miami-Ft. Lauderdale also ranked highest with loan payments overdue at 7.15% (with no other city close).
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01.27.08
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The New Economy -- It's No Longer New
The transition from the old economy to the new economy is now complete. More people make their livings shuffling and dealing cards in casinos (82,340) than running lathes (14,880). There are almost three times as many security guards (1,004,130) as machinists (385,690). Whereas 30 percent of Americans worked in manufacturing in 1950, fewer than 15 percent do now.
That from Christopher Caldwell writing in today's NYT Magazine.
"The economy as politicians present it," he proclaims, "is a folkloric thing. Choreographers, blackjack dealers and security guards have replaced factory workers as the economy's backbone, if not yet its symbol.
"The new economy we have been promised is in place."
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01.24.08
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My Other Car Is a Bright Green City
"Today's cars are costly, dangerous and an ecological nightmare. What if the solution to the problems they create, though, has more to do with where we live than what we drive?"
That is the provocative question with which World Changing founder Alex Steffen opens his essay on our generally destructive pattern of development that no increase in MPG will fix. Read it here.
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01.21.08
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The Killing of Murder
With the stunning drop in the city's homicides, New York magazine speculates on what it would take to take homicides to zero. Improssible? Probably. But here's the proposal:
>> Keep on keeping on. Now that the low hanging fruit has been picked, Police Commissioner Ray Kelly, with the help of CompStat, is doubling manpower on about 20 small hot spots where crime remains stubbornly high. Instead of spreading rookies across the boroughs, he is focusing them in these particularly tough areas.
>> Decriminalize drugs. Fewer than 100 of last year's 494 homicides involved perpetrators who were strangers to their victims. The remaining killers can be broken broadly into two categories: crimes of passion and those acting with economic or social incentives. And the most obvious source of the latter is the illegal drug trade.
>> Play marriage cop. NY cops made 76,000 home visits last year where domestic violence had occurred. Only 45 domestic violence homicides were recorded last year. Home visits let abusers know that someone is watching and victims know that there is someone they can turn to. Home visits can also remove offenders who have moved back in without court appproval.
>> Get inside the would-be killer's head with cameras and even brain imaging.
>> Gentrify the entire city and make everyone a homeowner. This is offered partially tongue in cheek, but it is based on this fact: 90% of the city's homicide victims last year were black or Hispanic, up from 86% in 2004. In other words, once whites/people of higher incomes/homeowners -- take your pick because too often in America, they still mean the same thing -- crime goes down. "It's too simple to say that the city has succeeded merely in displacing crime, driving it outside the boroughs' boundaries or corralling it into a few unlucky NY neighborhoods," the magazine reported, since high crime neighborhoods are still safer than they were in 1990 and they have more police coverage.
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01.21.08
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Is Social Responsibility Connected to Profitability?
Not according to 167 studies conducted over the past 35 years. After reviewing those studies, academics Joshua Margolis and Hillary Anger Elfenbein concluded that social responsibility doesn't hurt. It doesn't diminish shareholder value. But, according to Margolis and Elfenbein, there is only a very small correlation between corporate behavior and good financial results. And that small correlation can be explained by the fact that companies that have performed well over a long period of time have enough money to contribute positively to society.
Importantly, though, corporate misdeeds, once they become known, do have a significant negative impact on financial performnace.
Of course, the good news is that so many actions that we generally consider to be "socially responsible" are now directly beneficial to the bottom line. Greening the company in ways that save energy costs is one such example. But putting a price on behavior that is detrimental to the common interest and rewarding behavior that is in the common interest may still be the strongest driver.
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01.20.08
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How Email Brings You Closer to the Next Cubicle
Love this column from Tim Harford in Wired.
First, he issues a clear challenge to the idea that "distance is dead."
"If distance really didn't matter," Harford write, "rents in places like London, New York, Bangalore, and Shanghai would be converging with those in Hitchcock County, Nebraska (population 2,926 and falling). Yet, as far as we can tell through the noise of the real estate bust, they aren't. Wharton real estate professor Joseph Gyourko talks instead of 'superstar cities,' which have become the equivalent of luxury goods — highly coveted and ultra-expensive. If geography has died, nobody bothered to tell Hitchcock County."
Harford observes that "technology makes it more fun and more profitable to live and work close to the people who matter most to your life and work. Harvard economist Ed Glaeser, an expert on city economies, argues that communications technology and face-to-face interactions are complements like salt and pepper, rather than substitutes like butter and margarine. Paradoxically, your cell phone, email, and Facebook networks are making it more attractive to meet people in the flesh."
"Email doesn't stop you from wanting facetime. Just the opposite: By enabling us to maintain productive business relationships with more people, it encourages more face-to-face contact.
Tthe world seems to be changing in a way that actually demands more meetings. Business is more innovative, and its processes more complex. That demands tacit knowledge, collaboration, and trust — all things that seem to follow best from person-to-person meetings. "
As Harvard professor Ed Glaeser has written, "Ideas are more important than ever, and the most important ideas are communicated face-to-face."
"
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01.12.08
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The Portland Bike Box
Portland, where a higher percentage of people bike to work than in any other large American city, is installing bike boxes at key intersections. The box is a clearly designated place for cyclists in front of and in full view of drivers to wait for traffic lights to change. The point of the boxes is to reduce the risk of the "right hook" collisions that killed two Portland cyclists in October. Drivers will not be allowed to pass through the bike box to turn right on red.
The 13 bike boxes will cost the city $150,000. (That seems expensive to me -- more than $11,000 per box -- but my husband just pointed out that perhaps the city is also having to move traffic detection devices at those same intersections.)
Read more about Portland's bike culture here.
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01.10.08
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Add 40% More Cars and Pray
That's the advice from Robin Chase, the amazing founder of ZipCar and GoLoco, on Tata Motors' announcement of the $2500 car. I couldn't agree more. That's the problem with better, cheaper technology -- induced demand. Read her blog entry here.
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01.06.08
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Losing Connection with Place
Kevin Fry, president of Scenic America, narrates a NYT slide show on the miserable suburban landscape found in so much of America.
"A thousand places look exactly the same, and that's the tragedy of it," he says. "There's nothing about this place that distinguishes it from any other place.
"Once you've lost your connection to a place there's no reason to care about it any more."
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01.01.08
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The Global Competition Among Cities Heats Up
If you have any doubt about the cities yours is competing with, read the latest issue of Price Tags about the work Larry Beasley, Vancouver's past co-Director of Planning, is doing in the Emerate of Abu Dhabi.
In Larry's words, "Vancouver is not nearly as far ahead as we think we are on the environment agenda. For example, little Abu Dhabi has developed and is implementing a model community for 100,000 people that will be carbon neutral and sustainable on many grounds. Can we match that kind of initiative?
"Vancouver is not even on the charts in growing and supporting our cultural institutions. Abu Dhabi’s Louvre is symbolic of a world movement to support culture and we’re just not with it here in our city.
"Vancouver may be on the verge of seeing a diminishment of our quality of life because we increasingly cannot house our people nor offer them an affordable housing option. It inspires me that Abu Dhabi aspires, as a prime government policy, to GIVE every citizen a comfortable home.
"Vancouver must up the ante on social equity. Even Abu Dhabi, who does not have a defensible record on this issue in regard to their visiting workers, is starting to face its profound social contradiction between rich and poor – and this is being struggled with everywhere in the world.
"We are just too complacent.
"But my experience has also confirmed for me in no uncertain terms that Vancouver still stands out in the world as a laudable model on so many grounds for what cities can create for contemporary urbanism, a return to beauty and urban design and a way of doing business within the local government that balances public and private objectives in a cooperative process. "
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12.13.07
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How It All Ends
I hope you'll take 10 minutes and have a look at this YouTube video.
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12.13.07
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Cities Make the World Spiky
Next time someone tells you the world is flat, send them this URL.
This is GDP per unit of area for the globe. The spikes correspond to
the densest concentrations of economic activity: cities.
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12.11.07
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Subways: The New Urban Status Symbol
Business Week leads with a story on subways as the new urban status symbol.
"It seems like everywhere you turn these days, a new high-speed train is whisking more passengers across longer distances faster than ever before. A ride to Paris from London is quicker than flying; Japanese bullet trains traverse the 320 miles from Tokyo to Osaka in two and a half hours; and magnetic levitating trains in Shanghai cut through the city at 268 miles per hour...
"Indeed, the world is seeing an unprecedented boom in new subways and expansion to existing systems."
What Business Week politely doesn't point out is how far behind U.S. cities and would-be mega-regions are in their investments in high speed rail.
The story is accompanied by a slide show of new systems.
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12.10.07
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New Suburbs in Fast Decay
A story in Sunday's Charlotte Observer by Liz Chandler and Ted Mellinik reminds me of southeast Memphis suburbs that declined in record time....
A band of new suburban neighborhoods that held promise for thousands of Charlotte families is now struggling with crime, blight and falling home values.
These neighborhoods were hit hard by the wave of foreclosures rattling the nation. Damage is most visible in starter-home subdivisions across northern Charlotte, and in pockets in the east and southwest.
The best of them show subtle signs: Vacant houses. Overgrown weeds. Trash piled at the curb.
Read more.
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12.09.07
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Blame Cities for Hot World? Think Again.
Unfortunately, today's Seattle Times printed an op-ed blaming cities for global warming. It actually argued for "smart sprawl" to combat the urban heat island effect. The piece originally appeared in The Washington Post October 14.
Here's a sensible response based on fact, not fiction, from Scott Bernstein, President of the Center for Neighborhood Technology.
To the editors, Washington Post
Re: Article by Joel Kotkin, Sunday October 14 2007
Ecological Fallacy
Joel Kotkin and Ali Modarres‘article of October 14, “Hot World? Blame Cities,” chastising New Urbanists and “greens” for allegedly anti-suburban attitudes rests its sprawling case on references to “academic literature and scientific journals.” The authors must not have read them very carefully, because the articles referred to do not support their contentions.
One reference is an article in New Scientist entitled “Urban heat island,” October 28, 2006. This is a respectable journal that publishes understandable explanations of complex phenomena. The article carefully explains how heat islands are created, notes studies going back to 1820, and on climate change specifically states: “no, the urban heat island effect does not explain global warming.” This is good, since global warming is attributable to the heat-trapping effect of global warming gases such as carbon dioxide, not to the heat effects of cities. Nor are heat islands limited to cities, rather, they occur wherever suffici