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I'm in the middle of Death and Life right now. I'm enjoying it for sure, and I find myself nodding my head at a lot of what she says, particularly stuff about b

I'm in the middle of Death and Life right now. I'm enjoying it for sure, and I find myself nodding my head at a lot of what she says, particularly stuff about border vacuums and mixed-usage areas, both of which have figured into my own past decisions about where to live. One thing I do find lacking is a discussion of assessing tradeoffs, particularly when her design principles bump up against natural pressures (i.e. driven by the market, not by fiat city planners). For example, she advocates a mix of new and old city buildings. Enforcing this may generate housing and office shortages, if a neighborhood becomes attractive at a rate exceeding that which we can maintain the desired old-new mix. How do we trade that off; at what price do we value incremental old-new mix? She does cover some of this in her chapter on self-destruction of diversity, but her solution of zoning for diversity was a little tautological for me, just stating that diversity should be enforced. What I'm interested in is how we weigh that against the lost utility of individuals and businesses who would prefer to move to the neighborhood in question. It's definitely a tough question! While I'd prefer some more head-on discussion of tradeoffs, I think (unfortunately, decades later) that there's still plenty of room for the ideas she advocates to be recognized at all.

tbihl 10y ago
Yeah, making her ideas systematic are definitely a sticking point. In so much as she suggests anything, the more prominent idea to me was the influential neighborhood association. That wasn't so much a policy as a recommendation to have a standing public opinion "army", if you will. I'm not sure that there is a way to put a system in place to save us from ourselves if we fail to be well informed, but the book definitely points out a lot of ways you can notice things going wrong. Jacobs also does a great job of explaining the mechanism of the many traps that we plan ourselves into. My favorite non-profit, Strong Towns, also frequently mentions how difficult it is to give a formulaic solution to these problems. Furthermore, as the founder likes to put it, what we're often asking for are "ways other people can change what they do so I don't have to change what I'm doing." Until I can figure out a better way to make change, I'm at least determined to be informed and well-versed enough in the lingo so that urban planners can't make their dumb ideas look good in conversation with me just by dressing the ideas up in jargon.
crispinb 10y ago
She was certainly a fox, not a hedgehog. We need both.

tbihl 10y ago

Yeah, making her ideas systematic are definitely a sticking point. In so much as she suggests anything, the more prominent idea to me was the influential neighborhood association. That wasn't so much a policy as a recommendation to have a standing public opinion "army", if you will. I'm not sure that there is a way to put a system in place to save us from ourselves if we fail to be well informed, but the book definitely points out a lot of ways you can notice things going wrong. Jacobs also does a great job of explaining the mechanism of the many traps that we plan ourselves into. My favorite non-profit, Strong Towns, also frequently mentions how difficult it is to give a formulaic solution to these problems. Furthermore, as the founder likes to put it, what we're often asking for are "ways other people can change what they do so I don't have to change what I'm doing." Until I can figure out a better way to make change, I'm at least determined to be informed and well-versed enough in the lingo so that urban planners can't make their dumb ideas look good in conversation with me just by dressing the ideas up in jargon.

crispinb 10y ago

She was certainly a fox, not a hedgehog. We need both.