Bulldozing entire blocks of cities and replacing the mixed developments that were there with towers surrounded by isolated green space was attempted in the US d

Bulldozing entire blocks of cities and replacing the mixed developments that were there with towers surrounded by isolated green space was attempted in the US during the middle of the century, under the guise of being "urban renewal". These projects were broadly considered failures, creating isolated communities with the net effect of displacing many more people in the "bulldoze" phase than they could attract in the "rebuild" phase. Many of these projects ended up as low-income public housing, developed huge crime problems in their isolation, and eventually got bulldozed themselves, in turn. There is some interesting historical reading here: https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/4ef3/28b64fdb97357674725324ccc7380d8220ca.pdf https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/4ef3/28b64fdb97357674725324... The modern twist on the concept is to focus on preservation instead of total replacement, trying to enhance the environment that attracted people to the diverse urban area in the first place rather than outright replacing it with centrally-planned alternatives. There are also large efforts to redevelop totally unused land (with projects like the Docklands in London or Hudson Yards in NYC) - but rarely in isolation, the goal is usually to incorporate the space into the rest of the city's fabric. I completely agree with your points about cars, though - most American cities devote far too much space to them, especially storage of empty ones. We'd do well to shift our streetscape priorities to people, especially in dense mixed-use areas, which I think would be a big step towards the communal spaces you envision.