Category Archives: Philosophy

Architecture, Books, Education, Philosophy, Professional, Review, Science, Urban Planning

RE-POST | 20 Must-Read Texts for Urban Planners (#1-10)

RE-POST | 20 Must-Read Texts for Urban Planners (#1-10)
by Dr. Mark David Major, AICP, CNU-A
(Originally posted January 28, 2013)

Here is Part 2 of the “20 Must-Read Texts for Urban Planners (#1-10)” article, originally posted on January 28, 2013. Read Top 20 ‘Must-Read’ Texts for Urban Planners (#11-20) here!

Plenty of Holiday gift ideas here!

10. “The Origin and Spread of the Grid-Pattern Town” (1946) by Dan Stanislawski
An old text, perhaps obscure to many and only familiar to a few, “The Origin and Spread of the Grid-Pattern Town” is one of the earliest and most thorough reviews of the evolution of regular grid town planning in the world. Yes, Stanislawski subscribes the spread of regular grid town planning to a process of historical diffusion, which Spiro Kostoff (see below) correctly points out nobody believes in any more. Despite this flaw, Stanislawski’s review is surprisingly comprehensive, for the most part. Stanislawski does seem to gloss over medieval town planning, see Maurice Beresford’s 1967 New Towns of the Middle Ages: Town Plantation in England, Wales and Gascony. However, some later writers ignore all together clear examples of regular grid planning in certain regions of the world (the Orient, for example). Stanislawski’s article is still a valuable resource today for any reader interested in the regular grid as long as they are careful about filtering out some of his misplaced – discredited today – ideas (for example, historical diffusion or the importance of Hippodamus). Available for download here with registration.

9. “Savannah and the Issue of Precedent: City Plan as Resource” (1993) by Stanford Anderson
John Reps in his historical narrative of American town planning (see below) is enchanted with the historical ward plan of Savannah, as are many architects, urban designers, and planners. Reps is equally mystified (and a little despondent) about why the Savannah plan was not more influential in the history of American town planning. In “Savannah and the Issue of Precedent: City Plan as Resource,” Anderson offers a succinct and brilliant analysis about how the ward plan of Savannah operated in terms of street alignments and building constitution working together to structure the outside-to-inside ‘assimilation’ of strangers into the town (principally in relation to the port). In generic terms, Savannah appears to be quite typical of a lot of waterfront settlements in American planning. However, its detailed specifications for squares and constitution is rigid, making it an inflexible model for early American town development (for example, compared to the flexibility of the Spanish Laws of the Indies model). Anderson’s article should be on the standard reading list for any academic program in planning. The article is available on Google Books here. It appears in the book Settlements in the Americas: Cross-Cultural Perspectives, which is available for purchase on Amazon here.

8. The Practice of Local Government Planning (2000)
It is one thing to complain about how planning works in the United States. However, it is hypocritical to complain without really understanding how planning works in the United States. The Practice of Local Government Planning offers a clear solution. For years, the various incarnations of the “green book” have been the go-to source for American planners to immerse themselves in the full scope of their profession in the United States. This Municipal Management Series book is the first one any planner will open when seeking to pass the AICP exam. It is comprehensive and detailed. Warning: it is a very, very dry read. It is also extremely careful to remain neutral when presenting a picture about the way things work, i.e. this is what it is, not this is the right way to do it. In this sense, it is value-free and empty at its core. Nonetheless, it remains an invaluable resource for any planner, or anyone wanting to understand planners. Available to purchase on Amazon here.

7. The City Assembled: The Elements of Urban Form Through History (1992) by Spiro Kostoff

6. The City Shaped: Urban Patterns and Meanings Through History (1991) by Spiro Kostoff

5. Cities of the American West: A History of Frontier Urban Planning (1979) by John W. Reps

4. The Making of Urban America: A History of City Planning in the United States (1965) by John W. Reps
Kostoff’s The City Shaped/The City Assembled are crucial books about the history of town planning in the world for any urban planner to have on their bookshelves. Reps’ The Making of Urban America/Cities of the American West about the history of town planning in the United States are crucial books for any urban planner to also have on their bookshelves. If an urban planner does not have these books on their bookshelves, it is reasonable to question the quality of said planner. There are other good historical narratives out there on the subject (Sibyl Moholy-Nagy’s The Matrix of Man or Eisner and Gallion’s The Urban Pattern, for example). However, Kostoff and Reps’ books are the most comprehensive and thorough for their particular subjects. All four books incorporate hundreds of plans/plats and photographs to tell the story of town planning in the United States and world at large. They also offer detailed historical information (especially Reps) about the people and events involved in building our cities. Sometimes they are insightful and sometimes they are mistaken. For example, despite his protestations about the dichotomy so prevalent in town planning, Kostoff remains firmly entrapped in that dichotomy, i.e. ‘organic’ and ‘regular’ cities. Reps correctly points out the historical importance of William Penn’s plan of Philadelphia but misstates the reasons, assigning to Philadelphia what should have more appropriately been given to the Nine Square Plan of New Haven and the Spanish Law of the Indies, which Kostoff correctly emphasizes (though we are discussing subtle but important degrees of difference instead of a chasm in thought between both writers). When he ventures away from historical narrative and facts into the realm of opinion, Reps is often prone to undervalue the functional power of regular grid. However, these are endlessly useful texts for anyone interested in cities. The collection of plans and other historical documents (e.g. bird’s eye views) are a wonderful resource for any planner to have readily at hand. Kostof books available for purchase from Amazon here and here. Reps books available for purchase from Amazon here and here.

3. Space is the Machine: A Configurational Theory of Architecture (1996) by Bill Hillier
A purist could argue that anyone interested in space syntax should start with The Social Logic of Space (1984) by Bill Hillier and Julienne Hanson. The Social Logic of Space is an important book where Hillier and Hanson spell out a lot of groundwork for the theoretical and mathematical foundations of space syntax. However, they do so to a level of detail that some readers might find off-putting. Even Hillier and Hanson admit one of its chapters is practically unreadable because it is so dry with mathematical set theory. If you want to learn about the space syntax approach and some of its early, important findings without getting bogged down in the detail, then you are better served by starting with Hillier’s Space is the Machine. Besides, Hillier is always careful about repeating the ‘big picture’ items that arose from The Social Logic of Space (beady ring settlements, restricted random process, and so on), so you won’t miss too much. For planners, the most important chapters in Space is the Machine are about cities as movement economies, whether architecture can cause social malaise, and the fundamental city. There are plenty of goodies for architects as well. Space is the Machine is a must-read for anyone serious about a scientific approach to the built environment. (NOTE: Original illustrations by yours truly). Available for paperback purchase on Amazon here. You can download the full book as a PDF here.

2. The City: Suggestions for Investigation of Human Behavior in the Urban Environment (1925) by Robert E. Park and Ernest W. Burgess
One of the planning profession’s biggest problems is the Chicago School (the sociologists Park and Burgess and their colleague, Homer Hoyt, see sector model of city growth, who together were the founders of human ecology) got so much right from the very beginning that there wasn’t anywhere for planning to go from there but downhill. Of course, planning theory proceeded to accomplish this downhill spiral with great vigor and spectacularly bad results (see the second half of the 20th century). With the advent of the computer processor, Park and Burgess’ approach may appear somewhat quaint to modern eyes. However, the essentials about cities are there. More importantly, Park and Burgess never divorce the socio-economic nature of the city from its physical form. They view them as intimately bound together. An important book and somewhat underrated in today’s world by planners, though it’s difficult to understand why or how that should be the case. Available to purchase on Amazon here.

1. The Death and Life of Great American Cities (1961) by Jane Jacobs
Big surprise, huh? These days it seems like anyone interested in cities is obsessed with Jane Jacobs, either in implementing and promoting her ideas or feverishly going to ridiculous lengths trying to refute them (one might call it Jacobs Derangement Syndrome). Indeed, this obsession in itself is a testament to the power of her book. Ironically, for its time, the most novel thing Jacobs did was she dared to look out her window and observe how things were really working out there on the street. It is a sad statement on the planning profession that this was somehow viewed as a sacrilege when the book was first published and, to a certain extent, this perception endures today. I mean, how dare she actually suggest we evaluate (and, by implication, take responsibility for) the social and economic consequences of our planning decisions. The Death and Life of Great American Cities is the essential book for any planner. Available to purchase on Amazon here.

There you go!

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Architecture, Education, Housing, Mark David Major, News, Philosophy, Professional, Science, Urban Planning

NOW AVAILABLE | The American City Track | Planetizen Courses

“The American City” Track (3.25 credits)
Many people see American cities as a radical departure in the history of town planning because of their planned nature based on the geometrical division of the land. However, other cities of the world also began as planned towns with geometric layouts so American cities are not completely unique. Why did the regular grid come to pervasively characterize American urbanism? Are American cities really different? “The American City” answers these questions and much more by exploring their urban morphology. In some ways, American cities are unique including a strong historical preference for geometric regularity in town planning, which endures to this day. However, in more important ways, American cities are still subject to the same processes linking street networks and human use found in all cities of the world.

Part 1: A Brief History of the Regular Grid
Part 2: The Invention of a New Scale
Part 3: Learning from the Grid
Part 4: Complexity and Pattern in the City

Featuring Dr. Mark David Major, AICP, CNU-A. Click here to purchase this Planetizen Courses track.

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Architecture, Books, Education, Philosophy, Professional, Review, Science, Urban Planning

RE-POST | 20 Must-Read Texts for Urban Planners (#11-20)

RE-POST | 20 Must-Read Texts for Urban Planners (#11-20)
by Dr. Mark David Major, AICP, CNU-A
(Originally posted January 22, 2013)

Lists are often a handy tool to spark a discussion, debate, or even an argument. The purpose of this list is pretty straightforward, i.e. what should you have read. Of course, in limiting the list to a mere 20 texts (books and articles), there is no possible way it can be exhaustive. There are a lot of interesting texts out there from a lot of different perspectives (some better than others). It is also true that compiling such a list will inevitably reveal the particular biases of the person preparing the compilation (like revealing your iTunes playlist). In the end, it is only their opinion. There’s no way around it. This list demonstrates a clear bias towards texts about the relationship between the physical fabric of cities and their spatio-functional nature with a particular emphasis on first-hand observation of how things really work. Because of this, perhaps the most surprising thing about this list is how few texts there are by people who identify themselves as planners (or perhaps not, depending on your perspective). Finally, as with most lists, it is wise to reserve the right to amend/update said list in order to allow for any unfortunate oversights. Having said that, the list is an absolute good. The list is life. All around its margins lies suburban sprawl. Let the making of lists begin…

20. Learning from Las Vegas: The Forgotten Symbolism of Architectural Form (1972) by Robert Venturi, Steven Izenour and Denise Scott Brown
Venturi et al expand the arguments first outlined in Complexity and Contradiction in Architecture in 1966 to the urban level with their seminal study of Las Vegas. Only on these terms, it is an interesting read. However, dig a little deeper beneath the surface and into their wonderful series of figure-ground representations of spatial functioning on, along and adjacent to the Las Vegas Strip. You will discover Venturi et al concede – almost casually – the functional dynamics of how the strip operates to the realm of urban space and pattern in order to quickly focus on their arguments on what really interests them, i.e. the semantic nature of architectural form. A surface reading of only what Venturi et al writes misses a lot of the richness found within since there is a whole other book hidden based on what they are not saying but merely showing you. Click here to purchase on Amazon.

concept_dwelling19. The Concept of Dwelling: on the way to figurative architecture (1985) by Christian Norberg-Schulz
One always has to be careful with phenomenology because, by definition, almost everything written is subjective and open to vast differences in interpretation. However, much like the previous entry on this list, if a reader is willing to dig beneath of the surface and give thoughtful consideration about what, at first, appears to be purposefully opaque writing, then often there are rich rewards to be discovered. Norberg-Schulz’s The Concept of Dwelling is one of the best examples. Click here to purchase on Amazon.

18. Ladders, Architecture at Rice 34 (1996) by Albert Pope
It is something of a mystery why this book seems to be sorely under-appreciated and underrated outside of Houston, Texas. Pope’s study about the physical pattern of the American urban fabric is a fascinating read. Urban planners – especially American ones – could do a lot worse than read an entire book examining the physical pattern of the urban fabric in cities they are suppose to be planning; in fact, they have and do so regularly. Click here to purchase on Amazon.

17. Dreaming the Rational City: The Myth of American City Planning (1983) by M. Christine Boyer
Boyer’s The City of Collective Memory seems to overshadow her earlier book, which is a shame. Her history of the planning profession in the United States is a devastating and powerful critique that is as relevant today as when it was first published. It is also a much better book than The City of Collective Memory. Click here to purchase on Amazon.

16. America (1988) by Jean Baudrillard
The best planners are good sociologists and the best sociologists are great observers. Baudrillard was one of the best and keenest observers of human society and its meaning. Baudrillard wraps his observations within a flamboyant, often elegant, and occasionally beautiful use of language. It is not always clear whether the flurries of linguistic gymnastics are really his or is the result of translating from French into English. However, the results often amount to genius. In America, Baudrillard’s compare and contrast of Paris, New York, and Los Angeles yields rich rewards to any planner who dares to pay attention. Click here to purchase on Amazon.

15. Streets and Patterns (2005) by Stephen Marshall
The first half of Marshall’s book is a brilliant review and analysis of where we are and how we got here. The second half – focusing on possible solutions – descends into being only interesting. Click here to purchase on Amazon.

14. City: Rediscovering the Center (1989) by William H. Whyte
Whyte’s study of informal, social interaction in public spaces is a case study in urban observation that any planner should seek to take into account and emulate. Yes, sometimes Whyte’s conclusions are too localized about the attributes of the space itself than how it fits into the pattern of a larger urban context. However, at other times, his findings are remarkable for their common sense. For example, people in public spaces will move chairs for the purpose of promoting interaction rather than locate their interactions where chairs are located or tend to locate social interaction in areas of high movement like street corners. Anyone who has ever tried to move their way through to party – mumbling to themselves “why do people have to stop here to talk” – will understand many of Whyte’s observations about human nature and informal interaction are rock solid. Whyte’s City can almost be read as a companion piece to Jane Jacobs’ The Death and Life of Great American Cities. Click here to purchase on Amazon.

13. “The Architecture of Community: Some New Proposals on the Social Consequences of Architectural and Planning Decisions” (1987) by Julienne Hanson and Bill Hillier, Architecture and Comportement, Architecture and Behaviour, 3(3): 251-273.
There are many texts by a lot of people about why space syntax is important. However, few have driven home the point more powerfully and succinctly than this early article by Hanson and Hillier about the social consequences of design decisions for Modern housing estates (projects) in the UK. In doing so, Hanson and Hillier add considerable intellectual and quantitative heft to Jane Jacobs’ arguments about urban safety and “eyes on the street” in The Death and Life of Great American Cities. This article will probably be obscure to most planners, especially in the USA. The real crime is it’s rarely read outside of the space syntax community itself. Download the article here.

12. Suburban Nation: The Rise of Sprawl and the Decline of the American Dream (2000) by Andres Duany, Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk and Jeff Speck
A purist will probably argue when it comes to New Urbanism, start with The New Urbanism by Peter Katz. If you’re not really keen on appetizers, then go straight to the main meal. Suburban Nation is not only about what is the New Urbanism but also delves into the argument about why we need the New Urbanism today. New Urbanism does not always get it right. Does anybody? However, there shouldn’t be any doubt that it is heading in the right direction and that is a huge achievement in itself. Click here to purchase on Amazon.

11. “Transect Planning” (2002) by Andres Duany and Emily E. Talen. APA Journal, 68(3): 245-266.
Duany and Talen elegantly translate a fundamental aspect about the spatio-functioning of streets tailored to urban form into understandable terms for public officials, urban designers and planners who are still trapped in – or refuse to leave – the box of the Euclidean zoning model and the arbitrary roadway classifications almost universally associated with it over the last half-century. In terms of the prevailing planning paradigm afflicting our cities, transect planning is the metaphorical equivalent of Duany and Talen pushing a Trojan horse inside the city gates. The more applied, the less tenable becomes the roadway classifications associated with the Euclidean zoning model. Beware of New Urbanists bearing gifts (i.e. methodology). You can read the abstract here.

Read Top 20 ‘Must-Read’ Texts for Urban Planners (#1-10) here!

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Editorial, Education, Housing, Mark David Major, News, Philosophy, Press, Urban Planning

Revisiting the City-State for the Modern World | Mark David Major

Revisiting the City-State for the Modern World
Editorial by Dr. Mark David Major, AICP, CNU-A

(NOTE: I have been mulling over these ideas for more than a decade, slowly working them out and so forth. However, there did not seem any point in rushing to write something because it would have been a hopelessly one-sided conversation. I have been working on a partial redraft of the U.S. Constitution to reflect these reforms. You can also revisit my “20 Theses for Political Reform” article, posted on June 5, 2012. In any case, finally, there is a sign of hope: The Most Disruptive Transformation in History by Richard Florida in Medium.)

The post-election reactions of the Fourth and Fifth Estate have been truly madly deeply depressing, especially from people nominally associated with the political left (to one degree or another) Very few people seem to ‘get it’; namely, why these cataclysmic political results occurred in 2016 (e.g. Brexit, election of Donald Trump, and obvious rise of the European right/nationalists). Most are content with their lazy ‘go-to’ accusations/explanations of racism, fascism, misogynism, xenophobia and ‘whitelash’, all of which happens in the disturbing alternate reality of an echo chamber.

Finally, there is evidence that someone ‘gets it’ in Richard Florida’s December 1, 2016 article “The Most Disruptive Transformation in History: How the clustering of knowledge lays bare the need to devolve power from the nation-state to the city”, the link to which is available at the end of this editorial.

Excerpt:

Devolution and local empowerment would enable blue-state metro economies to invest their own resources while allowing others to do the same. It would respect local differences, local desires, and local needs.

This is a good start to the political debate, which requires both sides to converse with each other. Unfortunately, it does not happen much these days. A lot of the people who voted for Ronald Reagan and Tony Blair bought into their neoliberal economic policies (e.g. globalization) on the promises of economic prosperity and increased local power over their everyday lives; ‘returning power to the states’ in Reagan terms and ‘devolution’ in Blair terms. The Blair’s Labour Government only partially delivered. The rise of the Scottish National Party (SNP) is a positive result of British devolution (and the Labour Party’s failures) whereas the rise of the UKIP (United Kingdom Independence Party) is a result of Blair’s failure to fully deliver on campaign promises vis-à-vis the power relationship between the European Union and local (mostly rural English and Welsh) communities. In the United States, the Democratic Party has frustrated efforts to ‘return power to the states’ for three decades, which has resulted in this behemoth of a Federal state with $20 trillion dollars of debt and the massive political reactions of the last decade. Hence, these constant ‘yo-yo-change’ elections culminating in the ‘surprise’ elevation of Donald Trump to the Presidency. It was only a surprise if you have not been paying attention.

Richard Florida’s article is a good start but delaying action in the USA for the last three decades now requires us to think bolder and get completely ‘outside the box’ to develop truly innovative solutions. We need to simultaneously solve multiple problems while drawing on the beauty of the constitutional system established by the Founding Fathers. Greater local political power for cities is certainly a big issue. Americans now live in an urban nation and we have to address this issue while still maintaining the horizontal and vertical balances of power inherent in the U.S. Constitution. How do we accomplish this? The answer may be to revisit the concept of the city-state for a modern world whilst reforming political representation at the Federal level. What might a plan of action look like?

1. Create criteria for city-states in the United States
Such criteria will have to be debated but a good starting point is physical and population size tied to population density in order to promote density, e.g. if cities want to become states with their own representatives, then they need growth management policies to densify their urbanized area. Right now, there are only a 6-8 US cities that would probably meet such criteria for statehood: New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Boston, Miami, Washington, D.C. San Francisco (oops, forgot SF in initial publication) and perhaps Philadelphia. Houston, Atlanta, and Dallas are probably insufficiently dense at this time (order revised to discount Atlanta at this time).

2. City-state status is not a permanent condition
Cities that achieve statehood could lose that status through a process of promotion and relegation (yes, like the English Premier League). That is, if a city falls below the size and density threshold, then such cities can be returned to their original state. These criteria reflect the competitive component of cities, their rise and decline, and the fact that there can be no shortcut to statehood and greater political power. Because urban growth and decline occur over a very long time (except in conditions of catastrophes), there is time to adjust/prepare for promotion to statehood or relegation back to the state. For example, Chicago would become an independent city-state with its own representatives in the U.S. Congress but, if for some reason, the city declines over successive decades (loss of population and density, etc.), then Chicago would automatically revert back to the State of Illinois. Early in the 20th century, Detroit probably would have achieved statehood but no longer due to its precipitous decline.

In a sense, the Blair government already accomplished something similar, in part, with the creation of the Greater London Authority in the U.K. during the late 1990s. The USA and the United Kingdom are quite different in size, democratic representation, and constitutional structures but similar solutions could be pursued based on the same principle (e.g. devolution), though obviously tailored for their specific conditions.

Such a constitutional change would better reflect the urban reality of today’s world in the United States. However, under current conditions, it would also represent a dramatic, unsustainable increase of political power in the urban power base of the Democratic Party. This would terrify the rural power base of the Republican Party, rightly so. Constitution reform of democratic representation within the ‘vertical’ balance of power framework established by the Founding Fathers (rural-urban, small-big states, etc.) is necessary. This can be accomplished by reinvigorating the republican (with a small ‘r’) foundations of the country while simultaneously reducing the size of the Federal state. How?

We would have to redress the vertical balance of power by reducing the legislative size of the Federal government.

3. Reduce the number of U.S. Senators to one per state
Limit representation to one senator per state in the U.S. Senate, thereby significantly reducing the size of this legislative body (and their associated political staffing). If six to eight U.S. cities achieve statehood, then we would have only 56-58 senators, creating political power for the representatives of these city-states while redressing the rural-urban/small- and big-state balance with greater political power for constituencies that are predominantly rural in nature (Wyoming, Oklahoma, Dakotas, etc.).

4. Reduce the size of the House of Representatives to 217 members/End gerrymandering of districts (convex shapes)
Same principle at work for the reduction of legislative size except for representation in the House of Representatives is tied to population size. In order for this to work, we have to end gerrymandering of districts in favor of common sense districts that are physically convex in shape, which incorporate a diversity of populations and thereby moderate political representatives; promote compromise and work ‘across the aisle.’ There would be no ‘single issue’ representatives (most often associated with identity politics). Gerrymandering of districts (nominally in some cases to ensure ‘diversity’) is a real problem in the USA because when you gerrymander one district (nominally for laudable goals), you are gerrymandering every other district immediately adjacent to it. There is a ‘domino effect.’ The result is the legislative dysfunction of political extremism we have witnessed over the last three decades.

5. The domino effect on Federal Power
This would have a ‘domino effect’ on political power of the nation-state, making more feasible the devolution of all sorts of functions from the Federal department level to the local level (especially to the city-states: those that are already states and those that aspire to statehood), more fully meeting Reagan’s pledge to return power to the states and reduce the role of the technocracy at the Federal level and in people’s everyday lives.

This is the conversation we need to be having right now. Not the lazy attacks and doublespeak that is currently dominating the conversation. Let the real debate begin.

Read the full article here: The Most Disruptive Transformation in History | Richard Florida | Medium

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AVAILABLE | The American City | Complexity & Pattern in the City | Planetizen

The American City, Part 4: Complexity and Pattern in the City course featuring Dr. Mark David Major is now available from Planetizen Courses. The course is approved for 0.75 professional development credits with the American Institute of Certified Planners (AICP) and Congress for New Urbanism (CNU).

Watch an extended preview here.

The American City, Part 4: Complexity and Pattern in the City
The course discusses the design of the urban pattern in several American cities (Los Angeles, Chicago, Las Vegas, Seattle, St. Louis, Orlando, and Phoenix). The course examines: 1) the synergy between different scales of movement patterned into the urban grid, which contributes to the “urban buzz” of distinctive neighborhoods and places; 2) the large role that local topography plays in allowing, limiting, or denying certain possibilities for urban growth, due to the massive horizontal scale of American cities and the practical necessity of overcoming topographical conditions; and 3) the consequences of government regulations, Euclidean zoning, modern transportation planning, and suburbanization during the post-war period in generating a hierarchal grid logic to the American regular grid planning tradition. The implications of development patterns and land consumption unseen during the history of city building over the previous 10,000 years are discussed.

Click here to purchase the course by subscribing to Planetizen Courses.

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