The Death and Life of Great American Cities: Difference between revisions

So, of the thundering, plainly right, observations Jacobs made in 1961, and which we seem to have forgotten, are these:

*Streets, and not the buildings, and critically, not parks, that are the veins and arteries of the city. Where they are clearly demarcated from private space, regularly occupied, or mixed use, and where activity is there for all to see and as such there are eyes on the street belonging not to the authorities but to the “natural proprietors of the streets”, the conditions are right for a safe, dynamic and prosperous neighbourhood. It is where these conditions are not met —long blocks, deserted sidewalks, little diversity and especially and where buildings face ''away'' from the streets — as they tend to in the projects — that the security and vibrancy is lost.

*A mixture of uses, residential and commercial, educational and recreational, together, ''adds'' cohesion, and ''reinforces'' positive feedback loops. This steadfastly flies in the face of modernist orthodoxy.  Businesses open by day, bars by night, ensure that the street are constantly over-watched by those natural proprietors. School children should interact with shopkeepers and publicans. They will, soon enough!

*You need old buildings as much as you need ones: not just fancy old ones, but also humdrum, run down, or even dilapidated old ones. For some members of the community, they will be all they can afford. If you have mechanisms to allow these people into the community in places they can with their limited means sustain, they have the opportunity for development. If the whole place has gentrified, there will people who can’t afford to live there.