Five Rules for Tomorrow's Cities: Design in an Age of Urban Migration, Demographic Change, and a Disappearing Middle Class by Patrick M. CondonMy rating: 3 of 5 stars
I participated in a workshop of Dr Condon's back in 2020, and purchased a copy of his book as a result. Although his ideas, radical they may be, seem to be based in common sense, in my opinion he places an unrealistic amount of confidence and reliance on the practice of urban design. He makes an excellent case for letting communities grow and prosper organically. He makes absolutely no case for urban design offering any sort of relief from draconian zoning and other controls that make it next to impossible for organic economic livelihoods to prosper - other than to state his belief that it should.
Well, maybe it 'should,' but it simply isn't likely.
Having worked in land use and zoning most of my adult life, and finally breaking free of it a few years ago in favor of a more useful career in parks planning and improvements, I fully agree that zoning is the problem. But hidden behind these codes, and strongly backing them, is the belief by many politicians and other decision-makers that in order for communities to prosper, and even survive in many cases, we must bend to the wishes of the wealthy and powerful. Land owners, bankers, developers, builders, real estate brokers. Zoning conforms exactly to what these power-wielders want, and the actual needs and goals of the community be damned. See, it is relatively easy to change zoning to allow what the powerful desire. All you need is a couple of public hearings and a relatively skillful technical writer. But to change it to meet community needs? To address a lack of viable commercial space for small producers and artisans? To build a school? To - gasp - require affordable housing? The well-funded powerful will rise up and fan the flames of fear, distributing "studies" and "information" and suddenly your public hearings are full of angry voices shouting that their tax dollars do not support such changes. The fearful can be manipulated like sheep, and almost never disappoint. And so, time and time again, proposals that would actually improve the lot of the not-so-powerful fail, never getting past the starting line of a majority vote in favor.
Condon barely acknowledges these truths, and so his argument is missing a major component: that of a real solution. Urban designers can potentially design all sorts of small spaces and interlinked uses, with lovely gardens and aesthetically pleasing structures that assuredly take into account the health, safety, and welfare so jealously guarded under the purview of zoning. Still, his examples are interesting, even if they could never be transmogrified to the modern US without a failure of the powerful. Which, unfortunately, means we are still looking for answers.
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