Reinventing America's Cities

Some have asserted that today's economic situation presents an opportunity to reformulate the usual means with which the country's infrastructure is paid for and the focus of the improvements. The very physical structure of our country may again need to be shifted. Indeed, there is no doubt that the way things worked last decade is now outdated. As stated by Richard Florida in the article I linked below,

But another crucial aspect of the crisis has been largely overlooked, and it might ultimately prove more important. Because America’s tendency to overconsume and under-save has been intimately intertwined with our postwar spatial fix—that is, with housing and suburbanization—the shape of the economy has been badly distorted, from where people live, to where investment flows, to what’s produced. Unless we make fundamental policy changes to eliminate these distortions, the economy is likely to face worsening handicaps in the years ahead.

Suburbanization—and the sprawling growth it propelled—made sense for a time. The cities of the early and mid-20th century were dirty, sooty, smelly, and crowded, and commuting from the first, close-in suburbs was fast and easy. And as manufacturing became more technologically stable and product lines matured during the postwar boom, suburban growth dovetailed nicely with the pattern of industrial growth. Businesses began opening new plants in green-field locations that featured cheaper land and labor; management saw no reason to continue making now-standardized products in the expensive urban locations where they’d first been developed and sold. Work was outsourced to then-new suburbs and the emerging areas of the Sun Belt, whose connections to bigger cities by the highway system afforded rapid, low-cost distribution. This process brought the Sun Belt economies (which had lagged since the Civil War) into modern times, and sustained a long boom for the United States as a whole.

But that was then; the economy is different now...

Along these lines, the NYT ran this fascinating article outlining some visions for reinventing the city in America. Using four examples, in New Orleans, Buffalo, LA, and the Bronx, ideas for rebuilding, reformulating, and reinvigorating our cities are examined. Using good planning and smart design, these changes can not only bring rejuvenation to an individual city, but collectively to our country.