Effervescent In Pink

To approach a city...as if it were [an] architectural problem
is to make the mistake of attempting to substitute art for life.
The results are neither life nor art. They are taxidermy.

Jane Jacobs passed away the other day. As one of the major influences on me professionally, I thought I should post something in small tribute to this great mind and inspiring urbanist.

Reading her ideas for the first time during my undergrad, I found Jacobs to be a breath of lively (not fresh - that's too sanitary for JJ's city) air in urban studies. Rather than come up with grand theories on how to "fix" city ills, she suggested we just look deductively at what does work. And she found that what did work was messiness, chaos, and diversity - concluding that "the point of cities is multiplicity of choice".

But look what we have built: low-income projects that become worse centers of delinquency, vandalism and general social hopelessness than the slums they were supposed to replace. Cultural centers that are unable to support a good bookstore. Civic centers that are avoided by everyone but bums. Promenades that go from no place to nowhere and have no promenaders. Expressways that eviscerate great cities. This is not the rebuilding of cities. This is the sacking of cities.

There is a quality even meaner than outright ugliness or disorder, and this meaner quality is the dishonest mask of pretended order, achieved by ignoring or suppressing the real order that is struggling to exist and to be served.

JJ's concepts on urban life and design have influenced many an urban planner, designer, and bureaucrat over the years. But what has made Jane Jacobs stand out for me is her later life. While most people would settle in and let the continued accolades for Death and Life of Great American Cities roll in, she became even more active in urban neighbourhood issues, eventually turning into that raging granny you secretly fear your mother may become. And her defense for doing so is gold:

I'm like most people. I have other things to do. I don't like getting in these fights. I hate the government making my life absurd. I don't want the government to set an agenda for what I have to be doing by it being so stupid that I have to devote myself to that. I have other things to do. And this is true of most people. It is really an outrage when you come to think of it.

Her passing isn't a tragedy; she lived to a rip old age and was prolific right to the end. As a side effect, though, JJ never passed the torch along to a great urbanist of our generation. Instead, I think she hoped her ideas and observations would scatter sparks among all of us who love cities. Looking around at our magnificently-apathetic city, I hope some of those sparks catch.

In related news:
The City of Vancouver has decided to scrap the groundbreaking Ethical Sourcing Policy they embarked upon last year. Oxfam is urging people to let Sam et al know we have better things to do than monitor their poor decisions.

posted by Aleksandra @ 10:36 AM