Why Cities Look the Way They Do
Why Cities Look the Way They Do

Author: Richard J. Williams

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2019-08-08

Total Pages: 190

ISBN-13: 0745691846

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We tend to think cities look the way they do because of the conscious work of architects, planners and builders. But what if the look of cities had less to do with design, and more to do with social, cultural, financial and political processes, and the way ordinary citizens interact with them? What if the city is a process as much as a design? Richard J. Williams takes the moment construction is finished as a beginning, tracing the myriad processes that produce the look of the contemporary global city. This book is the story of dramatic but unforeseen urban sights: how financial capital spawns empty towering skyscrapers and hollowed-out ghettoes; how the zoning of once-illicit sexual practices in marginal areas of the city results in the reinvention of culturally vibrant gay villages; how abandoned factories have been repurposed as creative hubs in a precarious postindustrial economy. It is also the story of how popular urban clichés and the fictional portrayal of cities powerfully shape the way we read and see the bricks, concrete and glass that surround us. Thought-provoking and original, Why Cities Look the Way They Do will appeal to anyone who wants to understand the contemporary city, shedding new light on humanity’s greatest collective invention.

The Image of the City
The Image of the City

Author: Kevin Lynch

Publisher: MIT Press

Published: 1964-06-15

Total Pages: 212

ISBN-13: 9780262620017

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The classic work on the evaluation of city form. What does the city's form actually mean to the people who live there? What can the city planner do to make the city's image more vivid and memorable to the city dweller? To answer these questions, Mr. Lynch, supported by studies of Los Angeles, Boston, and Jersey City, formulates a new criterion—imageability—and shows its potential value as a guide for the building and rebuilding of cities. The wide scope of this study leads to an original and vital method for the evaluation of city form. The architect, the planner, and certainly the city dweller will all want to read this book.

Cities by Design
Cities by Design

Author: Fran Tonkiss

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2014-01-21

Total Pages: 279

ISBN-13: 0745680291

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Who makes our cities, and what part do everyday users have in the design of cities? This book powerfully shows that city-making is a social process and examines the close relationship between the social and physical shaping of urban environments. With cities taking a growing share of the global population, urban forms and urban experience are crucial for understanding social injustice, economic inequality and environmental challenges. Current processes of urbanization too often contribute to intensifying these problems; cities, likewise, will be central to the solutions to such problems. Focusing on a range of cities in developed and developing contexts, Cities by Design highlights major aspects of contemporary urbanization: urban growth, density and sustainability; inequality, segregation and diversity; informality, environment and infrastructure. Offering keen insights into how the shaping of our cities is shaping our lives, Cities by Design provides a critical exploration of key issues and debates that will be invaluable to students and scholars in sociology and geography, environmental and urban studies, architecture, urban design and planning.

Invented Cities
Invented Cities

Author: Mona Domosh

Publisher: Yale University Press

Published: 1996-01-01

Total Pages: 206

ISBN-13: 9780300074918

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Why do cities look the way they do? In this intriguing new book, Mona Domosh seeks to answer this question by comparing the strikingly different landscapes of two great American cities, Boston and New York. Although these two cities appeared to be quite similar through the eighteenth century, distinctive characteristics emerged as social and economic differences developed. Domosh explores the physical differences between Boston and New York, comparing building patterns and architectural styles to show how a society's vision creates its own distinctive urban form. Cities, Domosh contends, are visible representations of individual and group beliefs, values, tensions, and fears. Using an interdisciplinary approach that encompasses economics, politics, architecture, historical and cultural geography, and urban studies, Domosh shows how the middle and upper classes of Boston and New York, the "building elite," inscribed their visions of social order and social life on four landscape features during the latter half of the nineteenth century: New York's retail district and its commercial skyscrapers, and Boston's Back Bay and its Common and park system. New York's self-expression translated into unlimited commercial and residential expansion, conspicuous consumption, and architecture designed to display wealth and prestige openly. Boston, in contrast, focused more on culture. The urban gentry limited skyscraper construction, prevented commercial development of Boston Common, and maintained homes and parks near the business district. Many fascinating lithographs illustrate the two cities' contrasting visions.

The Heart of the City
The Heart of the City

Author: Alexander Garvin

Publisher:

Published: 2019-05-07

Total Pages: 266

ISBN-13: 1610919491

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Downtowns are more than economic engines: they are repositories of knowledge and culture and generators of new ideas, technology, and ventures. They are the heart of the city that drives its future. If we are to have healthy downtowns, we need to understand what downtown is all about; how and why some American downtowns never stopped thriving (such as San Jose and Houston), some have been in decline for half a century (including Detroit and St. Louis), and still others are resurging after temporary decline (many, including Lower Manhattan and Los Angeles). The downtowns that are prospering are those that more easily adapt to changing needs and lifestyles. In The Heart of the City, distinguished urban planner Alexander Garvin shares lessons on how to plan for a mix of housing, businesses, and attractions; enhance the public realm; improve mobility; and successfully manage downtown services. Garvin opens the book with diagnoses of downtowns across the United States, including the people, businesses, institutions, and public agencies implementing changes. In a review of prescriptions and treatments for any downtown, Garvin shares brief accounts--of both successes and failures--of what individuals with very different objectives have done to change their downtowns. The final chapters look at what is possible for downtowns in the future, closing with suggested national, state, and local legislation to create standard downtown business improvement districts to better manage downtowns. This book will help public officials, civic organizations, downtown business property owners, and people who care about cities learn from successful recent actions in downtowns across the country, and expand opportunities facing their downtown. Garvin provides recommendations for continuing actions to help any downtown thrive, ensuring a prosperous and thrilling future for the 21st-century American city.

Looking at Cities
Looking at Cities

Author: Allan B. Jacobs

Publisher:

Published: 2013-10-01

Total Pages: 168

ISBN-13: 9780674863866

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Allan Jacobs has written a city planning book for everyone with a passion for urban environments. His message--conveyed in word and vivid image--is that the people who make changes in cities base their decisions upon what they see, and that their visions and actions, which affect the lives of millions, have too often been faulty. Jacobs shows us how to read cities by identifying and discussing the many visual clues and their various meanings in different environments.

Close-Up
Close-Up

Author: Grady Clay

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Published: 1980-04-15

Total Pages: 212

ISBN-13: 9780226109459

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"Grady Clay looks hard at the landscape, finding out who built what and why, noticing who participates in a city's success and who gets left in a 'sink,' or depressed (often literally) area. Clay doesn't stay in the city; he looks at industrial towns, truck stops, suburbs—nearly anywhere people live or work. His style is witty and readable, and the book is crammed with illustrations that clarify his points. If I had to pick up one book to guide my observations of the American scene, this would be it."—Sonia Simone, Whole Earth Review "The emphasis on the informal aspects of city-shaping—topographical, historical, economic and social—does much to counteract the formalist approach to American urban design. Close-Up...should be required reading for anyone wishing to understand Americans and their cities."—Roger Cunliffe, Architectural Review "Close-Up is a provocative and stimulating book."—Thomas J. Schlereth, Winterthur Portfolio "Within this coherent string of essays, the urban dweller or observer, as well as the student, will find refreshing strategies for viewing the environmental 'situations' interacting to form a landscape."—Dallas Morning News "Clay's Close-Up, first published in 1973, is still a key book for looking at the real American city. Too many urban books and guidebooks concentrate on the good parts of the city....Clay looks at all parts of the city, the suburbs, and the places between cities, and develops new terms to describe parts of the built environment—fronts, strips, beats, stacks, sinks, and turf. No one who wants to understand American cities or to describe them, should fail to know this book. The illustrations are of special interest to the guidebook writer."—American Urban Guidenotes

The Fear and the Freedom
The Fear and the Freedom

Author: Keith Lowe

Publisher: Macmillan + ORM

Published: 2017-10-24

Total Pages: 708

ISBN-13: 1466842296

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Bestselling historian Keith Lowe's The Fear and the Freedom looks at the astonishing innovations that sprang from WWII and how they changed the world. The Fear and the Freedom is Keith Lowe’s follow-up to Savage Continent. While that book painted a picture of Europe in all its horror as WWII was ending, The Fear and the Freedom looks at all that has happened since, focusing on the changes that were brought about because of WWII—simultaneously one of the most catastrophic and most innovative events in history. It killed millions and eradicated empires, creating the idea of human rights, and giving birth to the UN. It was because of the war that penicillin was first mass-produced, computers were developed, and rockets first sent to the edge of space. The war created new philosophies, new ways of living, new architecture: this was the era of Le Corbusier, Simone de Beauvoir and Chairman Mao. But amidst the waves of revolution and idealism there were also fears of globalization, a dread of the atom bomb, and an unexpressed longing for a past forever gone. All of these things and more came about as direct consequences of the war and continue to affect the world that we live in today. The Fear and the Freedom is the first book to look at all of the changes brought about because of WWII. Based on research from five continents, Keith Lowe’s The Fear and the Freedom tells the very human story of how the war not only transformed our world but also changed the very way we think about ourselves.

Remedy Network
Remedy Network

Author: J. Caleb Perkins

Publisher: J. Caleb Perkins

Published: 2017-12-15

Total Pages: 70

ISBN-13: 1984030914

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REMEDY NETWORK is a practical guide for millennials who desire the courage to start an initiative of change and share their story. J. Caleb began Remedy Network Inc. after hearing the devastating news of Kalief Browder's suicide that occurred in the summer of 2015. Caleb left his corporate job at 23 years old and moved to New York City to begin Remedy. His vision is to see properly resourced millennials who are equipped to reach their personal and professional goals, well-rounded in their mental health and educated in all spheres of societal influence.

Looking at Cities
Looking at Cities

Author: Allan B. Jacobs

Publisher:

Published: 1985

Total Pages: 176

ISBN-13:

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Allan Jacobs has written a city planning book for everyone with a passion for urban environments. His message--conveyed in word and vivid image--is that the people who make changes in cities base their decisions upon what they see, and that their visions and actions, which affect the lives of millions, have too often been faulty. This book is about how to look at and understand urban environments. In order to plan sensitively, the city and regional planner must walk in, look at, wonder about, and simply enjoy cities. Careful observation is a crucial tool for the kind of analysis and questioning necessary to achieve good planning. Through observation the city planner and urban activist can learn when an area was built, for whom it was built, who lives there now, how it has changed, and how it might be improved for present and future inhabitants. Jacobs shows us how to read cities by identifying and discussing the many visual clues and their various meanings in different environments. Case studies of American and European cities--San Jose, San Francisco, Cincinnati, Bologna, Rome--and over two hundred striking photographs, drawings, and maps by the author present ways to read the environment that will prove indispensable for urban planners and will delight all city watchers.