[...]
The city or near it, any city, anywhere, one size or another.
We flee from it and are drawn to it. Oppressed, excited, frustrated,
enthralled, appalled by it.
The city or near it.
This incredible collection of things, people, pathways, habits,
history, problems and possibilities.
What do we want in a city? Everything we have ever wanted to fill our needs and
meet our wishes. Out of our needs and wishes, we make our cities and the
lives we lead in them.
How have we managed? All you have to do is wake up in
the morning and look around.
[...] we have to do is wake up in the [...]
Somehow it happened. By accident perhaps.
By compromise surely. By things done and undone.
Disorder and disproportion.
Eterioration. Monotony. Ugliness amid affluence.
Who did it? Who does it still? All these did it or failed to stop it.
In the end, all the people who didn't see or have learned not to see.
We all share the consequences. But there are
opportunities to share as well. What can we do? Any number of things.
The planning of a tree. The design and construction of a
building that graces its surroundings.
The redevelopment of a great downtown area.
The center of the city revived and embellished. Whatever the act, whatever its
scope, the common element is design and always an urgent will to make things
better than they are now.
Where do you start? Just look around. It could be here as you approach the
city. From what you see along the way, what kind of city would you expect to find
when you arrive? Urban sprawl.
The careless misuse of land, unregulated and unrestrained. The big loud
sell on the march. Cutter.
As you move toward the city, what visions of it are raised by this?
As much as anything else, the city is an experience
and the approach foretells what it will be like.
The landscape suddenly opens up, allows the city to be discovered. The capital of
the nation and the far end of a road that respects the beauty of nature.
Surrounded by possibilities, often we seem determined to kill them off.
The waterfront, potentially a proud to land bound imaginations,
a place for people to enjoy.
Yet here in Detroit and in other cities, the river becomes a magnet for
industrial debris. In
Washington, the Potomac lies unfulfilled.
Half hidden, vulnerable to the leavings of litter bugs,
unpledged to lively human use.
And yet, the alternatives are there, loud and clear.
Why not bring river and people together?
Let the river grace the city and the lives of its people.
San Antonio, Texas did this with the stream that winds through its very center.
A wandering walk, Paseo del Rio, for the pleasure of citizens
in the heart of the city.
But what happens when downtown runs down? It's hard to believe that this
part of Hartford, Connecticut did.
Today, the eye scans the center of commerce built to human scale. Constitution
Plaza, where the eye meets the variety it demands, the surprises it savors,
the gentle piece of growing things. There is a place for automobiles and a place
for people. They are not the same place.
Traffic goes under and around the plaza. Cars park underground. People go about
their business safely in an area designed for people. It is pleasant to discover
places to get lost in, yet reassuring to find landmarks to go by.
What you see around you is important, whether the view is from the office, from
the home, anywhere.
Public and private resources will combine
to renew much of downtown America.