Tag Archives: neighborhoods

Bass Ackwards

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The proposed Pershing Square Renew/Agence Ter design with the shade structure at the rear.

At about the same time I went to work for Bryant Park Restoration Corporation (BPRC) in 1991 a similar project was underway on the West Coast. Pershing Square, the oldest public space in Los Angeles, was also the subject of a major downtown revitalization effort. In 1992, Pershing Square was closed for a $14.5 million re-design and renovation by Mexican architect Ricardo Legorreta and Philadelphia-based Hanna Olin Design. Hanna Olin was also the landscape design firm engaged for Bryant Park. The “new” Pershing Square opened in 1994. Shortly after it was completed, I visited Pershing Square and found it to be hot, dusty and deserted – essentially the roof of the parking garage located under the park. Over the past two decades, while Bryant Park had become New York’s “town square” and the stimulus to billions of dollars in redevelopment, mostly inert Pershing Square has been a drag on efforts to revitalize Downtown LA. The square sits between the glass and steel office center of modern LA and the rapidly changing original LA downtown of loft buildings of brick, limestone and terracotta. It’s fascinating to see how much positive activity is happening one or two blocks away from the square – without it as anchor. Continue reading →

When the Signs Suck

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Perhaps the most egregious awnings on 34th Street. Maybe the bottom one has some utility — but the other two?

Recently, I gave a tour of downtown Jamaica to a major retail developer. It was his initial close look at the downtown while walking. We met in a restaurant, and when we walked out on the sidewalk, the first words out of his mouth were, “The streets looks awful. The signs are terrible.” Nothing is more of an obstacle to downtown revitalization then poor storefront presentation – and nothing is more difficult to fix. Nope, not even street vending is as hard as trying to improve as retail signs, storefronts and the merchandising visible from the street.

Malls are able to have high quality signs and retail presentation because of their unitary ownership. Leases give mall owners review rights for retail presentation and have a long list of rules regarding their signs, storefronts and displays – and mall owners tend to enforce those rules. Downtowns have multiple owners, and even more individual retail tenants. There is little incentive for any landlord to enforce the sign provisions in their lease, since the woman next door isn’t enforcing hers and all you really want is your monthly rent check. Why alienate a high rent-paying tenant, who pays every month, over a trivial issue like how his store looks? Continue reading →

Selling on the Sidewalk

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When I went to work for Grand Central Partnership among my first assignments from Dan Biederman was to figure out how to deal with sidewalk issues: vending, newsracks, newsstands, payphones and making public toilets more available. In dense urban centers sidewalks, while public space, are highly contested territory, and the regulation of activity on them in New York City is arcane and labyrinthine. Not only pedestrians care about sidewalks. Adjacent property owners not only have responsibility for cleaning and maintaining their sidewalks, but they care about what happens in front of their multi-million dollar investments; particularly with its impact on ground floor retail. In midtown Manhattan, many buildings have vaults under the sidewalks that expand their basement space – and so are concerned about how much weight is put on them and whether anyone is punching holes in them.

A range of people have traditionally engaged in commercial activity on the New York City sidewalks – and these uses are heavily, if often ineffectually, regulated. There are separate governing schemes for four kinds of sidewalk venders: general merchandise, food, veterans and first amendment vendors. The Department of Parks and Recreation has its own scheme for concessioning venders within city parks as well as on adjacent sidewalks, and even sidewalks across the street from a park! The City permits individuals to erect newsstands at any sidewalk location that meets certain siting criteria – with no discretion by the City with respect to the location. If the proposed structure fits – the applicant is entitled to a permit. The Department of Transportation manages the enforcement of some (but not all) of these rules and is ultimately responsible for the physical condition of the sidewalks and with seeing to it that sidewalk uses don’t interfere with transportation (bus stops) or public safety (fire hydrants). Continue reading →

Pissing On Sidewalks

Make American Downtowns Great Again

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Frankreich, Provence, Aix-en-Provence: Cafes auf dem Cours Mirabeau

Cours Mirabeau, Aix-en-Provence, France

Cutting edge thinking among urbanists and the progressive development community is that American consumers are tired of the covered shopping mall and are seeking a return to the walkable downtown retail experience – or that’s what one hears at the Urban Land Institute and the International Downtown Association (David Milder’s blog analyzing retail trends on medium and small-sized city downtowns is required reading towards this end: http://www.ndavidmilder.com/blog). But, what makes the experience of being on Main Street great? What would make it better? What do we enjoy about being there? What opportunities does this create for aging Downtowns across the country? Continue reading →

The View from Vancouver

TAKING SUBURBIA SERIOUSLY

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The house in the suburbs in which I grew up.

Joel Kotkin’s latest book, The Human City: Urbanism for the Rest of Us, poses some serious challenges to those of us who focus on urban revitalization, downtown development and the improvement of public spaces. In essence, he asks the question: “What about the suburbs” and using persuasive data argues that it is where most people want to live – and not just here in the United States, but in most developed and developing places around the world. Kotkin’s point is that most people want an affordable place to live, where they can bring up their children, have a yard, a sense of community and good schools – and that means places outside the urban core.

Kotkin distinguishes his analysis from that of Richard Florida, New urbanists and such-like, by saying that while it may be true that over the last couple of decades people are moving back Downtown, and that this may be a good thing, the data shows that it is rather a limited phenomenon and most people still want to live in the ‘burbs. But he goes much further than that. He argues that because of limitations put on housing unit expansion in desirable cities, and the resulting increased density, they are becoming too expensive for any families but the most wealthy. As a result, fertility rates in urbanizing countries are beneath replacement level. Kotkin says that in many/most major cities around the world, since having kids is so expensive, people have stopped having them. His ultimate argument is that in order for countries to grow and remain economically healthy, they need to create policies to encourage affordable housing creation on the peripheries of cities; and those homes should be detached, with yards and a sense of neighborhoods and have good schools. In his final chapter he demonstrates that there are plenty of resources and space to accomplish this. Continue reading →

Gentrification and its Discontents

The Place Master

Resources for Placemaking