Urban Studies Legend Jane Jacobs Essay

According to Jacobs, "It was being done unofficially when what had grown big and successful was used to eat up, or wipe away, or starve what was not."

Besides just abject failures, though, Jacobs also cites a number of success stories that indicate city planners in the United States had learned some valuable lessons from their failures in the late 20th century. According to Jacobs, "There are quite a few cities that are more vigorous and more attractive than they were 10 or 20 years ago. A lot of good things are being done, but it's not universal." As an example, Jacobs points to Portland, Oregon as a city that has taken steps to reinvent itself based on the lessons learned in the past. Emphasizing that the Portland planners did not use a "lot of gimmicks," Jacobs reports that the holistic approach used has resulted in a reinvigorated city:

"It's not any one splashy thing," Jacobs adds, "It's the ensemble that I think is so pleasant." In response to a suggestion that the desirable outcomes achieved in Portland were due to regional planning that she opposes because they drive housing prices up and exacerbate traffic conditions, Jacobs indicated that Portland was different than many other cities because it enjoys such a low population density. According to Jacobs, "Well, my goodness. Portland is not a dense city and never was. Whoever made that prediction, that densifying the city itself would have all those bad consequences, they don't know anything about it." It is reasonable to suggest that the citizens of Portland may have some different views on these issues, but Jacobs did not elaborate and simply brushed these objections aside.

When queried about her experiences with city planning in Los Angeles, Jacobs makes the point that this city managed to overcome its constraints to effective development by simply letting things happen on their own, which would appear to be congruent with her position against regional planning and metropolitanism.For instance, Jacobs advises that, "That's what I say: Every city is different. But don't think that because Los Angeles can do that, and it turned out that way, that every city can be a Los Angeles." It is also reasonable to suggest that not all American cities want to be another L.A., but their citizens do want and need all of the attributes that make living in a city desirable, including entertainment, recreational resources and an adequate transportation infrastructure. In this regard, Jacobs emphasizes the need for green spaces in urban areas and suggests that many of the efforts to date by city planners have failed to hit their mark because of a lack of understanding about how a city and its people really work. For example, Jacobs notes that, "I don't think the New Urbanists understand this kind of thing. They think you just put it where you want."

Conclusion

Hindsight is 20-20 of course, and at 85 years old, Jane Jacobs certainly has her fair share of it. Based on this lifetime of experience, Jacobs argues for a more informed and enlightened approach to city planning that takes the need of its residents into account and an approach that avoids many of the missteps that urban planners in the U.S. In the past. There is a certain apple-and-orange quality to her comparisons of U.S. And Canadian cities, though. Nevertheless, in her interview with Bill Steigerwald of Reason magazine, Jacobs succeeds in describing some of the pitfalls that can result from explosive urban growth and her empirical observations concerning what has worked in the past in Canada may have significant implications for urban planners in similarly situated….....