Why Andrés Duany Is So Focused on Making 'Lean Urbanism' a Thing

2014-03-19T12:06:00-04:00

The lean urbanism concept, he says, is like a software patch, or a workaround – ultimately a guide or a tip sheet to navigate the complicated, and often very expensive, maze of working in the built environment in the U.S. “It’s about knowing that with certain building types, under a certain threshold, you don’t need an elevator. Or a sprinkler system. A lot of developers know that, and we want to daylight that. We want to present that thematically.”

Andrés Duany to 'avant-garde establishment:' It's not about style

2011-04-16T02:25:22-04:00

And yet, few want to know that. The otherwise omniscient Kenneth Frampton was recently heard to say, “The New Urbanists … are they still around?” “They make porches for white Southerners, don’t they?” is Rodolfo Machado’s joshing version. Unfortunately, architecture students from our elite schools believe this more easily than the truth...

Andrés Duany is looking to open a new architectural can of stylistic worms. And he wants you to reply. The gist of the argument can be summed up by the following quote:

"The problem, it seemed to us, was not one of inadequately designed “unprecedented typologies.” Suburban sprawl does not call for aesthetic intervention. It is nothing less than the principal cause of climate change. The car-dependent lifestyle of the American middle class (as well as its export version) is the major contributor to atmospheric and aquatic degradation. And that is just the beginning, as the attendant social and economic problems become even more urgent. When aging boomers are torn from their cars, when the national impoverishment fails the infrastructure, as cheap energy winds down—then the drifting wreck of suburbia will require salvage work. This is the great design challenge of the 21st century."

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Why Andrés Duany Is So Focused on Making 'Lean Urbanism' a Thing

Andrés Duany to 'avant-garde establishment:' It's not about style