Interesting. I tried to convince my geography class that New Urbanism is the worst idea in the world, but they wouldn't listen. Maybe they all joined this facebook group just to spite me.
what's so bad about new urbanism? not trying to be snide, but it's something i'm not terribly familiar with and it seems that a lot people bash it here without really explaining why.
i see it as a reference to hyper-architecture, created by constant. check out his book "new babylon, the hyper-architecture of desire". its a book out of the 60's ish era a la archigram and superstudio. very cool read. i really enjoyed it (even though it did take my head too far out of reality, but i believe!!!)
--Sounds like CNU is concerned with all the issues that are continually bitched about on this forum. Like any other ism, there are honest and devoted practitioners and those who use the ism as a marketing tool. My guess is that people on this forum probably see a gabled roof and break out in a cold sweat. Not every design problem requires the shining instant icon with a hole in it.---
The Congress for the New Urbanism views disinvestment in central cities, the spread of placeless sprawl, increasing separation by race and income, environmental deterioration, loss of agricultural lands and wilderness, and the erosion of society's built heritage as one interrelated community-building challenge.
We stand for the restoration of existing urban centers and towns within coherent metropolitan regions, the reconfiguration of sprawling suburbs into communities of real neighborhoods and diverse districts, the conservation of natural environments, and the preservation of our built legacy.
We recognize that physical solutions by themselves will not solve social and economic problems, but neither can economic vitality, community stability, and environmental health be sustained without a coherent and supportive physical framework.
We advocate the restructuring of public policy and development practices to support the following principles: neighborhoods should be diverse in use and population; communities should be designed for the pedestrian and transit as well as the car; cities and towns should be shaped by physically defined and universally accessible public spaces and community institutions; urban places should be framed by architecture and landscape design that celebrate local history, climate, ecology, and building practice.
We represent a broad-based citizenry, composed of public and private sector leaders, community activists, and multidisciplinary professionals. We are committed to reestablishing the relationship between the art of building and the making of community, through citizen-based participatory planning and design.
We dedicate ourselves to reclaiming our homes, blocks, streets, parks, neighborhoods, districts, towns, cities, regions, and environment.
Thanks for this clear definition Vado.
So it does sound like a great statement doesn't it? Why is everybody against it? Is there a catch, a trap, a hidden political agenda that I'm not aware of?
prolly the issue of sentimentality. the white pickett fence, manicured lawn front porch americana that may or may not have existed. of course, along with that americana of the past you had all the all the social problems that you have today. of course, mies and corb and flw and bauhaus is all sentimental as well. go figure.
French, I think the issue for architects is that NU, as adopted by non-architects, is usually using historic "styles" (like Victorian house facades) without realizing that the overall urban forms - pedestrian-scaled streets, less emphasis on cars, etc. - can be achieved with contemporary architecture too.
I suspected something like that. But nothing in the statement logically implies nostalgia, just a logical reflexion on the advantages of density versus sprawl pretty much; of course, "urban places should be framed by architecture and landscape design that celebrate local history, climate, ecology, and building practice" can be interprated in many ways, but it could also simply mean that architects should consider urbanity as an evironment and respect it ? Does it have to be a nostalgic imitation to be respectful?
Or we could just steal the statement, call it "new new urbanism" and make it something better...
French: maybe that many New Urbanist communities are suburbs themselves? For example, The Kentlands is the DC-area's hallmark New Urbanist community, yet it's part of the sprawling suburb of Gaithersburg. One needs to take the Beltway, then the dreaded I-270 to ge there. ug. I would guess that the majority of people who live in The Kentlands commute the 25 miles to DC everyday. OR they continue to perpetuate the nearby office parks in the burbs.
I'm all for enlivening our existing urban environments. Perhaps there need to be two factions: 1) The New Urbanists who contribute to urban sprawl (boo!), and 2) Those who enrich the existing urban fabric of our cities and existing first ring suburbs. (yay!)
Yeah DCA, I read a little about this theory before joining the conversation. And i knew there was something obviously wrong with the application. So how would you keep the good and remove the bad? ( sorry for bad spelling, I just don't spend enough time anymore on archinect and I'm loosing my English...)
well its not against the law to live in a walkable community but still drive to work in a different city is it? perhaps if they had branch offices of the cia, fbi, hud, pentagon etc there, then people could ride their segues to the office and ride back to walk the -insert popular breed of the month- at lunch.
there is nothing wrong with the goals of having walkable, dense, vibrant, urban sutainable, transit-based communities, which new urbanism claims to promote. in fact, most architects (and tons of other people) would agree with these because so much of our country lacks a sustainable urban condition - in every city it's pretty much the mentality that you have to move to suburbs once you have kids. in newer cities like austin and charlotte, most of the young professionals already live in the suburbs, leaving there to be few choices for those who wish to lead a more cosmopolitan urban lifestyle.
the reason most architects don't like new urbanism? (1) it generally is associated with cheesy recreations of historical styles - architectural pastiche - and (2) how it's been implemented so far has been less than stellar - mostly just car-suburbs with the houses closer together and more communal space.
my additional reason to dislike new urbanism that nobody usually mentions: to reach their laudable goals, their mode of operation is to mimic urban forms of the 19th century (i.e. main street, town green, front porches, back alleys, neighborhood school, gridded streets, etc.). this looking back in time to an (as it were) 'ideal' time in our history of urban development totally ignores the realities that the 21st century needs to accomodate, also it bypasses any change for creative innovation in urban form. even if you stuck tons of awesome contemporary buildings in a new urbanist settlement, in its urban form it would still be the equivalent of a neo-georgian plantation house.
the cnu does not imply an architectural style, but the cheesy historical recreations have definitely given them a bad rep [although they have helped forward the basic principles with a broader public- and perhaps in doing so ejected them from more "avant garde" discussions].
i keep teaching it in my classes, insisting that what we should take from it is not the cheesiness but the issues of scale, program, relation to the street, etc. that vado cites above. i find this essay by doug kelbaugh is useful in understanding new urbanism, everyday urbanism a and kool-urbanism, although i think kelbaugh has not looked at some of koolhaas's urban projects that closely. if you look at his bijmermeer proposal, for example, he actually is suggesting some very cnu things like diverse typologies, important buildings in key locations, mixed use, etc.
Front porches make me laugh. I live in an old village with tons of them and most renovations include one wrap-around and I have yet, in 10 years here, to see anyone using their porch. Their only virtue is that they keep the wretched foundation planting from covering the front windows.
For me, the challenge and danger of the new urbanism is that, at heart, it is about identity architecture... the appropriation, mutation, and mass production of a ralph laurenish vision of what 19th century pastoral small town urbanism "might" have been like had cars been around. As such, instead of providing solutions to the problems it purports to address in its manifesto, it simply presents new media on which the wars of race and class conflict rending apart this country can be fought. Look at what happened when DPZ tried to foist their agenda on impoverished communities in the Gulf after Katrina, or the playful but angry response of the Latino (new) Urbanists in southern California, or, on the other side, the maniacal ravings of Kunstler about potential of new urbanism to restore whitebread "American civilization", whatever that means.
i would add to the above criticisms of new urbanism that it applies a blanket approach to all situations. it does not look carefully at the immediate circumstances in which it is applied and therefore does not adequately react to its context. density is not always a good thing. mixed uses is not always a good thing. pedestrian oriented development is not always a good thing. as with modernist master planning, be weary of anything that claims there is one solution to very complex set of issues associated with urbansim.
The fundamental problem with new urbanism is this: it’s touted as a solution for cities, but it’s based on traditional town planning. All of the other aspects of new urbanism (walkable cities, mixed use, higher density, etc.) are admirable. The idea is that new urbanism will replace suburbs. However, if you apply new urbanism to cities, not only do you get rid of the suburbs, but you also lose the complex urban fabric that defines a city. Essentially, new urbanism calls for an agglomeration of miniature towns, each with its own town centre, with all residential development within a ten minute walking distance. The idea is that residents can get their basic needs at their town centre, and will therefore drive less, develop a sense of community, etc, etc. All of this is fine for towns, but is devastating for cities. The fact is, cities and towns are two separate things, and therefore they function differently. One reason that people live in cities is because of the diverse options they have for where they, shop, eat, work, play, etc. With new urbanism, you don’t get a choice; you go to your town centre. In real cities (plain urbanist cities) people are mobile, and can choose where they want to spend their time. Instead of planned town centre neighbourhoods, each person creates their own “neighbourhood” based on where they like to buy groceries, where they work, where they go for coffee, and all those other things. The complex network of these personal “neighbourhoods” is what distinguishes cities from towns, and is the reason why town planning cannot be implemented in cities. Rather than promoting this new and exciting form of non-urban urbanism, I think we should focus simply on urbanism.
P.S. After writing this, I realised that Chase Dammtor mentioned what I have said above. I couldn't agree more.
I agree with jafidler, and would argue that the totality credited by CNU/DPZ (and I do believe to some extent that they're one and the same) to their transect (mix and match templates for every scale) is a very good example of this one-size-fits-all mentality.
It's more than that for me though. I think that the architects behind the new urbanism equate one size fits all in the formal sense to one culture fits all in the sociopolitical sense. I believe strongly that meaning in architecture arises out of a study of theoretical and historical precedents/antecedents and, in the case of NU, its a very disturbing lineage. Even if you insist on stripping away Kunstler's ostensible fascism (his over the top defense of CNU's worst excesses may be excused by his role as one of NU's paid spokespeople), one cannot deny that DPZ, Calthorpe et al were all students of Leon Krier -- who did advocate for formal totality as a legitimate expression of a set of neotraditional political beliefs tied closely to contemporary European conservative/fascist political movements. I'm not saying that calthorpe for one espouses these beliefs (I don't think he does) but nonetheless the HTC links in the literature are pretty clear: Krier + transit planning/American grid = new urbanism.
I remember one conversation I had a couple of years ago about the palmetto bluff project in south Carolina (hart howerton).. Actually a nicely done master plan... The next phase was going to be called Big House Creek or something like that, 'cause referencing southern plantation life evoked just the right nostalgic image of traditional American civic identity! Yeah, ok, whatever.... Just count me out.
I'm not saying that much of what the NU people say isn't valuable, it is. So is much of what the CIAM people said, but stripping away these good pieces of the manifesto from the theory of neotradition totalism and fascism that its spiritual father, Krier, peddled is going to be pretty difficult to do... At least as difficult as prising the value of CIAM away from the very different totality of high Modernisn. And the result wouldn't be called new urbanism anymore. It'll be called something else.
i don't agree necessarily that referring to historic themes is some sort of fascist agenda. i do think that many people regardless of background and personal experience envision a traditional housing typology. and the idea of diversity and race and class is tricky because frankly many minorities are firmly entrenched in the middle and upper middle classes and have the similar american dreams ie schools, yards, suv's, labrador retrievers, etc as the rest of the american dreamers. i guess the question is what alternatives are there? can someone point us in that direction??? what is the messy urbanist doing? also i joined the facebook group so now its cool.
Oh, I don't have a problem with referring to historical themes at all. The issue of concern with Krier, Kunstler, "Prince Charles" et al is not that their aesthetic is historicist but that they see architecture as a means of ordering civic programs (i.e., the standards and rituals by which community life is governed) based on neo-traditional models, that range from being regressive and claustrophobic (in the case of the small rural town) to downright authoritarian (Krier's conceit for Berlin or, in its extreme form, the changes in society assumed by DPZ's full transect). The church or civic center at the head of a series of radial progressions, often on or before a formal open space or parade-ground of some type, almost universally present in NU models, is a case in point.
To aml's point, I know that recently CNU's been saying, in response to criticism, that they don't necessarily peddle neo-traditional architectures and that NU is actually architecture-neutral. Unfortunately, NU practice doesn't reflect this. A typical tactic, which DPZ has mastered and still uses all the time, is to organize a community meeting at which they show pairs of images:-- one shows a neo-traditional (or actually traditional), typically Romantic, architecural form sitting on the street line behind a nice row of sidewalk trees, the other, paired below, shows the same program contained in a featureless tilt-up big box sitting behind a barren parking lot. The DPZ practitioner then goes, "Which do you prefer?" The audience votes for the Victorian, and, voila, the architect goes off to design the neo-traditional version with full confidence that he has "community input"... which proves that CNU is "architecture-neutral"... haha
Unfortunately, if you read the literature of Krier, Kunstler on down to Duany, the words "traditional" "vernacular" "identity" "civic identity" "restoration" etc abound.. and their real intentions are laid pretty bare.
so how do you design a town? can you design a town? apparently the idea of the traditional or the vernacular or identity or civic identity is strong in places where this exists. ie the neighborhood association or the Your town here Historic Society. of course, no one is going to pick the tilt up building with the barren parking lot. you know why? because we all have entirely too much experience with those building types. so, the pendulum swings the other way.
Of course, if one really wanted to force the issue one would demand that traditional building techniques be used and traditional ie real materials instead of fypon, foam, plastic that is used as lip service to traditional building. also, one could argue against any building that is not following period styles properly (of course you'd have to study these styles) to impede any bastardized sentimental pastiche. but, again its complicated as terms like romantic, victorian, traditional get interchanged quite frequently.
Vado, there's a long list of successful non-new urbanist new town developments which the CNU likes to ignore -- check out McHarg's Woodlands TX, deMonchaux's Milton Keynes in the UK, Rouse/Work Group's Columbia, MD, MVRDV's Waterwijk Ypenburg in the Hague NL and Malmo's West Harbor (can't remember who the site planner of that was).
Vado - ' ... but, again its complicated as terms like romantic, victorian, traditional get interchanged quite frequently.'
You're right, it is complicated, but it's complicated because the people using those terms are ignorant of their nuance and context. It's up to architects to educate them.
I'm just skeptical by reflex of anyone's advocacy of the status quo. Just because the dumb civilians don't know what those words mean, that's no excuse for architects to go 'oh hell what's the difference!', too.
well one could argue that designing a non central civic oriented town is no more staged than the new town that looks as though it wasn't designed with these things in mind. hmmmm. one could argue this. and really isn't a city/town about civic organization? why criticize the organization of civic life?
well Vado, if you like that big church in the middle of Ave Maria pictured above, as an expression of civic life, you're welcome to it. Speaking personally, I prefer to see fewer axial progressions and less monumentalism, and less totalitarian assumptions, on the part of the architects, on what my religious and political preferences are.
Here's some construction photos of those incredible civic axes, for Vado's viewing pleasure :)
...parking in the rear, rigidly defined street lines, axial structure, civic identity, vernacular referents, transit stop orientation.. follows all of the NU rules
To be fair, I suspect a lot of that is driven by code, and, following the new urbanist dictat, the parking is behind the buildings off the main blvds.. but still....
ok, Krier is much more respectable than Kunstler. Krier is simply a historicist architect, which, while disagreeable to many of us (including myself) he's an intelligent intellectual with a good eye for design. Kunstler, on the other hand, is a loud-mouth lunatic who has denigrated New Urbanism (not that it was that great to begin with) by attempted to be associated with it.
hehe Chase. On Krier, I don't disagree.. it's a question of degree, although I should note that there's an annual lecture at MIT entitled "The Flatulence of Leon Krier" On Kunstler, NU has embraced Kunstler and Kunstler, NU, so loud mouth as he is, he's become a quasi-official loudmouth.
well if you take the worst examples then yeah it looks horrible. but if you'd have posted say berlage's rendering of his plan of amsterdam which uses a similar methodology people would be warm and fuzzy about it. i'm not disagreeing with you urb, its just that i wonder if the idea of the new town puts its designer behind the 8 ball. the tabula rasa of the new city is hard to pull off...
Thanks Vado, I agree, but one should note that Berlage was not an NU architect and there is no permutation of the new urbanist Traditional Neighborhood Develompent Ordnance or the DPZ transect that underlies it, which could conceivably result in a Berlage district. If you're saying tha New Urbanism is Berlage, then I love New Urbanism, but, alas, the doyens of NU would've exiled Berlage as quickly as they would've banished Sert & CIAM.
right, im just sayin he used similar tenets promoted by new urbanism. also, as far as the facebook group goes people on there seem to question the same issues we are talking about here.
And what is up with this rampant fear of religion? Seriously. Its not cute or funny. It just makes you look ignorant and bigoted. So the Domino's guy is catholic and wanted to make Ave Maria. Give it a rest. Some people in this world have beliefs that are different than yours. They think you're just as stupid as you think they are. Get over it.
the traditional certainly IS rammed down the throats of all who try to be involved with work in a new urbanist development. try being the architect for, say, a firehouse in a dpz project. their project architect sends you a drawing of what it will look like, down to the doric column diameters, and you have to duplicate it. if you don't get it quite right, you don't get the development's planning approval.
and rf, i don't think it's fear of religion. it's fear of a precedent: a place in which ONE way of life is favored over others. are we ok with towns that bill themselves as baptist, jewish, and muslim, too? once that ball gets rolling, we'll all retreat to our own little bastions of religion or non-religion.
npc, its not so much about Ave Maria as much as its just something I've noticed in general here. I just get fed up with it. I'm not pointing any fingers. I'm just sick of seeing it and not seeing anyone call it out.
Yeah, y'all should definitely check out the facebook group and read some of the discussions there. They're pretty lively and they're arguing about these exact issues.
rfuller, for the record, I consider myself to be an observant Christian. My issues with New Urbanism in particular, and what I call Identity Urbanism in general, has nothing to do with religion.. but rather what is and isn't appropriate for civic architecture/urban design in this country. I believe that NU is about identity politics, as much as anything else, and that as such it divides instead of unites people. There is a role for vernacular identity in architecture, but entire towns and communities are the wrong scale to express such identity. And NO identity (or Traditional Neighborhood Development Ordinance) has a monopoly on good urban form... despite what the Kunstler's and Duany's of the world say. I don't see the point of urbanism if it isn't to build inclusive communities, which appeal to a consensus that reflects the socioeconomic and political diversity of our country. Modernism at least aspired to such universality (even if it failed to achieve it). NU simply repudiates it. And as such, it deserves to be repudiated.
Vado, I'm a member of the following facebook arch groups.. dunno if any of 'em are any good:
Urban and Infrastructure Development ▪ Landscape Ecology ▪ Urban Ecology ▪ USGBC ▪ Urban Land Institute ▪ Urban Planning ▪ Green Architecture: How It Should Be ▪ The 2010 Imperative: Sustainable design ▪ Eco-Design + Sustainable Architecture Aficionados ▪ American Planning Association
Don't really have time to really participate, but I plan to look at 'em more often.
Urbanist, for the record, I wasn't pointing any fingers. I don't really take the time to scroll back up and see who's doing it. I just got sick of not seeing anyone say something when it happens (with pretty amazing frequency). I consider myself a Methodist with Presbyterian tendencies. That has very little to do with why I don't like seeing it. I just get fed up with any kind of intolerance, be it racial, religious, sexist, et. al. I would like to reiterate that I wasn't pointing fingers here. Most of it is in jest from what I can tell. I just get sick of it. It's more of a "seriously, that joke's not funny anymore" kind of attitude I have more than anything.
I'm a little vague on where you're getting this division from. And I'm also not sure if you're saying that NU repudiates universality or modernism. (Forgive me, I'm tired.) Even if it does repudiate either of those, I don't understand why it would merit repudiating NU.
*****Just so we're clear here, I'm asking these questions humbly. I'm trying to incite discussion, not a flame war. There is absolutely no trace of animosity on my end. Just looking for an intellectual discussion. I'm also not saying there is anything different on your end. I just want to make this very clear before there is a misunderstanding. I've been having problems today with people on other boards (i.e. not the 'Nect) not being able to read my tone of voice.*****
architectural flatulence and facebook
OK.. I just found a big facebook group
Facebookers for New Urbanism
The world is coming to an end. Help!
Ha ha, how big?
367 members.. which is pretty big for an arch-related facebook group.. ugh. Can't we send these kids to a reeducation camp or something?
Interesting. I tried to convince my geography class that New Urbanism is the worst idea in the world, but they wouldn't listen. Maybe they all joined this facebook group just to spite me.
Maybe I should start an Old Urbanism Facebook group.
what's so bad about new urbanism? not trying to be snide, but it's something i'm not terribly familiar with and it seems that a lot people bash it here without really explaining why.
i see it as a reference to hyper-architecture, created by constant. check out his book "new babylon, the hyper-architecture of desire". its a book out of the 60's ish era a la archigram and superstudio. very cool read. i really enjoyed it (even though it did take my head too far out of reality, but i believe!!!)
what's wrong with Neu Urbanism? Celebration and Seaside? The Truman Show. that is if i knew what i was talking about...
--Sounds like CNU is concerned with all the issues that are continually bitched about on this forum. Like any other ism, there are honest and devoted practitioners and those who use the ism as a marketing tool. My guess is that people on this forum probably see a gabled roof and break out in a cold sweat. Not every design problem requires the shining instant icon with a hole in it.---
The Congress for the New Urbanism views disinvestment in central cities, the spread of placeless sprawl, increasing separation by race and income, environmental deterioration, loss of agricultural lands and wilderness, and the erosion of society's built heritage as one interrelated community-building challenge.
We stand for the restoration of existing urban centers and towns within coherent metropolitan regions, the reconfiguration of sprawling suburbs into communities of real neighborhoods and diverse districts, the conservation of natural environments, and the preservation of our built legacy.
We recognize that physical solutions by themselves will not solve social and economic problems, but neither can economic vitality, community stability, and environmental health be sustained without a coherent and supportive physical framework.
We advocate the restructuring of public policy and development practices to support the following principles: neighborhoods should be diverse in use and population; communities should be designed for the pedestrian and transit as well as the car; cities and towns should be shaped by physically defined and universally accessible public spaces and community institutions; urban places should be framed by architecture and landscape design that celebrate local history, climate, ecology, and building practice.
We represent a broad-based citizenry, composed of public and private sector leaders, community activists, and multidisciplinary professionals. We are committed to reestablishing the relationship between the art of building and the making of community, through citizen-based participatory planning and design.
We dedicate ourselves to reclaiming our homes, blocks, streets, parks, neighborhoods, districts, towns, cities, regions, and environment.
Thanks for this clear definition Vado.
So it does sound like a great statement doesn't it? Why is everybody against it? Is there a catch, a trap, a hidden political agenda that I'm not aware of?
prolly the issue of sentimentality. the white pickett fence, manicured lawn front porch americana that may or may not have existed. of course, along with that americana of the past you had all the all the social problems that you have today. of course, mies and corb and flw and bauhaus is all sentimental as well. go figure.
French, I think the issue for architects is that NU, as adopted by non-architects, is usually using historic "styles" (like Victorian house facades) without realizing that the overall urban forms - pedestrian-scaled streets, less emphasis on cars, etc. - can be achieved with contemporary architecture too.
Hmm, I'm not stating this very well. Anyone else?
vado, please explain w/o the attitude, because I think your point is right on.
I suspected something like that. But nothing in the statement logically implies nostalgia, just a logical reflexion on the advantages of density versus sprawl pretty much; of course, "urban places should be framed by architecture and landscape design that celebrate local history, climate, ecology, and building practice" can be interprated in many ways, but it could also simply mean that architects should consider urbanity as an evironment and respect it ? Does it have to be a nostalgic imitation to be respectful?
Or we could just steal the statement, call it "new new urbanism" and make it something better...
French: maybe that many New Urbanist communities are suburbs themselves? For example, The Kentlands is the DC-area's hallmark New Urbanist community, yet it's part of the sprawling suburb of Gaithersburg. One needs to take the Beltway, then the dreaded I-270 to ge there. ug. I would guess that the majority of people who live in The Kentlands commute the 25 miles to DC everyday. OR they continue to perpetuate the nearby office parks in the burbs.
I'm all for enlivening our existing urban environments. Perhaps there need to be two factions: 1) The New Urbanists who contribute to urban sprawl (boo!), and 2) Those who enrich the existing urban fabric of our cities and existing first ring suburbs. (yay!)
Yeah DCA, I read a little about this theory before joining the conversation. And i knew there was something obviously wrong with the application. So how would you keep the good and remove the bad? ( sorry for bad spelling, I just don't spend enough time anymore on archinect and I'm loosing my English...)
well its not against the law to live in a walkable community but still drive to work in a different city is it? perhaps if they had branch offices of the cia, fbi, hud, pentagon etc there, then people could ride their segues to the office and ride back to walk the -insert popular breed of the month- at lunch.
there is nothing wrong with the goals of having walkable, dense, vibrant, urban sutainable, transit-based communities, which new urbanism claims to promote. in fact, most architects (and tons of other people) would agree with these because so much of our country lacks a sustainable urban condition - in every city it's pretty much the mentality that you have to move to suburbs once you have kids. in newer cities like austin and charlotte, most of the young professionals already live in the suburbs, leaving there to be few choices for those who wish to lead a more cosmopolitan urban lifestyle.
the reason most architects don't like new urbanism? (1) it generally is associated with cheesy recreations of historical styles - architectural pastiche - and (2) how it's been implemented so far has been less than stellar - mostly just car-suburbs with the houses closer together and more communal space.
my additional reason to dislike new urbanism that nobody usually mentions: to reach their laudable goals, their mode of operation is to mimic urban forms of the 19th century (i.e. main street, town green, front porches, back alleys, neighborhood school, gridded streets, etc.). this looking back in time to an (as it were) 'ideal' time in our history of urban development totally ignores the realities that the 21st century needs to accomodate, also it bypasses any change for creative innovation in urban form. even if you stuck tons of awesome contemporary buildings in a new urbanist settlement, in its urban form it would still be the equivalent of a neo-georgian plantation house.
the cnu does not imply an architectural style, but the cheesy historical recreations have definitely given them a bad rep [although they have helped forward the basic principles with a broader public- and perhaps in doing so ejected them from more "avant garde" discussions].
i keep teaching it in my classes, insisting that what we should take from it is not the cheesiness but the issues of scale, program, relation to the street, etc. that vado cites above. i find this essay by doug kelbaugh is useful in understanding new urbanism, everyday urbanism a and kool-urbanism, although i think kelbaugh has not looked at some of koolhaas's urban projects that closely. if you look at his bijmermeer proposal, for example, he actually is suggesting some very cnu things like diverse typologies, important buildings in key locations, mixed use, etc.
Front porches make me laugh. I live in an old village with tons of them and most renovations include one wrap-around and I have yet, in 10 years here, to see anyone using their porch. Their only virtue is that they keep the wretched foundation planting from covering the front windows.
For me, the challenge and danger of the new urbanism is that, at heart, it is about identity architecture... the appropriation, mutation, and mass production of a ralph laurenish vision of what 19th century pastoral small town urbanism "might" have been like had cars been around. As such, instead of providing solutions to the problems it purports to address in its manifesto, it simply presents new media on which the wars of race and class conflict rending apart this country can be fought. Look at what happened when DPZ tried to foist their agenda on impoverished communities in the Gulf after Katrina, or the playful but angry response of the Latino (new) Urbanists in southern California, or, on the other side, the maniacal ravings of Kunstler about potential of new urbanism to restore whitebread "American civilization", whatever that means.
i would add to the above criticisms of new urbanism that it applies a blanket approach to all situations. it does not look carefully at the immediate circumstances in which it is applied and therefore does not adequately react to its context. density is not always a good thing. mixed uses is not always a good thing. pedestrian oriented development is not always a good thing. as with modernist master planning, be weary of anything that claims there is one solution to very complex set of issues associated with urbansim.
The fundamental problem with new urbanism is this: it’s touted as a solution for cities, but it’s based on traditional town planning. All of the other aspects of new urbanism (walkable cities, mixed use, higher density, etc.) are admirable. The idea is that new urbanism will replace suburbs. However, if you apply new urbanism to cities, not only do you get rid of the suburbs, but you also lose the complex urban fabric that defines a city. Essentially, new urbanism calls for an agglomeration of miniature towns, each with its own town centre, with all residential development within a ten minute walking distance. The idea is that residents can get their basic needs at their town centre, and will therefore drive less, develop a sense of community, etc, etc. All of this is fine for towns, but is devastating for cities. The fact is, cities and towns are two separate things, and therefore they function differently. One reason that people live in cities is because of the diverse options they have for where they, shop, eat, work, play, etc. With new urbanism, you don’t get a choice; you go to your town centre. In real cities (plain urbanist cities) people are mobile, and can choose where they want to spend their time. Instead of planned town centre neighbourhoods, each person creates their own “neighbourhood” based on where they like to buy groceries, where they work, where they go for coffee, and all those other things. The complex network of these personal “neighbourhoods” is what distinguishes cities from towns, and is the reason why town planning cannot be implemented in cities. Rather than promoting this new and exciting form of non-urban urbanism, I think we should focus simply on urbanism.
P.S. After writing this, I realised that Chase Dammtor mentioned what I have said above. I couldn't agree more.
I agree with jafidler, and would argue that the totality credited by CNU/DPZ (and I do believe to some extent that they're one and the same) to their transect (mix and match templates for every scale) is a very good example of this one-size-fits-all mentality.
It's more than that for me though. I think that the architects behind the new urbanism equate one size fits all in the formal sense to one culture fits all in the sociopolitical sense. I believe strongly that meaning in architecture arises out of a study of theoretical and historical precedents/antecedents and, in the case of NU, its a very disturbing lineage. Even if you insist on stripping away Kunstler's ostensible fascism (his over the top defense of CNU's worst excesses may be excused by his role as one of NU's paid spokespeople), one cannot deny that DPZ, Calthorpe et al were all students of Leon Krier -- who did advocate for formal totality as a legitimate expression of a set of neotraditional political beliefs tied closely to contemporary European conservative/fascist political movements. I'm not saying that calthorpe for one espouses these beliefs (I don't think he does) but nonetheless the HTC links in the literature are pretty clear: Krier + transit planning/American grid = new urbanism.
I remember one conversation I had a couple of years ago about the palmetto bluff project in south Carolina (hart howerton).. Actually a nicely done master plan... The next phase was going to be called Big House Creek or something like that, 'cause referencing southern plantation life evoked just the right nostalgic image of traditional American civic identity! Yeah, ok, whatever.... Just count me out.
I'm not saying that much of what the NU people say isn't valuable, it is. So is much of what the CIAM people said, but stripping away these good pieces of the manifesto from the theory of neotradition totalism and fascism that its spiritual father, Krier, peddled is going to be pretty difficult to do... At least as difficult as prising the value of CIAM away from the very different totality of high Modernisn. And the result wouldn't be called new urbanism anymore. It'll be called something else.
i don't agree necessarily that referring to historic themes is some sort of fascist agenda. i do think that many people regardless of background and personal experience envision a traditional housing typology. and the idea of diversity and race and class is tricky because frankly many minorities are firmly entrenched in the middle and upper middle classes and have the similar american dreams ie schools, yards, suv's, labrador retrievers, etc as the rest of the american dreamers. i guess the question is what alternatives are there? can someone point us in that direction??? what is the messy urbanist doing? also i joined the facebook group so now its cool.
Oh, I don't have a problem with referring to historical themes at all. The issue of concern with Krier, Kunstler, "Prince Charles" et al is not that their aesthetic is historicist but that they see architecture as a means of ordering civic programs (i.e., the standards and rituals by which community life is governed) based on neo-traditional models, that range from being regressive and claustrophobic (in the case of the small rural town) to downright authoritarian (Krier's conceit for Berlin or, in its extreme form, the changes in society assumed by DPZ's full transect). The church or civic center at the head of a series of radial progressions, often on or before a formal open space or parade-ground of some type, almost universally present in NU models, is a case in point.
To aml's point, I know that recently CNU's been saying, in response to criticism, that they don't necessarily peddle neo-traditional architectures and that NU is actually architecture-neutral. Unfortunately, NU practice doesn't reflect this. A typical tactic, which DPZ has mastered and still uses all the time, is to organize a community meeting at which they show pairs of images:-- one shows a neo-traditional (or actually traditional), typically Romantic, architecural form sitting on the street line behind a nice row of sidewalk trees, the other, paired below, shows the same program contained in a featureless tilt-up big box sitting behind a barren parking lot. The DPZ practitioner then goes, "Which do you prefer?" The audience votes for the Victorian, and, voila, the architect goes off to design the neo-traditional version with full confidence that he has "community input"... which proves that CNU is "architecture-neutral"... haha
Unfortunately, if you read the literature of Krier, Kunstler on down to Duany, the words "traditional" "vernacular" "identity" "civic identity" "restoration" etc abound.. and their real intentions are laid pretty bare.
so how do you design a town? can you design a town? apparently the idea of the traditional or the vernacular or identity or civic identity is strong in places where this exists. ie the neighborhood association or the Your town here Historic Society. of course, no one is going to pick the tilt up building with the barren parking lot. you know why? because we all have entirely too much experience with those building types. so, the pendulum swings the other way.
Of course, if one really wanted to force the issue one would demand that traditional building techniques be used and traditional ie real materials instead of fypon, foam, plastic that is used as lip service to traditional building. also, one could argue against any building that is not following period styles properly (of course you'd have to study these styles) to impede any bastardized sentimental pastiche. but, again its complicated as terms like romantic, victorian, traditional get interchanged quite frequently.
Let's consider some illustrations:
axial centrality of civic programs
or Seaside, FL (civic centrality)
or worse, Ave Maria, FL (religious centrality)
desired diversity of residents [Ave Maria]:
I rest my case :)
Vado, there's a long list of successful non-new urbanist new town developments which the CNU likes to ignore -- check out McHarg's Woodlands TX, deMonchaux's Milton Keynes in the UK, Rouse/Work Group's Columbia, MD, MVRDV's Waterwijk Ypenburg in the Hague NL and Malmo's West Harbor (can't remember who the site planner of that was).
Vado - ' ... but, again its complicated as terms like romantic, victorian, traditional get interchanged quite frequently.'
You're right, it is complicated, but it's complicated because the people using those terms are ignorant of their nuance and context. It's up to architects to educate them.
I'm just skeptical by reflex of anyone's advocacy of the status quo. Just because the dumb civilians don't know what those words mean, that's no excuse for architects to go 'oh hell what's the difference!', too.
well one could argue that designing a non central civic oriented town is no more staged than the new town that looks as though it wasn't designed with these things in mind. hmmmm. one could argue this. and really isn't a city/town about civic organization? why criticize the organization of civic life?
well Vado, if you like that big church in the middle of Ave Maria pictured above, as an expression of civic life, you're welcome to it. Speaking personally, I prefer to see fewer axial progressions and less monumentalism, and less totalitarian assumptions, on the part of the architects, on what my religious and political preferences are.
i'm not afraid of churches and i'm an athiest.
Here's some construction photos of those incredible civic axes, for Vado's viewing pleasure :)
...parking in the rear, rigidly defined street lines, axial structure, civic identity, vernacular referents, transit stop orientation.. follows all of the NU rules
Look at all the fucking parking.
Just look at all the fucking parking!
Urbanistically speaking we're all going to hell, Ave Maria residents included.
That's a fantastic image, Urbanist - thanks for posting it.
"I live in a strip mall!"
To be fair, I suspect a lot of that is driven by code, and, following the new urbanist dictat, the parking is behind the buildings off the main blvds.. but still....
ok, Krier is much more respectable than Kunstler. Krier is simply a historicist architect, which, while disagreeable to many of us (including myself) he's an intelligent intellectual with a good eye for design. Kunstler, on the other hand, is a loud-mouth lunatic who has denigrated New Urbanism (not that it was that great to begin with) by attempted to be associated with it.
*attempting
damn i should proofread
hehe Chase. On Krier, I don't disagree.. it's a question of degree, although I should note that there's an annual lecture at MIT entitled "The Flatulence of Leon Krier" On Kunstler, NU has embraced Kunstler and Kunstler, NU, so loud mouth as he is, he's become a quasi-official loudmouth.
well if you take the worst examples then yeah it looks horrible. but if you'd have posted say berlage's rendering of his plan of amsterdam which uses a similar methodology people would be warm and fuzzy about it. i'm not disagreeing with you urb, its just that i wonder if the idea of the new town puts its designer behind the 8 ball. the tabula rasa of the new city is hard to pull off...
Thanks Vado, I agree, but one should note that Berlage was not an NU architect and there is no permutation of the new urbanist Traditional Neighborhood Develompent Ordnance or the DPZ transect that underlies it, which could conceivably result in a Berlage district. If you're saying tha New Urbanism is Berlage, then I love New Urbanism, but, alas, the doyens of NU would've exiled Berlage as quickly as they would've banished Sert & CIAM.
right, im just sayin he used similar tenets promoted by new urbanism. also, as far as the facebook group goes people on there seem to question the same issues we are talking about here.
oh and is there a facebook group on urbanism that you can recommend?
I don't think Krier would have anything but scorn for Ave Maria.
Vado, I'm behind you on this one.
And what is up with this rampant fear of religion? Seriously. Its not cute or funny. It just makes you look ignorant and bigoted. So the Domino's guy is catholic and wanted to make Ave Maria. Give it a rest. Some people in this world have beliefs that are different than yours. They think you're just as stupid as you think they are. Get over it.
the traditional certainly IS rammed down the throats of all who try to be involved with work in a new urbanist development. try being the architect for, say, a firehouse in a dpz project. their project architect sends you a drawing of what it will look like, down to the doric column diameters, and you have to duplicate it. if you don't get it quite right, you don't get the development's planning approval.
and rf, i don't think it's fear of religion. it's fear of a precedent: a place in which ONE way of life is favored over others. are we ok with towns that bill themselves as baptist, jewish, and muslim, too? once that ball gets rolling, we'll all retreat to our own little bastions of religion or non-religion.
npc, its not so much about Ave Maria as much as its just something I've noticed in general here. I just get fed up with it. I'm not pointing any fingers. I'm just sick of seeing it and not seeing anyone call it out.
Yeah, y'all should definitely check out the facebook group and read some of the discussions there. They're pretty lively and they're arguing about these exact issues.
rfuller, for the record, I consider myself to be an observant Christian. My issues with New Urbanism in particular, and what I call Identity Urbanism in general, has nothing to do with religion.. but rather what is and isn't appropriate for civic architecture/urban design in this country. I believe that NU is about identity politics, as much as anything else, and that as such it divides instead of unites people. There is a role for vernacular identity in architecture, but entire towns and communities are the wrong scale to express such identity. And NO identity (or Traditional Neighborhood Development Ordinance) has a monopoly on good urban form... despite what the Kunstler's and Duany's of the world say. I don't see the point of urbanism if it isn't to build inclusive communities, which appeal to a consensus that reflects the socioeconomic and political diversity of our country. Modernism at least aspired to such universality (even if it failed to achieve it). NU simply repudiates it. And as such, it deserves to be repudiated.
Vado, I'm a member of the following facebook arch groups.. dunno if any of 'em are any good:
Urban and Infrastructure Development ▪ Landscape Ecology ▪ Urban Ecology ▪ USGBC ▪ Urban Land Institute ▪ Urban Planning ▪ Green Architecture: How It Should Be ▪ The 2010 Imperative: Sustainable design ▪ Eco-Design + Sustainable Architecture Aficionados ▪ American Planning Association
Don't really have time to really participate, but I plan to look at 'em more often.
Urbanist, for the record, I wasn't pointing any fingers. I don't really take the time to scroll back up and see who's doing it. I just got sick of not seeing anyone say something when it happens (with pretty amazing frequency). I consider myself a Methodist with Presbyterian tendencies. That has very little to do with why I don't like seeing it. I just get fed up with any kind of intolerance, be it racial, religious, sexist, et. al. I would like to reiterate that I wasn't pointing fingers here. Most of it is in jest from what I can tell. I just get sick of it. It's more of a "seriously, that joke's not funny anymore" kind of attitude I have more than anything.
I'm a little vague on where you're getting this division from. And I'm also not sure if you're saying that NU repudiates universality or modernism. (Forgive me, I'm tired.) Even if it does repudiate either of those, I don't understand why it would merit repudiating NU.
*****Just so we're clear here, I'm asking these questions humbly. I'm trying to incite discussion, not a flame war. There is absolutely no trace of animosity on my end. Just looking for an intellectual discussion. I'm also not saying there is anything different on your end. I just want to make this very clear before there is a misunderstanding. I've been having problems today with people on other boards (i.e. not the 'Nect) not being able to read my tone of voice.*****
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