For generations, government policies have been geared toward creating endless landscapes of strip malls... In the process we have gutted our traditional downtowns. We have eaten up farmland and forest. We have, as Nate Berg reported this week, endangered the lives of our senior citizens. We have engineered a world where children cannot walk or bike to school without risking their lives. We have created countless places devoid of any real social value. — theatlanticcities.com
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the quote from the man (pictured) running for congress is amazing "I’m at a beautiful, beautiful strip mall in Oakland County. It’s one of the most beautiful strip malls I’ve seen. I like it. It’s got character. I like to call it Neoclassical, but I’m not an architect....[In the 11th District] you see vacant properties everywhere you look. This is the product of an economy that is manipulated, controlled, and over-regulated by the federal government." in it's ignorance regarding style/aesthetics but also the politics and policy points! Also interesting to note that a conservative goes on to argue why is he wrong...
I like this ending from the writer the best.
Watching Bentivolio stand in that parking lot, mourning this vacant strip mall, just made me sad. Is bringing this zombie infrastructure back to life really the best that we can imagine?
it's its
"An opinion is like an asshole, everybody has one".
I have often struggled with the question of what makes one persons opinion more valid than anothers? People like what they like and the truth of the matter is it would not be right to denigrate others likes and dislikes simply because we disagree with them.
HOWEVER, that said maybe the proper course of action is, assuming ones audience is open to being educated, to explain why the building in question is ugly and unworthy of praise. It would also be interesting to ask the designers of these "buildings" what is their assessment of them. Perhaps they would admit that the results were "less than hoped for" and they were simply giving the owners what they wanted? At any rate I'm sure most architects would agree the building that Bentivolio thinks is "Beautiful" is one of the most horrific examples of Post Modern architecture to be found (and yes I know many would say all of Post Modern architecture is horrific, so let's not go there).
Maybe through great effort we as architects and designers can educate those who wish to learn why certain designs are more preferable than others. But then there's the issue of cost, so maybe not.
Call me Don Quixote.
Oh, that is a beautiful strip mall. I agree with the man, really, it's one of the best.
If you really want to get to the root of zombie infrastructure then you need to start looking at zombie money and zombie banks. The scary thing is that all of these zombies are really just the endpoint of the economic growth paradigm that we all cling to. Our entire financial and political system is nearing its endpoint and now beginning to eat itself alive.
From Ilargi at TAE:
Last year I started to label the money used to allow zombie banks to continue to extend and pretend, zombie money. It's conjured up out of thin air, the thinnest air on the planet. The only thing that serves as collateral is the future taxability of the future citizens of bankrupt nations.
In the end, the only truth that remains, though people are seemingly completely blind to it, is this:
The banks that are kept alive with the zombie money will use it to do what they will - rightfully, in the present economic model - see as the most profitable thing to do: bet against, and ultimately bring down, the very system that has "saved" them. This is how perverted the entire scheme has become. The money taken from you by your "leaders" will be, and already is, used to bring you to your knees.
Yo.
At any rate I'm sure most architects would agree the building that Bentivolio thinks is "Beautiful" is one of the most horrific examples of Post Modern architecture to be found (and yes I know many would say all of Post Modern architecture is horrific, so let's not go there).
it's not so much the building itself (which actually is pretty well detailed for what it is), but this particular building typology in it's "urban" context is one of the most horrific examples of our current planning and economic policies. If you've worked any length of time you are going to have to eventually grapple with some sort of auto-orientated development.
so - what are you going to do - put the lot in front or in back? even if it was clad in some cutting-edge facade covered in vertical gardens, it's still a f-ing strip mall that people drive to.
I agree. These are the buildings that modern automobile-centric city planning has spawned.
Regarding the architectural manifestation of the building type, this is what you get when you ask architects with no training in traditional architectural languages (and probably no real deep interest in it, either) to design traditional buildings.
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