Category Archives: Places

Linking crime rates to poor urban design

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The possible effects that urban design has on human behavior is an interesting, cross-disciplinary field of study. In the pages of the Jerusalem Post, an architect and town planner calls for better urban design in order to reduce crime rates:

But the crime problem will not be resolved through increased police forces alone. The function of police is to apprehend criminals, but they can in no major way create or foster security by eliminating the conditions in which most crime breeds.
Also obvious to all is that a panicky response to the problem – clearly evident in the government’s actions in the case of Lod – is unsuitable and sure to prove wasteful. Needed is a far deeper understanding of the roots of the problem, including its social, economic and moral aspects, such as inequality. One important factor, not well enough understood, is simply the physical environment.

Architecture can encourage encounter or help prevent it. Certain kinds of buildings and spatial layouts favor criminal activity. Knowing how to identify problem areas in existing environments, understanding why they have become dangerous, then prescribing corrective measures is essential. Knowing how to create safe new environments, at least avoiding the many pitfalls leading to the creation of dangerous spaces, is the other side of the coin. While architecture admittedly operates more in the area of influence than control, it can be an important step toward preventing crime…

With our rapidly expanding population and limited land reserves, urban renewal and the creation of new medium- to high-density, large-scale housing developments, most difficult challenges have become an urgent necessity. The time has come for the existing professional literature on environmental sociology and psychology – practically unknown or systematically ignored here for so many years – to be given the serious attention and respect it deserves.

These are interesting claims: a certain kind of urban design will reduce crime rates and is a better response (or more measured approach) than panicked crack-downs on crime. This sort of argument is not uncommon: New Urbanists make claims about community life based on their planning principles. Several full communities as well as a number of smaller developments have been built with these particular principles that are intended to counter the sterile life of suburban sprawl. Similar claims have also been made in the United States. Not too long ago, in the era of public housing high-rises, it could often be heard that such buildings prompted more crime. The counter-argument was that plenty of wealthy people live in high-rises without much crime, a contrast that could clearly be drawn in cities like Chicago where public housing high-rises and wealthy high-rises were within sight of each other.

In American discussions of this topic, the conversation often turns to Jane Jacob’s The Death and Life of Great American Cities. In this book, Jacob makes an argument for “eyes on the street” in order to ensure a vibrant and safe community. By this, she meant that a certain number of people, resident, shop owners, walkers, and others are on the street throughout the day, signaling to people that the neighborhood is watching.

I would be curious to know: how many urban sociologists today would suggest that particular urban designs or principles are key factors in reducing crime or anti-social behaviors? While architects and planners make this argument (perhaps to illustrate the important social consequences of their work), how much research supports this claim?

How to respond to the demise of Borders

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With negative business news about the bookstore Borders, a number of commentators have weighed in with opinions about how to respond. On one hand, Borders is a big box bookstore that helped push independent and smaller bookstores out of business. On the other hand, the demise of Borders suggests that bookstores in general are on the way out in favor of online retailers.

Chicago Tribune columnist Mary Schmich writes about how the closing of the Borders store on Michigan Avenue in Chicago affects the shopping district:

By Saturday, Borders’ marquee Chicago store, at 830 N. Michigan Ave., will be closed for good. And — here’s what I think is the real news — the city’s premier shopping street will be without any bookstore for the first time in decades…

Borders was hardly a landmark on par with the old limestone Water Tower that stands just outside the store’s windowed walls. It had occupied its prime corner for only 16 years, barely a blip in Chicago history.

But 16 years is half an eternity in retail time, and Borders had come to seem as basic to the street as traffic.

Back in 1995, when it opened, spinning through its revolving doors was like stepping into a literary Oz, a unique place that, even though part of a chain, pulsed with ideas, people, cappuccino.

Even people who sniffled that it was killing smaller bookstores — most memorably the cozy shop just up the street run by the legendary Stuart Brent — came for the books and the buzz.

I myself have spent a good amount of time in this store, browsing books and music. This location was a nice change of pace from the typical retail store (clothing, in particular), a place to get out of the heat or the cold, watch people go by on Michigan Avenue, and enjoy browsing.

Instapundit provides a different perspective. After some comments about how Borders leftist leanings might have driven some customers away, Instapundit quotes an email from a reader who cites the irony of people lamenting the end of Borders:

Is this — like much of the newspaper industry — a case of the leftist 20% of the populace chasing a way a lot of potential customers over politics? Or is it mostly just technology and convenience?

STILL MORE: Reader Gary Rice has thoughts on the sudden onslaught of Borders-nostalgia:

Re; Borders…. Wasn’t it just a few years ago that Borders and Barnes & Noble were the bad guys? Corporate behemoths destroying the local independent bookstore with their Wal Mart like pricing models ? Wasn’t there even a Tom Hanks romance movie about this exact subject?

So Amazon comes along with a better pricing model and now we are all supposed to mourn liberal Borders’ demise? It is a wonder these people remember how to read, because they sure can’t remember anything else….

Heh.

A good point: can we lament the end of Borders today after criticizing it for over a decade? Perhaps we can: bookstores could be considered “third places,” a middle location between home and work where citizens could gather to read the news, talk to each other, and shop. I suspect there will always be people who like going to bookstores (I will still enjoy it though I’m not sure I would go out of my way to go there) but perhaps they simply can’t survive on the scale and size of a Borders or Barnes & Noble.

These sorts of strange juxtapositions may one major marker of our globalized and fast-paced economy. Do we want any bookstore or a big box bookstore or an online bookstore or an independent bookstore? People vote with their dollars and visits and within twenty years, the entire landscape can change.

But I doubt we would see the same kind of mourning if Walmart suddenly went out of business in favor of online retailers. There is something unique here about bookstores.

Efforts to revive local shopping malls; how about an ice skating rink?

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The recent economic downturn has severely affected many retailers, especially shopping malls. One local mall, Charlestowne Mall in St. Charles, has been hit particularly hard and is looking for ways to bring in more shoppers. One idea: build an ice skating rink.

Barring an eleventh-hour change of heart, 94 employees at the Sears store at Charlestowne Mall in St. Charles will lose their jobs in two months. But the mall management and city officials hope to coax the retail giant to stay.

And the city and mall owners see hope in new business coming to Charlestowne, including an ice arena…

There might be reasons to be optimistic about the mall. Anchor stores Kohl’s and Von Maur both own the property they operate, making them less likely to leave. Aiston said the mall also disclosed it’s in negotiations to bring two or three new businesses to the mall, including a restaurant.

In addition, the mall may soon have a new headline attraction. Aiston and Kekatos said the city is reviewing plans the mall owners submitted to build an 18,000-square-foot ice arena at the mall to revive foot traffic.

“What I really want the public to know is our new ownership is fabulous,” Kekatos said. “You have to remember it’s only been going on seven months since they’ve purchased the mall. We’re updating the interior and the exterior of the mall. The community, the people in it, they just don’t understand that it takes time to do all this.”

This seems to be a common strategy for shopping malls: attract new kinds of businesses that will bring in a steady flow of potential shoppers. The restaurant strategy has been a common one – it moves malls beyond the world of the shopping mall food court with its quick food and may bring in a crowd with more time and money. But bringing in a shopping rink hints at another area of potential uses: recreational uses. Could the shopping malls of the future include things like ice skating rinks, gyms, climbing walls, and more? If so, this could help further transform malls from shopping spaces to community centers.

It is also interesting that the quest for developers and mall owners to add uses to shopping malls mirrors the efforts of many downtowns who have also been interested in increasing foot traffic. Of course, the shopping mall is often blamed for helping to kill off many downtowns but perhaps they are both now in the same boat. Are there enough retail and recreational and restaurant businesses to fill all of the space in shopping malls and downtowns?

Naperville’s ongoing problem with 1 homeless man

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Naperville in the last decade has been a celebrated place: named one of the best places to live in the country plus a growing population plus a vibrant suburban downtown. But one homeless man has created an ongoing set of issues:

A Naperville psychologist and others asked the Naperville City Council Tuesday to do more about what they say is continued harassment from protester and squatter Scott Huber.

Kathy Borchardt, a clinical child psychologist who is suing Huber after a 2010 confrontation that resulted in disorderly conduct and criminal trespassing charges against him, said she was frustrated more has not been done to stop Huber’s infringement on business owner’s rights.

“This sort of bullying behavior by Mr. Huber has given him more power in this community than any business owner or official,” she said, adding that an ordinance passed by the council banning camping on sidewalks in the downtown area caused Huber to move outside her business, leading to the confrontation.

Huber frequently sets up a makeshift, mobile protest site on Ogden Avenue and in other areas of the city with signs calling for the boycott of Borchardt’s practice and claims about her ethics…

City Attorney Margo Ely said the encampment ordinance that was put in place was a legal remedy the city thought would hold up if challenged in court. Expanding the ordinance to the entire city — instead of just its downtown — or establishing “free speech zones” would be a lot less likely to withstand a legal challenge. She also cautioned that the city cannot act to limit the free speech of an individual.

Councilman Bob Fieseler said the issue could be handled immediately by enforcing laws on the books giving the city the right to confiscate property left unattended on public sidewalks…

But Police Chief Dave Dial said he — nor patrol officers — have seen Huber blocking walkways or leaving his property unattended.

This story has been going on for quite a while now. This is not an issue – a homeless man creating trouble – that typically plagues suburbs but Naperville is no normal suburb due to its size plus affluence.

Throughout the coverage of this case, I don’t remember reading about efforts by the City of Naperville or Naperville citizens to help this man stay off the streets (beyond city efforts to enforce or create ordinances). And if there is one homeless man on the streets, how has the city of Naperville dealt with this issue? Is this affluent community prepared for big-city type problems?

The current problems of mixed-income development in Chicago

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The challenges facing a new Chicago mayor are large. Within a story about how growing Chicago’s middle class will prove to be one of these challenges, the Chicago Tribune summarizes the progress of the mixed-income developments that replaced a number of public housing high-rises:

For years, miles of high-rise public housing buildings stretched across the city’s skyline, blocking off entire neighborhoods from any hopes of improvement and further defining Chicago as an urban failure.

Today, much of the city’s stability rides on the success of the $1.6 billion effort launched by Daley in 2000 to tear down those public housing towers, sending thousands of Chicago’s poorest residents to new neighborhoods.

As part of the Chicago Housing Authority’s Plan for Transformation, the mixed-income developments going up in those neighborhoods are meant to be cornerstones for further growth, luring urban pioneers whose presence there would then attract new stores, restaurants, better schools and even more residential development.

The plan has worked in some neighborhoods, most notably, the area near the Gold Coast that was home to the infamous Cabrini-Green housing complex. Synonymous for decades with urban despair, the community has been transformed to a bustling center of urban chic, even before the CHA began demolishing the last high-rise building there last month.

But in other Plan for Transformation communities, the weak economy has altered plans for new development, generating concerns about an effort that has been blamed for destabilizing some neighborhoods.

Unable to attract enough interest for the middle-income homes that are the linchpins of those developments, several developers have recently won approval to instead build more rental homes, including public housing units and other low-income apartments.

That has stirred worries that pockets of poverty are being re-created, though a federal judge overseeing the effort has emphasized the importance of including the mixed-income units.

“If you get too much rental, and too much of it is low income, the neighborhood can get fixed with an image that is hard to change, so that’s an ongoing concern,” said Alexander Polikoff, a director at Business and Professional People for the Public Interest, a law and policy group that has monitored the Plan for Transformation’s efforts as part of a federal court settlement stemming from a 1966 class-action lawsuit.

In a 2009 report, BPI criticized developers for the “slow pace” of building on middle-income homes that could have been sold when the housing market was still strong.

Some thoughts about this summary:

1. We will still need time to assess the full impact of the Plan for Transformation.

2. For sources like the Chicago Tribune, just getting rid of the public housing high-rises is an important enough feat. Because Chicago no longer has these high-rises, is it now not an urban failure?

3. The emphasis here is on neighborhoods, collectivities of institutions and individuals, and their status. What about the residents who left the public housing high-rises. What sort of neighborhoods are they in?

4. Within the Plan for Transportation, how much planning was there for harder economic times? When the Plan was conceived and put into practice (late 1990s-2000s), it seems imperative that middle-class professionals would want to purchase in the mixed-income neighborhoods. If this pool of buyers is not available or is not as big, then the neighborhoods can’t be what they were intended to be.

More demographic issues, this time in Southern Europe

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Amidst news that Japan experienced a record population drop in 2010, today, the New York Times reports on Southern Europe where there is a lack of jobs for the young even as a growing elderly population requires support and how this has led to a “pervasive malaise among young people”:

Indeed, experts warn of a looming demographic disaster in Southern Europe, which has among the lowest birth rates in the Western world. With pensioners living longer and young people entering the work force later — and paying less in taxes because their salaries are so low — it is only a matter of time before state coffers run dry.

“What we have is a Ponzi scheme,” said Laurence J. Kotlikoff, an economist at Boston University and an expert in fiscal policy.

He said that pay-as-you-go social security and health care were a looming fiscal disaster in Southern Europe and beyond. “If these fertility rates continue through time, you won’t have Italians, Spanish, Greeks, Portuguese or Russians,” he said. “I imagine the Chinese will just move into Southern Europe.”

The problem goes far beyond youth unemployment, which is at 40 percent in Spain and 28 percent in Italy. It is also about underemployment. Today, young people in Southern Europe are effectively exploited by the very mechanisms created a decade ago to help make the labor market more flexible, like temporary contracts.

Whoever is going to tackle these issues is going to have be very brave or thick-skinned.

While the consequences of long-term low birth rates are becoming more clear, why is there not more discussion about boosting these birth rates? How exactly did the birth rate drop so much? How did it become so desirable for nations and individuals to have so few children? Could governments provide incentives to families so that they would have more children?

It will also be interesting to track how this “malaise” works its way through the younger generation. Could this be the first generation in a while that has a tougher life than their parents in terms of having to work longer and harder just to keep society afloat? What are the social consequences of this malaise: less productivity, less interest in civil society, general unrest?

Cities that are losing population

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The list of the top seven American cities in population loss (measured as a percentage of total population) is not surprising: New Orleans, Flint, Cleveland, Buffalo, Dayton, Pittsburgh, and Rochester (NY). And outside of New Orleans, why these cities have lost population is also not difficult to figure out: a loss of manufacturing jobs.

But a list like this raises some questions about cities:

1. Is it that unusual for cities to lose population? If cities can boom, as these cities did during the industrial boom, why can’t they also go bust?

2. The headline on the article is misleading: “US cities running out of people.” There are still plenty of people in these communities – what is unusual is that the population is declining.

3. Is there a point where these population losses will stabilize? I always wonder this about cities – some people stay because there are still some jobs, particularly medical, municipal, and service jobs available.

4. Is there something the federal government could do to help these communities reverse these trends? Is there a public interest in not letting cities like these slowly die?

5. Measuring the city’s population is perhaps not the best way to go about it. How have the metropolitan populations changed? Are there still people in the region? This would make a difference.

Record population drop in Japan

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Numerous industrialized nations are facing a demographic challenge: an aging population coupled with a low birth rate. Japan is one of these countries and experienced a record population drop in 2010:

Japan faces a looming demographic squeeze. Baby boomers are moving toward retirement, with fewer workers and taxpayers to replace them. The Japanese boast among the highest life expectancies in the world but have extremely low birth rates.

Japan logged 1.19 million deaths in 2010 — the biggest number since 1947 when the health ministry’s annual records began. The number of births was nearly flat at 1.07 million.

As a result, Japan contracted by 123,000 people, which was the most ever and represents the fourth consecutive year of population decline. The top causes of death were cancer, heart disease and stroke, the ministry said.

Japanese aged 65 and older make up about a quarter of Japan’s current population. The government projects that by 2050, that figure will climb to 40 percent.

This will have some enormous social consequences in the coming decades: an growing older population will require more and more government services that will be paid for by a shrinking base of younger workers.

One important piece of the story seems to be missing in this article: immigration. Japan has historically been relatively closed to immigration where other industrialized nations have various rates of immigration. In the United States, population growth has been fueled by higher birth rates than some other industrialized nations plus high levels of immigration. As countries continue to think about this demographic shift, could more nations see immigration as a solution to looming budget issues related to government programs for the elderly?

Quick Review: The Sixth Floor Museum

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During a short trip to Dallas, I had a chance to visit The Sixth Floor Museum in the Texas Book Depository. This is, of course, the site from where Lee Harvey Oswald assassinated President John F. Kennedy. A few thoughts about this intriguing museum:

1. There is a lot of interesting material about the event including photographs, videos, models, and artifacts. I have read multiple books on the subject and there were a number of features of that day that I had forgotten. It was a nice mix of media through which to explore that fateful day.

1a. One video featured the national TV news coverage in the days after the assassination. From what I saw, it looked like those few days were a quick foreshadowing of the 24/7 news we have today. After the shooting, the major news networks had live coverage for much of the next few days and NBC even captured the shooting of Oswald by Jack Ruby live on a Sunday.

2. It was hard not to feel a sense of sadness when hearing about the death of a President. This sadness was not just limited to the feelings of people at the time (and there was a 10-minute video showing the somber scenes in Washington D.C. as JFK’s body was led through the streets) but it was noticeable among those in the museum. There was a guestbook at the end of the museum and a number of people had signed it and expressed their condolences and emotions. I was not alive on that day but I could see why it was a momentous day for many Americans.

3. The museum had more than I expected about the possible conspiracies. I would be curious to hear how the museum decided to present these – they can’t really be ignored and this is why many people are interested in the event but many of the conspiracies have a limited basis in facts. One of the more interesting displays in the museum was one that showed the numerous governmental commissions that examined the issue between 1963 and 1980.

3a. One thought I had when standing next to the recreated corner where Oswald shot from was that it would have been a difficult shot to hit a person in a moving vehicle with trees in the way. There is some dispute about how good of a marksman Oswald was. I’d like to read more about how difficult of a shot this really was.

3b. One area where there was less information regarded the backstory of Lee Harvey Oswald. While they hinted at his convoluted story of defecting to the Soviet Union and then returning to the United States, there is a lot of other curious information they could have displayed.

4. The museum was quite positive about JFK’s legacy. Perhaps they are simply reflecting the positive way in many Americans view JFK (more info here).

5. I have mixed feelings about having a gift shop at the end of such an experience.

Overall, I imagine this would be an intriguing museum for many Americans and not just those interested in history or Presidents.

Millennium Park: an example of how growth machines work

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Within a story about whether Chicago will be able to move forward with large development projects in the next few years, a historian describes how Millennium Park, a significant undertaking, came about:

Indeed, as Chicago ponders its future, it may be useful to view Millennium Park not as a triumph to be repeated, but as a shining exception, one that occurred only because the stars aligned and Daley had created order in Chicago’s turbulent political universe.

After years of fruitless talk, the story goes, the park got its start in 1997, when the mayor peered down from his dentist’s office along Michigan Avenue and decided to turn that dusty railroad yard in Grant Park’s northwest corner into an urban showcase.

By then, Daley had been mayor for eight years and had consolidated his grip on power. Key figures in the park’s creation, including major donors like the Pritzker and Crown families, were “in many ways indebted to, dependent upon and allied with the mayor,” Gilfoyle said. They wanted to please Daley, he explained, partly because their real estate and other holdings might benefit from future city action.

All roads, in other words, led to Daley. And the economic winds were at his back. The late 1990s dot-com boom gave the park’s chief fundraiser, former Sara Lee Corp. CEO John Bryan, enormous wealth to tap. Without it, Gilfoyle said, the 6-year-old park might never have happened.

Today, with such favorable conditions a distant memory, Chicago’s builders are scrambling to find new paths to get things done. One is to push projects ahead step by step rather than in a single, expensive rush, as at Millennium Park.

This sounds like a classic description of growth machine development: the mayor wants something to get done, major donors and partners are sought and found, and a large and impressive park is able to be built on a spot that had been an industrial location/blighted site for years.

This is an interesting example considering the context of the rest of the story: Chicago will have a new mayor (with less consolidated power) and also is facing significant budget issues. Growth machine politics may not be possible at least with the new mayor for a while though other power brokers could emerge. Growth machines are also more limited when money from businesses and local governments is scarce.

Another question one could ask after reading this story: how unusual was it for both Mayor Daleys to undertake so many significant projects? Around Chicago, they are known for having significant building legacies. Are there mayors in other major cities with similar records or are they truly unusual?