The Olmsteds and American urbanity, present and future

I never realized how much of America the Olmsteds shaped. I knew about the parks, of course. but then there were the parkways, campuses, and enormous subdivisions they planned, setting the tone for practically a century of urban and landscape planning.

The Frederick Law Olmsted National Historic Site and Arnold Arboretum hosted a panel discussion this past Sunday. Historian Charles Beveridge, UVA's Ethan Carr and Yale's Alexander Garvin and Dolores Hayden (who has authored some very interesting books) spoke specifically on the future of the Olmsted legacy, past and future. The family (Olmsted's sons have careers as prodigious as his own) defined the American city and suburb, with a little help from the City Beautiful movement, etc. - injecting a thirst for "natural" (though heavily engineered) green spaces into the public mind, a noble cause in the filthy cities of their time. In retrospect, they had a hand in our contemporary problem of sprawl.

I can't help but suspect there are solutions to sprawl in Olmsted ideas. His insistance that nature should be part of daily experience and that parks should be inclusive of all activity made me think of my daily commute. It also conflicts with the strict definition of American public space as leasure space, where the business of life is excluded. All public spaces in America, save a very few, are either strict leasure olmstead parks, or elaborate ornament for shopping or civic use. Rarely is there the richness of piazza life, were citizens interact in real-time.

The day left me dreaming of my urban streets filled not with sooty smog but the Olmstedian picturesque, my front door contuguous with all-purpose, useful parks. The convergence of these ideas - Olmsted, Shared Space, super-scale "machines as garens", is a hopeful sign, let's hope I get to be a part of it. ;)

Shared Spaces: harnessing the civility of people

A recent article in the Boston Globe Magazine suggests "Boston drivers are bad, but Boston pedestrians might be worse", presumably because they break traffic rules. But what if the rules are the problem? Because of the questionable habits of both parties, many streets in Boston exist in a de facto state of Shared Space, the slowly & steadily growing idea of Dutch planner Hans Monderman. It seems we are edging toward the recognition that the urban street is an altogether unique creature.

The idea is that all our fussing and stoplights and walklights and orchestration for safety is making our streets less safe. Drivers and pedestrians believe if they obey, everything will be fine. People stop thinking. Shared Space advocates the removal of curbs, signs, lights, etc. and letting people figure it out for themselves. Calling on common sense and cooperation, it harnesses the civility of people rather than letting it atrophy. Apparently it actually does reduce accidents, and reportedly reduces congestion due to increased efficiency.

The aesthetic value of clearing the clutter is promising as well, in addition to the promise of freeing urban life from the four foot strip of concrete mashed against building facades.

It's had success in the Dutch town of Drachten and in Germany.

The discussion brings the larger political implications of urban design tantalizingly close to the surface, but that's a post for another day.

"We're losing our capacity for socially responsible behaviour, ...The greater the number of prescriptions, the more people's sense of personal responsibility dwindles." ^[4]
- Hans Monderman