Comments: Fitzgerald - geography of a revolution
Simon Mertner Vind
A couple of weeks ago we read the Berman text and discussed – among other things – the Marx sentence: “In our days everything seems pregnant with its contrary” and we discussed the difference between dualism and dialectic: ‘Things’ coexists with its contrary, things doesn’t wipe out its contrary.
And during last class Marc gave us a great presentation of the ‘theory’ and agenda of the Situationist movement. During the class, there was a short discussion about the perspectives on the utopian city ‘New Babylon’ by Constant Nieuwenhuys, a Dutch anti-capitalist architect. There were different opinions about the potentials of creating ‘alternative life experiences’ and’ situations’ through the act of play: A city for the flaneur and homo ludens, man at play.
Understandable, in reality it does sound silly. So why did the Situationists create this utopia, which question does New Babylon try to answer?
I think that the Situationist saw the same kind of devastating dynamics in cities and government as William Bunge saw in Fitzgerald. Logic, efficient and rational planning; and logic, efficient and rational built environment.
But the Rational city planning existed without its contrary, so the Situationist had to create (give birth) to the contrary of the Rational City: The New Babylon. The important thing about New Babylon is not whether it should be build or not, or if it would work or not. New Babylon was about extending the spectrum on which principles and values cities should be built and architecture carried out.
Bunge shows how cities and town planners were in need of different planning ideas and principles in order to avoid the racial and social reproduction of that in Fitzgerald in Detroit (which again mirrors the general story of cities all over US). Fitzgerald is maybe not a Situationist, but his agenda echoes the artistic movement. And Bunge asked the kind of questions that the Situationist did:
“Why not use the buses for employed persons’ journeys to work in the early morning, and then later for housewives shopping trips? Why not two or three full-time bus salesmen working in the neighborhood to drum up trade for ski trips in the winter and beach trips in the summer?”
Like the Situationists showed that architechture can be carried out radical, Bunge shows how Geography can be done differently: his work is critical, angry, political and normative – the contrary to rational science (positivism) and planning.
Bunge lived, worked and fought in the Fitzgerald neighborhood; he didn’t create master plans from his office. He showed that research is not a pure activity and carried out by few elite experts, it should be carried out in the interest of everyone. Naïve and utopian? Utopias is in its nature naïve, but if just a small part of it is realized….
Simon
William Cawthern
Reading Bungie’s “Fitzgerald,” I found myself constantly agreeing with what the author had to say. I think Bungie’s analysis of Fitzgerald as a neighborhood always undergoing (or on the verge of) change is key insight into how communities change or “stay the same.” Fitzgerald, as the time of Bungie’s study (through the 1960s), was a one-square mile neighborhood half-in Detroit and half-in its suburbs. The question Bungie wanted to answer was if, following the usual course of American cities, Fitzgerald will get swallowed up by the expanding slums at the city center, or if Fitzgerald will resist slum-ification.
Bungie uses Fitzgerald as an archetype for all of America. Bungie notes that it is dangerous to use one sample population to discuss about the condition of all of America, but he argues that Fitzgerald is appropriate for extracting themes of American society because Fitzgerald has no “really atypical events or personalities” (pg. 2). Throughout Bungie’s discussion of Fitzgerald, he provides examples of the neighborhood’s organic resistance to outside forces. One of Bungie’s main points is that the poor conditions of slums are caused and perpetuated by interests based in the suburbs. The slum-owner doesn’t care what conditions are like at his building, because he doesn’t live there. The bottom line is that he gets payment from the very high rent the inner city demands. As an example of foreign perpetuation of slum conditions, Bungie cites how the racism of a white property owner breeds racist backlash from black residents. Then: “if the white owner wants total revenge, he then makes his store the most ugly eyesore possible, insulting the entire community, driving down black residential values, and allowing passing white motorists to cluck-cluck about how the neighborhood has declined since ‘they’ moved in” (pg. 149).
One limitation of Bungie’s study of Fitzgerald is that it has now become dated. It would be interested to see how, if Bungie went back to Fitzgerald today, how it would stand up to his expectations. The image below is of the Lollo Tot Lot from Google Maps.
Google tries to leave out people from maps as much as they can, which is an issue that Bungie himself raises. Maps don’t engage what really matters about an area: the people there. Bungie mentions that when there was talk to make a new playground for Fitzgerald’s kids, a photographer only took a picture of an empty dilapidated playground, inciting opponents to ask “Why should there be a renovated playground to use if the kids don’t want to be out playing?” But at the time kids were playing – “illegally” on an abandoned lot, not on their underserved playground. The picture today of Lollo may indicate that it, too, has fallen into neglect, judging by the rusting and faded features. But behind all this I think Bungie would urge us to keep in mind that there are people. If the image above doesn’t account for them, that doesn't mean they aren't present, or willing to get into the picture.
Cindy Borrero
Cindy Borrero
October 10, 2011
Constructing Difference in Public Spaces:
Race, Class, and Gender as Interlocking Systems
In Constructing Difference in Public Spaces, Susan Ruddick talks about how public spaces, such as coffee shops , parks, taverns, and fast food places, and how they are crucial parts of society. They provide meeting places for people of all sorts of races, gender, and economic classes to come together, where they otherwise would not do so. Public spaces are also significant because they help shape our personal identities. Ruddick also gives account of different crimes that have occurred in such open public places and tries to give reason as to why some of the crimes were more publicized in the media and caused more of an outrage among its citizens. Ruddick also states that while public spaces are open to all, they tend to be exclusionary, especially to minorities, such as blacks and women.
Ruddick feels that we need to rethink the idea of public spaces as a meeting ground where all classes, gender, and races can come together equally and without affecting one another. Public spaces help shape who we are as individuals as well as whom we are collectively, as a society. The influences of public spaces can be as small as local and as large as national.
Root Shock
How Tearing Up City Neighborhoods Hurts America and What We Can Do About It
Mindy Thompson Fullilove is a psychiatrist that wanted to fully comprehend what people go through physically, mentally, and emotionally when they are displaced and so she immersed herself in their world. Instead of just hearing from them, she wanted to experience it for herself.
Fullilove describes the term “root shock” as something experience by people who suffer from a dramatic shock to their emotional environment. It can range from affecting a small part or the entire emotional network all together. It will affect the person for the rest of their life and can have consequences ranging from locally to nationally. Root shock is devastating to the individual and affects all aspects of their life. Even the way an event doesn’t affect you, is still an effect on the person, good or bad.
Fullilove goes on to give examples of events that caused people to experience root shock, such as the urbanization and the world trade center attacks. While local, these happeningshad implications thought out the world. The emotional events that affect us not only bind us together as a society to one another, but it also ties us to our environment. She believes that, not only are we rooted to our physically environment, but we are also rooted to our family and social ecosystem.
bradley brashears
“Root shock is the traumatic stress reaction to the destruction of all or part of one’s emotional ecosystem.”
Dr. Mindy Thompson Fullilove explains in detail the effects of urban renewal projects that occurred mainly between the years 1949 to 1973 that bulldozed 2,500 neighborhoods, of which 1,600 were African-American. These so-called “blighted” communities were completely destroyed by urban renewal projects, many of which constructed large highways through neighborhoods and left many communities separated and destroyed. Many African-Americans were displaced, cut off from other parts of the city and left to cope with the aftermath.
“The great epidemics of drug addiction, the collapse of the black family, and the rise in incarceration of black men – all of these catastrophes followed the civil rights movements, they did not precede it.”
Once urban renewal had plowed through African-American communities, individuals began to experience what Fullilove defines as root shock. The decline of these communities as a whole allowed drug addiction, poverty and crime to manifest. These communities, such as the Hill District in Pittsburgh, were isolated from other parts of the city by physical barriers, lack of adequate mass transportation, limited access to educational services, and few job opportunities. These disastrous urban renewal projects made it extremely difficult for communities to keep up with the pace of wealthier parts of the city. Not only were people’s lives and neighborhoods destroyed – the city as a whole became fragmented, segregated and full of unequal opportunities.
Fullilove explains that root shock, much like that of a tree being uprooted, has devastating affects on human emotions. “In cutting the roots of so many people, we have destroyed language, culture, dietary traditions, and social bonds.” At the individual level, root shock destroys what one knows of the world. Root shock in this extreme did not only affect individuals but also entire communities which have now been affected for generations.
Fullilove explains that root shock has a ripple effect that can be felt at the individual level, by the community, the region and even the rest of the world. Fullilove uses the tragic events of 9/11 to illustrate this point. The destruction of the World Trade Center, a vertical neighborhood, not only affected New York City, but also the region, the country, and the entire world. The World Trade Center was the financial center of the world; once destroyed, the stability and vitality of the financial markets were weakened – effects that we are still reeling from today. Lives were lost and businesses collapsed; many were relocated, leaving everyone in shock not only here at home but in the rest of the world.
“By my estimates, a half million people had direct losses, another million had witnessed the collapse of the buildings, and everyone in the metropolitan area – millions of us – was in a state of shock.”
The “Main Street for the World” was destroyed and the effects could be felt worldwide by a tragic event that occurred in just one neighborhood.
In order to rectify the problems of urban renewal that tore through neighborhoods and caused the root shock that rippled through entire cities and regions, Fullilove proposes four principles to reverse what has been done. The first principle is to “respect the common life the way you would an individual life”; second, “treasure the buildings history has given us”; third, “break the cycle of disinvestment”; and lastly, “ensure freedom of movement”. By upholding these principles it is possible to remove barriers and respect entire communities that contribute to the larger region. Communities must preserve the old while building the new, reinvest in “blighted” areas and enable freedom of movement through adequate transportation and opportunities that aid upward mobility for everyone. If these principles are achieved then it should be possible to undo the evils of urban renewal that left so many behind. This too would have a ripple effect – a positive one – that would be felt for generations to come. Instead of marginalizing more individuals and communities these principles, once practiced, could have an enduring impact on future generations, moving everyone forward together and leaving no one behind.
Dave L
social identity, scale, and various other socio-economic factors that
determine how people live their lives in an urban environment. She
illustrates clearly that we have many barriers between us and Berman’s
utopian vision for open-minded public space. Our deep-seated fears
and need to establish “us” from “other” determine who has access to
public space. One some level, I think this is a necessary function in
a melting pot where cultural groups strive to maintain their
identities. If that is so, should all spaces be truly accessible by
the general population? Even places that are generally accessible to
everyone tend to be divided naturally along racial lines. For
instance, on any weekend in Fort Greene Park the North side is
primarily African American and the South Side is all Caucasian. The
Just Desserts shooting in Toronto takes the question further by asking
why a shooting in a gentrified area leads to a massive public outcry
when similar events in lower-income areas go without much notice.
This example uncovers the imbalances of power and privilege that run
throughout society. Unfortunately, many of us have a hard time being
ourselves, truly expressing ourselves, amongst friends, family and
most of us have this difficulty in public spaces well within our
defined comfort zones. How can we expect to overcome the challenge of
overcoming the barriers described by Ruddick? I think more
aggressive, bold design ideas and “experiments” in collective economic
and social activity are needed to jolt people out of their comfort
zones. We need to be distracted by interesting economic (collective /
community-based business models) and social (street play, farming,
etc.) options.
I think Chapter 8 of Fullilove speaks directly to this point.
Cantal’s ideas of equity aesthetics and designing for perspectives
that lead people to explore are promising reforms that could impact
the way we interact in public space. Physically connecting struggling
or threatened areas to the larger city can help to restore them in
ways that serve the current residents. To achieve this kind of design
intervention, advocacy planning of the kind carried out by Fullilove
in Pittsburgh is remarkable. I think the accomplishments she
describes there have the right balance of education and empowerment of
the local community as opposed to prescriptive technical
recommendations from the top down.
On Oct 10, 5:46 pm, bradley brashears <bl.brashe...@gmail.com> wrote:
> *“Root shock is the traumatic stress reaction to the destruction of all or
> part of one’s emotional ecosystem.”*
> Dr. Mindy Thompson Fullilove explains in detail the effects of urban renewal
> projects that occurred mainly between the years 1949 to 1973 that bulldozed
> 2,500 neighborhoods, of which 1,600 were African-American. These so-called
> “blighted” communities were completely destroyed by urban renewal projects,
> many of which constructed large highways through neighborhoods and left many
> communities separated and destroyed. Many African-Americans were displaced,
> cut off from other parts of the city and left to cope with the aftermath.
>
> Once urban renewal had plowed through African-American communities,
> The “Main Street for the World” was destroyed and the effects could be felt
> worldwide by a tragic event that occurred in just one neighborhood.
>
> In order to rectify the problems of urban renewal that tore through
> neighborhoods and caused the root shock that rippled through entire cities
> and regions, Fullilove proposes four principles to reverse what has been
> done. The first principle is to “respect the common life the way you would
> an individual life”; second, “treasure the buildings history has given us”;
> third, “break the cycle of disinvestment”; and lastly, “ensure freedom of
> movement”. By upholding these principles it is possible to remove barriers
> and respect entire communities that contribute to the larger region.
> Communities must preserve the old while building the new, reinvest in
> “blighted” areas and enable freedom of movement through adequate
> transportation and opportunities that aid upward mobility for everyone. If
> these principles are achieved then it should be possible to undo the evils
> of urban renewal that left so many behind. This too would have a ripple
> effect – a positive one – that would be felt for generations to come.
> Instead of marginalizing more individuals and communities these principles,
> once practiced, could have an enduring impact on future generations, moving
> everyone forward together and leaving no one behind.
>
> - Bradley
>
>
>
> On Mon, Oct 10, 2011 at 4:34 PM, Cindy Borrero <cct81...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > Cindy Borrero
>
>
> > *Constructing Difference in Public Spaces:*
>
> > *Race, Class, and Gender as Interlocking Systems*
> > In Constructing Difference in Public Spaces, Susan Ruddick talks about how
> > public spaces, such as coffee shops , parks, taverns, and fast food places,
> > and how they are crucial parts of society. They provide meeting places for
> > people of all sorts of races, gender, and economic classes to come together,
> > where they otherwise would not do so. Public spaces are also significant
> > because they help shape our personal identities. Ruddick also gives account
> > of different crimes that have occurred in such open public places and tries
> > to give reason as to why some of the crimes were more publicized in the
> > media and caused more of an outrage among its citizens. Ruddick also states
> > that while public spaces are open to all, they tend to be exclusionary,
> > especially to minorities, such as blacks and women.
>
> > Ruddick feels that we need to rethink the idea of public
> > spaces as a meeting ground where all classes, gender, and races can come
> > together equally and without affecting one another. Public spaces help shape
> > who we are as individuals as well as whom we are collectively, as a society.
> > The influences of public spaces can be as small as local and as large as
>
> > *Root Shock*
>
> > *How Tearing Up City Neighborhoods Hurts America and What We Can Do About
> > It*
> > Mindy Thompson Fullilove is a psychiatrist that wanted to fully comprehend
> > what people go through physically, mentally, and emotionally when they are
> > displaced and so she immersed herself in their world. Instead of just
> > hearing from them, she wanted to experience it for herself.
>
> > Fullilove describes the term “root shock” as something experience by people
> > who suffer from a dramatic shock to their emotional environment. It can
> > range from affecting a small part or the entire emotional network all
> > together. It will affect the person for the rest of their life and can have
> > consequences ranging from locally to nationally. Root shock is devastating
> > to the individual and affects all aspects of their life. Even the way an
> > event doesn’t affect you, is still an effect on the person, good or bad.
>
> > Fullilove goes on to give examples of events that caused people to
> > experience root shock, such as the urbanization and the world trade center
> > attacks. While local, these happeningshad implications thought out the
> > world. The emotional events that affect us not only bind us together as a
> > society to one another, but it also ties us to our environment. She believes
> > that, not only are we rooted to our physically environment, but we are also
>
> - Show quoted text -
Tess Bath
Looking forward to tomorrow. As we won't be using slides I'm attaching some links here for the presentation.
If you could briefly look over some photos of the "Make it Right" homes, Brad Pitt's effort to rebuild in the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans post-Katrina, that would be awesome. I'm hoping we'll get to talk about this briefly tomorrow as I think it ties into a lot of what we've been discussing/reading.
http://www.google.com/search?q=make+it+right+homes&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&hl=en&tbm=isch&source=og&sa=N&tab=wi&biw=863&bih=666
If this link doesn't work just type "Make it Right" into google.
Also here's a before and after image from the Lower Hill in Pittsburgh (pre and post-construction of the Civic Arena):
http://www.pittsburghpostgazette.com/pg/11107/1138810-455.stm
Less important, but if you have time I found a video of Michel Cantal-Dupart in Englewood with the Fulliloves - just in case you were as curious about him as I was.
http://www.theenglewoodreport.com/files/category-10.html
Hope you get time to look over a few of them and see you tomorrow!
Tess
Sara
phenomenon cited as a consequence of urban renewal plans. Her analysis
exceeds the physical loss and relates the emotional tax waged by the
dislocation of individuals, their resources, and their networks from
an established community. As a psychologist, she engaged in a planning
exercise to help the Hill’s residents understand their community in
new terms as well as communicate their personal ties to the place to
outsiders.
Through Cartal’s four principles on the Aesthetics of Equity,
Fullilove offers a more general set of criteria for analyzing places,
assessing their value and helping them recover. A striking similarity
between the approach of the urban planners promoting urban renewal
schemes and Fullilove’s adoption of Cartal’s beliefs both refocus
thinking to the urban scale. Urban renewal plans took large swaths of
land to build infrastructure that would benefit the whole city (well,
if only truly for the wealthy in the city at least the projects were
of a scale that relates to the whole city). Likewise, Fullilove states
that problems in the neighborhood are the problems in the city and
presents the emotional ecosystem in which small actions anywhere can
influence future action on the other side of the globe. The
interconnections she emphasizes between humans, space, and place are
ultimately part of the solution proposed for revitalizing the Hill and
any other condemned neighborhood.
Cartal and Fullilove view movement from all places to all other places
in a city to be essential to the health of a place. This concept is
indirectly supported by the alleged intention of urban renewal
advocates to cut off undesireable areas. Again, the importance of
movement, as in past readings, is essential to determining the
economic, society, and emotional health of a place and its residents.
The argument made through Fullilove’s work is to prioritize the
facilitation of a plethora of connections to an ease of movement.
On Oct 10, 7:41 pm, Tess Bath <tessbat...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hey all!
>
> Looking forward to tomorrow. As we won't be using slides I'm attaching some
> links here for the presentation.
>
> If you could briefly look over some photos of the "Make it Right" homes,
> Brad Pitt's effort to rebuild in the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans
> post-Katrina, that would be awesome. I'm hoping we'll get to talk about
> this briefly tomorrow as I think it ties into a lot of what we've been
> discussing/reading.
>
>
> read more »
Richie Alicea
them as places that are blind to class, gender, and race, where all
can come together as equals and interact, I can't help but agree with
most of what is said. The idea of spaces as 'public' is relative to
one's view of the role of government, and I keep thinking about a
conversation I had with some friends early this Summer, as we set out
to plan some outdoor events in Brooklyn, where we are all from.
While exploring neighborhoods, looking for spaces where we could, for
example, put on an outdoor movie for local residents to come and enjoy
a summer evening, we came to the realization that there were no public
spaces to do such a thing. What I mean is that, in no spot, could we
simply show up, lay out some equipment and begin showing a movie where
folks could show up and relax. If we were to do so in a park, we'd be
subject to approval by the City of New York, empty lots were usually
private property where owners were difficult to reach, and any other
open space was either under the purview of the state or a property
owner. Even in some cases, where property owners were willing to allow
for the use of their space, there were limitations based on local laws
that prevented such use. Even sidewalks in front of businesses that
were friendly to what we were trying to accomplish were mostly off
limits to any sort of activity not sanctioned by the state. Areas like
parks, sidewalks, and streets, considered by most to be public
property, were still actually limited-use by the public.
The point is that, to me, a public space shouldn't be a place where
there are limitations imposed by the state, or a place where you must
seek and obtain permission from the state in order to use it in a
certain fashion that doesn't harm others. In a way, it is similar to
what Ruddick is arguing, that public space isn't truly public because
all do not have equal rights to it. As my group sought out spaces to
hold a public event (where anyone would be able to attend), we
experienced some of Ruddick's observations firsthand, that public
spaces are not public, even if they are provided by public funds.
I thought it would be interesting to add my personal experience to the
discussion, as we talk about rethinking what public space actually is,
and what it should be.
On Mon, Oct 10, 2011 at 3:16 PM, Simon Mertner Vind
<simon.mer...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
Lea Dyrup
In Ftizgerald: geography of a revolution Wiliam Bunge decribes, one square mile in Detroit, as a symptom of what is going on in American cities. Bunge started a revolution of the exploited against a ruling class and of people against a technology of death.
Last year I spend to weeks doing a film project
in Detroit.
The first day it became evident, that if this project should succeed we needed a car. The distances in the city was huge, and the streets build for cars – not people. On the picture below, you can clearly see, which kind of transportation form is highly prioritized in the city.
We tried using two different forms of public transportation when we were there. One of them was the bus. While we waited at the bus stop, we wondered where this bus would take us, and when it would arrive. Because there was no signs of the line number, neither a time schedule. After we waited for more than half an hour, the bus arrived and continued downtown. Arriving to downtown we had to change into another bus, but the bus did never arrive, and we had to take a taxi to our scheduled meeting.
The other public transportation we tried was called: “The people mover”. The people mover is an air train running in downtown Detroit. The main difference between these to transportations forms was, while the bus was full with poor black people, the people mover was most of the time empty, besides from white tourist whom once in a while took a round above downtown Detroit. The people mover doesn’t have to stop where you wouldn’t be able to walk within 15 minutes – it coveres a very small area, and stopped between different offices and Casinos.
My point with all this, is that staying in downtown Detroit, where mostly poor people lives in slums, it was very clear how the physical structures and functions did maintain the segregation between the middleclass and rich people coming from the suburbs, and the poor people living in downtown. If the people living in downtown were going to work in the suburbs, they would have to use an unspecific amount of time getting there every day. This touches upon Bunges argument about the hidden structural unemployment – the poor will loose hours of “working-time” by taking public transportation, which will lock the slum dweller to the slum and keep him from work. Bunge describes an unequal society, where slum-owners earn their income from slum and are favored by the American tax system. The rich are getting richer living in areas separated from the slum. A problem that also seems very relevant today, with the Occupy Wall Street movement.
But even though the car seemed to determinate structures and life in Detroit, the city seemed to have another live underneath the surface. To repeat Simon: “things coexists with its contrary” and in the Motor city I’d experience some of the strongest community feelings I’ve seen yet so far. People was doing urban farming on abandoned lots, creating art-projects with children and founded small community projects in poor neighborhoods. Their projects were small, but the importance is that they included the people – a method Burge calls for:
“Only as the people of the community build their own plans, work for them, and change them as necessary, will the plans work and will areas like Fitzgerald posses beauty.”
Lea
Marc Pearce
Through reading William Bunge and considering the notion of
neighborhood, other readings came to mind such as Paul Davidoff and
his idea of advocacy planning.
In contrast to many of our previous discussions and readings, we have
left behind principles particular to one unitary comprehensive
planning model and find ourselves closer to more context sensitive
approaches.
The general perception has become that of a fragmented society, one of
many sensitivities. The issues of today’s society, if ever they were
different from those of the past, can no longer rely solely on
technical issues and functional considerations. The issues of today
demand that we take into account the diversity of interests groups and
that we consider the pregnance of social attitudes. Values are no
longer something that we can afford to take for granted or that we can
push aside. Values, the admittance of their plurality but also the
necessity for them to find advocacy is paramount and should no doubt
be integrated in the planning process. A necessity if we wish to
continue a truly democratic society, of course, but also as a rational
imperative. The general welfare can no longer be summarized one way or
the other and calls for some form of plural planning that can only
emanate from the local scale, from the neighborhood.
Threw this view it is very interesting to consider Bunge’s
contribution. Concentrating essentially on a neighborhood in Detroit
he considers with strength and determination the social inequalities
and the issues that threaten American society. Bunge’s advocacy is
fierce and by times even violent. Whether you are touched by his
determination or stricken by the cynicism of his portraying, it is
hard to deny his writings and his maps a certain “road braking”
character.
Even today, some of his maps may seem politically incorrect. Yet, what
it states holds real meaning and significant value in the political
determination of welfare.
Here are a few maps I found interesting.
Source: http://indiemaps.com/blog/2010/03/wild-bill-bunge/
[can't seem to import images... i will bring them tomorrow]
mqu...@hunter.cuny.edu
Fullilove describes “root shock” as the stress and trauma of communities and
individuals that experience the destructive processes of slum clearance and
urban renewal. The author emphasizes the importance of the quality of
interconnectedness of any urban neighborhood, between people, memory and
the environment. The delicate balance of the urban ecosystem in which the
individual lives can be disrupted by demolition and development, which throws
off all contextualization the individual has with the surrounding environment.
Root shock also occurs on the level of the community at large, disrupting
interactions and organizations by dispersing once connected groups all over.
Fullilove points out that the implications of wiping out a neighborhood to start
over new are beyond the surface, implications that go to the fundamental way
we experience and understand our environment, interact with our neighbor and
construct our psyche.
Urban renewal programs were carried out in thousands of communities of color
across the country. This interventions were undertaken to clear out “blight” from
urban centers on American cities and to build new, yet the criteria used to select
areas to be renewed destroyed disproportionately more communities of color.
Institutions and spaces that were the backbone of communities: churches,
schools, parks and streets were erased; their replace reconfigured to create a
new sanitized realm.
Fullilove describes the struggle of the Lower Hill community in Pittsburgh, PA to
stop the demolitions of two housing projects. In her discussion of the process of
organizing the resistance to these policies she describes the concept of a “burn
index” to measure the effect of renewal on communities. The analogy suggests
that the loss of housing in a neighborhood is paralleled by the loss of layers of
skin through a burn, exposing the organism to infection and disease. The loss
of “epidermal” built environment leaves the neighborhood vulnerable to
disinvestment, loss of networking, connections and memory.
The “aesthetics of equity” is discussed as a set of principles to help communities
fight blight and give an alternative approach to slum clearance. The resources of
peoples’ web of relationships as well as the history and memory of place are
emphasized to establish the importance of what exists. Also highlighted is the
freedom of movement, as often physically segregated communities suffer from
economic vitality and social isolation.
-Mario Quijano
A.Baruch Tauber
Through the beautiful analogy of the “mazeway”, Fullilove makes a compelling connection between physical space and one’s individual and communal wellbeing. But I struggle to fully understand how this proves the tragedy of Urban Renewal.
. I love how she uses Jacobs to bring the analogy to life: “They are connecting not to the negatives or even the positives of the settings, but to their own mastery of the local players at play.” Indeed the analogy of one filling their role in a play is great to describe how one finds meaning in life. But, when Fullilove takes the setting and “shreds” it (as the bulldozers did), removing the ballet’s cues and “center stage”.. “for a long moment, the actors will be frozen in horror... [then] confusion sets in. Where is the food? Where is shelter? Should I still go to school?” This, says, Fullilove, is root shock.
But what brought it on? Was it A) merely the abrupt loss of context, of staging, of the proximity to one’s fellow characters in the play? Or was it also B) the way it was taken away, what was rightfully theirs. i.e. not the change of scene and the need to adapt but the manner in which it changed. Did urban renewal “accelerate.. the inexorable decline the [black] community experienced during the second half of the century” (175) because of the moral blow of feeling powerless, or was it the physical change as well? How much of a role did the displacement play in the community’s decline? Did those who stayed fare better than those who left? On page 174, Sala Udin remembers the bittersweet experience of displacement, upgrading in living conditions but losing his friends, excited about the new adventure. In the end the community’s decline that had begun “before urban renewal continued.. from its substantial economic, social, and political losses.” It seems clear that urban renewal did not fix anything, but I’m not sure how it made things worse, directly.
No doubt UR stole from the 1,600 communities something priceless, a human right of community no one should ever be denied. But while I think the description of root shock as a strong factor is gripping, i’m not sure how it is proven in the reading.
Yes, there is the ripple affect. A tragedy affecting part of a community can tear another part down. But was this tragedy felt at the time of the “shredded scene” of the street ballet during renewal, or was it, as Udin put it, “the sense of fragmentation is a new experience that we can now sense, (after the fact?) that we didn’t sense then”. When the displacement seemed like an upgrade. If the fragmentation was a tragedy lying dormant, only to take affect as it accelerated the decline that followed the displaced to their new location, then what caused the root shock?
<Abraham Baruch Tauber>
Samuël Poisson
While reading Susan Ruddick, we are approaching a meaning of public spaces that has been one of the most discussed topic in philosophy and political science during the last 50 years (Habermas published The structural transformation of the public sphere in 1962).
Starting from the physical public space, theorists usually draw a continuity with the public sphere and make of open public spaces a condition for a real deliberative democracy. Ruddick quotes the enthusiasm of many authors exalting the value of public spaces, that enable random encounter between individuals. But she takes up the feminist argumentation and criticizes this exaltation of the difference for letting think that everyone come in the public sphere with the same possibilities of action. The public sphere can not be considered as a realm inhabited by universal human beings. It is much more the place where individual identities are being constructed, and categories being defined. And this is a permanent process, the categories are constantly moving, interacting with each other. What happens in public spaces is always more complicated than any theoretical version.
William Bunge shows some distance with theories also, and he manifests it in taking a radical position as a geographer. He resolutely considers his discipline as a practice, so that we could link it to the action research. A research has to be useful to the people who are being studied : the object of the research should be able to use the research itself in order to act as a subject.
Acknowledging the primacy of that subject, it becomes obvious that there can't be any good plan in the sense usually shared among planners. Only subjects, only a community can build a space, adapt it constantly to its own life. There is no definitive plan, the only criterion is the capacity to be modifiable, adaptable.
By focusing on the action, Bunge's method really takes in account the power of the categories underlined by Ruddick. Beyond the try of a theoretical deconstruction, he changes the role of science and the relation between scientists and public. Categories and myths are called into question. Even if Bunge does not think the gendered repartition of work (proposing a bus for workers and a second one for housewives), he largely questions the racial aspect of the development of slums. The term of slum itself, although not directly, is being deconstructed. In order to enable things and thought to change, perceptions have to change. We see a struggle around the perception of a neighborhood as slum : it becomes a slum when everyone, from institutions to inhabitants, is projecting the category of slum on it. We could continue the demonstration and show that there is no inner identity of a slum.
The other aspect when generalizing Bunge's study is his explanation on the cycle of slums. The financial reasoning behind it is more actual than ever, and the cartographic representation of money transfers from poor to rich makes the whole demonstration, if somewhat simplified, very efficient.