Change requires believing in our own ability to adapt.
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San Francisco's Mission District is an example of everything that makes a Strong Town work: incremental development, urbanism oriented to people rather than cars, a deeply rooted local economy, and a distinctive sense of place. It's also in peril because of decades of collective failure to allow more places like it to be built.
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Urban environments full of fine-grained detail, hidden nooks and crannies and narrow passages are memorable, lovable places that stimulate our sense of play and adventure. They are a way to use land more intensively and productively without building monolithic, outsized developments. A historic artists' colony nestled in a residential neighborhood in Florida provides an example.
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Last week, I pointed out some silly public space investments. This week, I'm working on some better ones. Here's a sneak preview of things to come.
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The idea of asking developers to contribute to public space is excellent (perhaps essential). By the looks of it, this has resulted in millions upon millions of dollars invested in places to sit or frolic. Too bad it keeps ending up in places where no one would actually want to linger... Imagine if we took all that wasted investment and directed it toward building more spaces that make people happy.
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Walking the tightrope of Strong Citizenship came to the fore this week after I re-read a short research article from grad school. At the time, I had highlighted the key points in a very theoretical way, ready to work them into an exam paper on the challenges of community involvement. Reviewing the paper again, I realized this is my life now. This is my life.
Make no mistake, we are not Tinkerbells. Hard work, not pixie dust makes a place feel magical. And while at times we enjoy this work immensely and it can even define us, the challenge remains, how to get paid?
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