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32
wrote Edward
C.
Banfield
tn
his
Unheavenly City,
"a transportation
technology [that ubiquitous automobile
again !], and a distribution of
in~ome
... thc city and its hinterland must
develop according to a predictable
pattern and ... even an all-wise and all–
powerful government could not change
this pattern" (page 24).
A New App.roach
Is thcre no hope, then, to eliminate
the wretched type of
city
we have today?
Yes, there is hope - there is a way to
have bountiful cities.
8111
man m11st change something in
his approach
toward life! H e must re–
evaluate his concepts concerning the size
of cities, how the auto is to be uscd,
and most important, the
pNrpoJe
a
city should serve.
Building more freeways and express–
ways is not going to solve the city prob–
lem. It will intensify the congestion by
allowing more people to commute.
Picccrneal urban renewal projects are, at
best, cutting out a piece of the canccr -
but the patient has not been healed. He
is still sick, and his disease is becorning
terminal.
America alone has spent $8.2
BIL·
LION
in the last 20 years on urban
renewal. But even so, the rclentless
march toward the death of citics in the
U. S. and around the world has not bcen
halted.
Unti l we are will ing to evaluate ouc
transportation technology, the con–
gestion of manufacturing, our assembly–
line pcoduction, our centralization of
populations, we will never have happy
cities. Our problems will simply become
more acute.
However, changing these aspects of
our society is only
half
the solution.
The other half concerns thc people
themselves. It is, after all, the people
who make up a city. The growth Jogic
has not caused crime. People cause
crime. The growth logic has not caused
unconcern for neighbor. People become
unconcerned. But of course, the envi–
ronmental conditions
DO
gravely affect
humans. They desperately do
NEED
to
be improved. Yet, it is the human spirit
which needs the improvement even
more.
The
PLAIN TRUTH
This is proveo by a classic Canadian
case.
Better Conditions- More Crime
Regent Park South in Toronto was
once hailed as a noble experiment in
public housing. Today, it is
proven
to
be a colossal failure.
Why ? Because of many of the
PEOPLE
who live there.
In the 1950's, 450 run-down houses
were leveled on a
27-acr~
site. The idea
was: "Give people better housing and
their problems will be solved."
This idyllic dream was soon shat–
tered. Today, passers-by can see hun–
dreds of broken windows. lnside, there
is human excremcnt in damaged eleva–
toes.
Walls and floors are charred. The
project is fiJthy and crime-ridden.
Here's a scoreboard of problems at
Regent Park South:
"Two of every three tenants are dis–
satisfied with the place....
"Half of them have had to call the
police wi th a variety of complaints....
"Hal f have had to call janitors and
security guards about teen-age rowdyism
and vandalism.
"One out of four families has been
confronted by sexual deviation in sorne
forro" (D avid Allen,
T
oronto Star,
December
7,
1968) .
One woman in the project says: "l'm
deathly afraid to go to the drug store in
the evening. I'm afraid I might be
beaten to a pulp by those noisy, igno–
rant teen-agers."
I t is people - human beings with
criminal tendencies - that are
caming
the jungle conditions in our cities.
If
a
person is a criminal in a broken-down
tenement, the chances are he will still
be criminal in a beautiful new apart–
ment complex. He must acquire a
totally oew set of values, a new way of
life.
That is why the
s11b11rbs
are now
experiencing a faster crime-rate growth
than the central cities. Congestion and
racial tensions, drug-taking are invading
the suburbs. Jncreasingly, we find racial
confrontations in
smaller towns.
Few realize that the central cities of
today were, in fact, the suburbs of yes–
terday. And the suburbs of today will
be the ghet tos of tomorrow.
December 1970
That is why reform programs, mov–
ing to the suburbs, building new ci6es,
wil1 not work unless there is also a
change
in the human miad.
The T wo Solutions
Ultimately, then, we shall never solve
the dilernrnas of our ci ties unless we
have effective government and changed
human beings. Implementiog piecerneal
urban renewal merely treats the effects.
It
may ternporarily alleviate as a drug.
But it cannot ultimately cure the
problems.
Edmund
K.
Faltermayer, Associate
Editor of
l'ortune
magazine, hit upon
thc above-mentioned solutions to the
city crisis when discussing a proposal to
limit the size of cities:
"This kind of proposal ... would
have to be implemented by means of
authoritaritm controls,
foc
ít would
require a reversa! of certain trends at
work in our society as well as
a change
in hllfiUI/1 nat11re" (Redoing Americe/,
pages 95-96).
George Romney, Secretary of U. S.
Department of Housing and Urban
Development saw the same need. Quot–
ing President Nixon's inaugural speech,
Romney said: " 'We find ourselves rich
in goods, but cagged in spirit.' Ours is
'a
CRISIS OF THE SPIRJT' -
and, he
added, 'to a crisis of the spirit, we need
an answer of the spirit.' ...
"1 believe," continued Romney, "that,
with an answer of the spirit from public
officials and the people, we can build
the most livable, fulfilling, and beautiful
cities thc world has ever seen."
And Secretary Romney is absolutely
correct! We could have the most beau–
tiful and fulfilling cities in the world
IF
- and it is a big
IF -
human nature in
both leaders and people were changed.
In the near future - although in a
way few suspect - this change is com–
ing. We
sha/1
have beautiful cities.
Holl'
this change will be brought
about is explained in our free reprint
article, "An Excitíog Preview of Tomor–
row's Cities." It shows in detail how
tomorrow's cities will be beautiful and
livable
and what changes must
occur in society, government and in the
human spirit to make tomorrow's cities
a reality. O