Saved by beth and
The Death and Life of Great American Cities
Death and Life became the most famous book on urban planning. It is fundamentally about the natural origins and benefits of “the spontaneous order.” Written a third of a century after Euclid normalized centralized planning, Death and Life rejected that precedent, arguing that throughout human history, cities had been built on spontaneity, with... See more
What’s Next for Jane Jacobs' Sidewalk Ballet?
Author and activist Jane Jacobs argued that cities thrive when they mingle “everyday diversity of uses and users in its everyday streets.”
Brendan Boyle • Spain's fix for a lonely planet
This order created uncoordinated systems that worked, without staff, as if by magic. Such was Jacobs’s “Sidewalk Ballet.” With density, she argued, came “eyes on the street,” a community-based security system that required neither barbed wire nor an extensive police presence. With wide sidewalks comes trusted interactions, even with strangers—a... See more