New New New Urbanism

There's hope yet. This Philly Inquirer article shines an optimistic spotlight on John Norquist, the new president of the Congress for New Urbanism. At a recent talk, he espoused growing urban cities better, instead of focusing on suburbs, and did not even mention the exlusive New Urban communities of Seaside, Florida.

People view New Urbanism with skepticism reserved for elites, and rightly so, for New Urbanists have traditionally been an incredibly elite group. (Recent posts on a list-serve hosted by Andres Duany, considered one of the primary founders of New Urbanism, were titled "vernacular invention," "classists in paradise," and the most puzzling "elephants and shrews", which was really a discussion about cars vs. transit, though one would never guess.) But appointing John Norquist is a new light in the intellectual fog.

For example, I really agree with the idea that fighting chains in dense downtowns is not a viable solution in a free market system. However, granting the go-ahead to a chain gives the city enormous bargaining power, which it should totally cash in. Cities should stipulate where the store will go (how about large infill?), how profits will be re-invested in the community, and how the storefront will work to make the traditional box store one that becomes a place for the community.

It's true, functionally, the box stores are not much different than the department stores that anchored downtown districts (there was a Macy's at Union Square, back in the day) but the department stores worked hard to make their retail transparent, to bring activity from the street inside, and to spill interior activity outside. It was about being part of the community, not only about making money, and old-fashioned department stores recognized that being part of the community by providing a nice place to go, shop, eat, and socialize, helped them make money. Time to bring back that standard.