Over the seas a man was declaring his faith

Mass production of cars influenced the settlings of American cities already in the 1920s. Moses spiced it up by establishing Jones Beach, where summer guest could enter only by car, because the bridges on the parkways were built too low for buses - decidedly purposely. But it was not the first car-dependant affair. Country Club Plaza - the world's first out of town shopping center - accesible by car was already established. And that was just the beginning. After the World War Two mass suburbanization was haunting farmlands in the US. Thousands of square miles of farmland was turned into fileds of houses. Cheap long term housing and zoning were the keywords in fast & king-size suburbanization. Acoording to Gottdiener zoning was evident already in the 1700s in Boston, where gunpowder warehouse was moved away from the city center. Hall marks it with early 1880s in California. These two dates differ by 180 years, but it does not matter. What matters is that it is not a modern phenomenon! Zoning has been a peculiar character of cities for many centuries maybe even longer.
Next to zoning is important cheap housing in suburbanization process. In the 40s one family made history - The Levitts.
They built fast and plenty, due to standardized design, prefabricated components, new materials+tools, good marketing. People lined up to have a home in Levittown! People used to line up when they could get something that was rare -like hoses during the soviet times in Estonia. So why should not americans line up for a cheap american dream house! Levitts furfilled 82 000 people's desires. It is one of the clearest examples of housing as part of (mass)consumption.
But suburbs were mainly occupied by whites, who had all the necessary 'virtues' - shiner, car, white skin. This kind of radical 'migration' of people from the central cities to the peripheral areas transformed strongly the existing settlements. 'Hobgoblins' are according to Gottdiener: government programs, economic prosperity and failure in establishing the regional planning. All that led to unleashing the formation of Multi-centered Metropolitan Region.
Multi-centres are also 'multiforms'. Options are many - based on consumption, consumption, consumption, production, residential/recreational life. During the 1948 - 82 census used another term - Major Retail centers - to describe the situation, where consumption temples concentrated within city centers and suburban region centers. Overgrown consumerism has created more and more public space, but this space is rather worthless. According to EMORs survey about 77% of people love to shop in the big shopping centers. The continous line of 'The biggest...', 'The best supplied...', 'The cheapest prices...' labels puffed consumers holy places have become substitutes for streets (shopping streets), parks, cafes, cultural events, living, breathing spaces (multifunctionalshoppingcenter=stores+cafes+bars+restaurants+hairdressers+marts+spas+apartments+hotels+bus stations+cinemas+events like 'shopping night', 'Hullud päevad', 'Fashion shows', 'School market', 'Christmas market'...and it goes on and on). And it all is festooned with the reality that shopping places are accidentally, comfortably in the center of crossings of different places and streets.

Pasi Mäenpää asked in his performance in series of Urban Study and Action Lectures:' Has public space come to an end?'
Probably not, but it is in a fragile state, due to peoples choice based on reorganization/redefinition of public space. Altough consumerism has shaped the cities firmly since the first department stores were established (1904 Wertheims Department store in Berlin, the first in Europe), the situation has never been so drastic and worrisome. Maybe Chicago School was right all the way. Maybe city is afterall a product of human nature! And as Mäenpää interpreted Greetz and pointed out, the city as the public consumeristic space is the story we tell of ourselves to ourselves.
I hope all the exhausted, something special, extraordinary, remedial seeking self delusional souls will find peace!
But...
....before it all went so wrong a man - Ebenzer Howard was 'preaching' about peacful and human scale Garden Cities - the best of countryside and city combined togheter and Geddes was 'saving the world' on this side and on another side of the eastern hemisphere.
He had a figuered out the important feature of planning - the starting point - survey. And every surveyor has his instruments. Geddes had Outlook Tower! and a vision for anyplace - a local survey center. A center where anyone could observe different kind of relations, as he put it, 'relationship of Le Plays trilogy of Place-Work-Folk'. But Geddes and his ways of planning were judged and marked as causes of errors in national construction. However, positively stubborn Geddes kept on going. Now about 90 years later we have 'Outlook Towers' everywhere where ´modern´ living soul enters. Tough it has gone through metamorphosis due to the development of information technology and everday technolog, it still can be used partly as Geddes desired.

Adaptions

Italo Calvino has described in his American Lectures phenomena which are captivating only because they are irregular, not fixed, indistinct, not seizable with a moment, like clouds in the sky. City is same kind.
Le Corbusiers geometrical La Ville Radieuse (1933) was plotted attempt to kill the spatial mosaics of different eras and to make the city predictable and transparent. Only one of ´La Ville Radieuses´ - in Roehampton was shaped into reality.
Le Corbusiers 'killer thought' 'We must build on a clear site' could only bring clear hate in citizens hearts. Altough he was able to forsee the growth of automobiles and the growing need for public transportation, he somehow thought that since the center of a city is also heart of the business, the wide avenues must be driven through the centres and over the history. This man with manic great visions and great fiction name did not think about garaging all these cars and not to mention the environmental concerns.

Also some dictators like Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin (also a man who loves to entitle himself) were infected with the harrowing need of showy avenues. Apart from Corbusiers fantasy Il Duce established (1932) a wide parade avenue, obviously to satisfy megalomaniac needs, over the ruins of Foro Romano-heart of Roman Empire.

And Hitler, who fancied grand avenues and attached manic importance in planning to them. Hitlers obsesseion the east-west axis was completed by russians in their sector after the war and notoriously and ironically named Stalinallee (Steelavenue).

After reading different texts about Le Corbusiers work i have come to a comprehension that he as a planner had all the qualifications to be someones architect in ordinary, like Hitler had Speer and Mussolini had Piacentini. I guess we must be thankful he did not have a power-loving master in flesh, beacause as David Byrne in 'Understanding Urban' alarms with his silent words:'Plans are never merely representations. They are intended action.'
Megalomania can be found in many heads and in different outcomes. 'Geddes goes to India' equals for me 'Geddes goes insane'. Insane in the best sence - he sails to India in 1914 at the age of 60!! and tries to help India with all the possible means he has at his disposal. His thinking 'Everything to the soil' was clever, because he did not think has European, but adjusted his thinking to another cultural context. 'Garden Villages' idea had 'prototypes' like Hampstead and Ealing, but Geddes wanted to adapt this idea to Indian conditions. He described this healing process of India as the oportunity of his life as a townplanner. He was 'cultivating' in India the planning philosophy of the sixtys in the first quarter of the twentieth century. But pathfinders have almost always the same destiny, they are overlooked and unheard or ignored as 'cuckoos' or 'crank who do not know his subject' in the case of Geddes.
About 60 years later in 1975 - Saab driving architect Rod Hackney - was trying to understand the needs of a small group of residents and was swinging his finger at architects and saying:'...We, the architects, got it terribly wrong in the 60s.' Hackneys community design was first of all understanding peoples needs!, secondly working with them under their instructions and guidances in the need of making their voices to be heard by approval/rejection powers.

In 1984, nine years later even Prince Charles was agreeing with him and was comfortably leaning to the 'community design' in his speech. After a mans lifetime, akcnowledgment also 'fell to Howards and Geddeses lot'.
But that was not a happy ending of urban! Postindustrial period kept on devastating former industrial countries with no mercy. Between 1971 and 1991 London lost around half of all their industrial jobs. The side effects of postindustrialisation were redeployed+redundant people and redeployed+redundant land. Changes in economy changed the practise of urban land use. Increased/changed capital mobility made possible transnational corporations, which labor was scouted out around the world and offcourse at the lowest possible price. And the lowest possible price was paid also to workers. We have clothe brands which mark their clothes with a message to the consumer:'no child labour used'! Why? Not because consumer is thickheaded, but hungry and suffers from selective responding (responding to the cheap price but not to the production 'story'). I am sure that if someone buys a TV which is made in China he can not leave out a very high possibilty that these cheap consumer products were produced by underpaid workers, maybe even by childlabor in inadequate working conditions. And if one does not think of it he surely will after buying this TV and watching certain documentals! This kind of selective responding is part of the problem.

Rowthorn and Ramaswamy conclude:'... deindustrialization is a result of the globalization of markets...'

Consumer carousal in this changing urban scene is tricky, tricky. Hannigan's Fantasy City is a case extraordinary. It is a theme-o-centric, branded, 24-hour, modular, solipsistic, postmodern, experience. And we all have had it in some shake.

It smells like money.

And since this experience is compact, dense and deliverd with in limited time you might get an 'hangover'. But according to Byrne it has its significance. Branded fanatsy is linked to high culture through herritage. But still, why do people support and keep on experiencing fantasy city?

Mainly because it helps you to plug in to fantasy and out of real - l i g h t l y!

Breadwinners and their stories

(Im)Migration as a trigger of some kind of a problem pops out too plus many times. America (somehow) has been a land of dream come true from the distance=from the home(land) for many (im)migrants. On the spot not so much. The city of the permanent underclass decodes the end of 20th century and 21th century situation in America and in Uk very skilfully. The same year when America was experiencing economic crisis, Little Sicily/Little Hell was 'discovered' as Chicagos main florishing loculus of bootlegging, hijacking, criminal gangs. This enclave was 'operated' by 15 000 ex-peasants who moved from Sicily to America. They changed their homeland for America and lived on as sicilians, but their offsprings did not succseed in keeping their 'ethnic baggage'. Living in two social worlds led to a 'cultural hybrid' or as Park suggested a 'Marginal Man'. Solidation of their 'ethnikos' was part of the price of the american bread.
American cities were captivating and escape worthy for many others also. Their desire for better life took a shape of Greektown, Chinatown or an original new born ghetto. The percentage of black people in the cities of America grew firmly during and after the World War One. Black people started to migrate from rural areas to urban areas, mainly to ghettos in the end of 19th century, this process was quite still til 1940. Then ghettos started to widen. Even Elvis-The King of rock'n'roll was singing about ghetto and its vicious circle (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_n3ebuL1cPA):'As the snow flies, On a cold and gray chicago mornin, A poor little baby child is born, In the ghetto.......' *
In the beginning of 20th century industry 'swallowed' rural inhabitants pleasingly. For example, 65 000 blacks from the rural areas went to Chicago during the period of 1916-1918, mostly to be servants of modern industry. After the war and return of white soldiers blacks situation got worse. The history has preserved plenty of facts and photos about the first incidents and riots, involving whites, blacks, intimidation, insolts, but conclusions are still not concluded, numerous theorys have been written and told but i am not in the position to pick the one which makes the most sence probably for me and to declare it in the characters of my writing.

Even tough blacks are suffering in the cities compared to whites the number of blacks keeps growing for some reason. For example in the beginning of ninties the white majorities were only 51% in Philadelphia and 58% in Boston. After this kind of black and white figures Gottdiener brings up the best question of his book:'Where did the white people go?' and with the same attractive simplicity he answers:'To the suburbs.'
Since the 1950 suburbanization has shaped the cities. By the 1970 most of the Americans lived in suburbs and in the cities - blacks.
Why?
Because they could not suburbanize so quickly mainly for poverty and racial discrmination which also comprehends 'collective action racism' and 'white flight'. In the case of the white flight inner city whites pay more to live in all white suburban communities. They are willingly willing to pay and with the same kind of will they are ready to use even threats of violance, racial zoning, restrictive covenants and policy instruments in the case of collective action racism in order to keep the blacks out and all that for the sake of eating blood-white bread in the white neighbourhood.
Another curiosity is that blacks on average have to pay more for rental housing than whites, but less for urban housing. But if poevrty is a squatter in ones wallet then there are two 'popular' choices slum or shanty town. Slum consists of everything inadequate (public services, housing, medical care, educational care...) as does shanty town but it has also lots of informal and unofficial somethings (house, means, materials...). Villa miserias come into being because it has affordable housing for poorly paid working class and for rural migrants. But where is need there is satisfaction waiting to be discovered. And so have done inhabitants of Villas miserias. Urban migrants have started small business enterprises and thanks to the global economy subcontracting helps to create new manufacturing jobs and to give a slice of global economic bread to shanty town residents. But when the new job creation is nonsufficient may emerge informal economy. It means that workers may be undocumented and working for barter in an unregulated factory. But as Gottdienr concludes, the poor does not just sit, watch and vegetate, but they are innovative and trying to support themselves. Innovative thinking and acting was also the keyword in the case of Little Hells bootlegging, corrupted innovative approach but still. Even Gottiener has in mind similar innovative managing, like illegal building and sex/drug market. But there are also breadwinners jobs which do not embrace dealing with drugs/prostitution, like production of food, making clothes, undertaking repairs (i imagine that repair of shoes to roofs)...it is still the land of many possibilities as long as one knows how to satisfie his/her 'hunger'.


*'As the snow flies, On a cold and gray chicago mornin, A poor little baby child is born, In the ghetto, And his mama cries, cause if theres one thing that she dont need, Its another hungry mouth to feed, In the ghetto...........Well the world turns, And a hungry little boy with a runny nose, Plays in the street as the cold wind blows, In the ghetto. And his hunger burns, So he starts to roam the streets at night, And he learns how to steal, And he learns how to fightIn the ghetto, Then one night in desperation, A young man breaks away, He buys a gun, steals a car, Tries to run, but he dont get far, And his mama cries, As a crowd gathers round an angry young man, Face down on the street with a gun in his hand, In the ghetto, As her young man dies, On a cold and gray chicago mornin, Another little baby child is born, In the ghetto. '

Era of confused gender types, their spaces, possibilities, commitments, escapes...

There are many factors associated to spatial settlings. In many cases the spatial arrangments(=space) of urban areas are a result of racism and gender domination. According to genders there are masculine space and feminine space. Sex based space boundaries are a silent agreenment, but there are always deserters.
Gendered spaces are connected to culturural and political features pretty obviously. Culture defines the role of a man and a woman, and that in turn defines masculine and femine spaces. Politics/political regime doesnt just stand and watch culture affairs but in many cases adds a bit of restriction/punishment/advantage/...
During the last centuries psychology, Sensitive New Age Guy, gender change operations, androgynes, feminism/Catwoman vs Batman, unisex-, lots of fads and so on have made it quite hard to define a man who is a consumer of masculine space and to define a woman who is a consumer of feminine space, tough stereotypes populate and vegetate.
Societies are accustomed to nurse men with power and that is a vital juice of domination. And domination means obviously domination in a certain space (bar, office, garage...), and this domination defines the nature of the space - feminine or masculine.
Nowadays power is not only a privilege of XY-s. Tough anorexic space consuming is still a problem. Lara Zadors observation about a woman who was apologizing beacause she was taking up too much space in her letter with big characters is sadly funny. It implies to the depth and size of the problem.
The biggest feminine space issue and in some cases even violation is the act of ignoring womans voice when the topic is urban planning. Altough the first clumsy steps are made towards involving regular people in planning process, women/mothers and children are still left aside. But they are the main consumers of a neighbourhood in this era of confused gender types and their spaces, possibilities, commitments, escapes...
The quality of a neighbourhood either fosters crime or helps to avoid it. Jacobs claimed that active city life excludes active `crime life`. Her conviction is supported by the fact that crimes are not spread out evenly. Different kind of crime types take place in the different areas. The higher the crime rate is in some area the less is this area beeing used by non-criminals. In this case the city space is public only formally because the usage is limited.
By Jacobs active and lively street life means commercial businesses open late into the night & coming and going inhabitants. It may prevent crimes which need darkness, shaded corners and no witnesses, but 'light weight crimes' executed by pickpockets and stalls will be present. And by Gottdiener most inhabitants of metropolitan regions are afraid of violent crime and not some much afraid of property crime. But property is not existing inevitability, it has an owner, so property and violent crime may become one in wide-open situation.

Cities witin cities

When analyzers are examining the global city and drying to define it, it seems quite difficult because, what exactly is global city. If I look it simply global city is a city that attends in word wide economy. Global city is a global economy command and control centre. It is a city what is well connected with others that are alike rather with the rest of the national cities. But does the center of worlds command and control of economy does cover whole city? It does not. Global city has two faces. One is the center what is global and the other is behind it. But these analyzers who are examining the city are often concentrating on the centre. And from that are coming mistakes and because of that theories and global city studies are overthrown and remade.
If in history treading needed a physical place that is sited in center of city (because of better accessibility), then now it is changing because of advanced electronics and virtual networks. But still it’s hard to let go of physical site and still these sites are situated in the center of city.
There is something that is common for global city and just big city – that are ghettos and racial segregation. Ghettos are usually placed behind the center and in front of suburb. And the term ghetto is followed by words like poverty, unemployment and substandard housing.
When few decades ago cities were occupied by whites then after sprawl to suburbs became popular the number of whites is getting lower and lower. Now in these areas are living immigrants, minority groups and people who can’t afford to live suburb. One reason why black districts were born, was because of racial discrimination and poverty. They couldn’t afford to by house in suburb. And now things have come to that black people rather live in black district. And this is even deepening the problem of segregation. In districts where are living people from many different nations, segregation problem is much lower but moving to suburbs or blending in with white people is difficult because of poverty.
There are also slums where housing is inadequate and inhabitants are poor. Though the first thing you see is housing, there is inadequate public services, poor medicine and education, lack of professionals. Slum areas, where everything is imperfect, are not common to developed countries, but to developing countries. And usually more than half of city population is living in slums.
Shanty towns are very similar to slums but there are some differences. These are unofficial living areas created by rural migrants. Housing has made illegally and from materials that have been found. And there is nothing but constant health crises, crime, poverty, and no future for next generation because lack of schools. Shanty towns are outcome of absents of low-income households.
Often people who are living in shanty town have a job in another part of city, but they come to live there because of low rent that is affordable for them.
Because these areas are created illegally there is constant threat of demolishment and be replaced with not affordable household. But in India the government has started not to demolish but to improve slums in order to create better living conditions.
For a global city is quite hard to carry out because at the same time to attend on global arena and look after its local inhabitants, is very complicated because of many components. More global and bigger the city is, the more problems have to be solved and the more aspects must be considered.

Spaces

There are many ways to explore space. Like living areas, green areas or market areas. But also we can look space from the point that it’s feminine or masculine. Thru history most or our surrounding space has been masculine – business, political structure and economy has always been area for men and household and raising children has always been area of women.
You may say that after sexual revolution everyone on every space is equal but the truth is still some places are directed to men and some are to women. Masculine spaces are places where traditionally have been more men, like bars, sport stadiums. Thou the number of women visiting these areas are increasing, these spaces are still masculine. Also areas what include danger, as is police, firefighting are masculine space. Female space is for example shopping malls, supermarkets and single family house.
Now the masculine space is under pressure to retreat to accommodate both men and women. Virtual world like movies, magazines and TV are not real places where you can be but these spaces offer a chance to reproduce masculine room that are in treat. Because there is explication what is expected from masculine space to be in world where women are getting more and more space. Before the workspace was area of men but women participation in business is growing with every day.
Thou the female space is increasing there is still hard for masculine world to accept loosing their hold on power. And thou both spaces has been blending to each other power is expected to belong to men.
Space can also separate as dangerous and safe areas in point of violence and crime. Crime is never spread evenly; it’s gathered to some certain locations (usually in poorer areas). The word crime is used in every case thou there is violent crime and poverty crime. And people are more worried about the rate of violent crime in cities and suburbs. The number of violent crime affects use of city space. For example if in public place the rate of crime is raising then the use of area is limited by fear to be a victim. And this may lead to moving out and thru that crime also devastates property values. In bigger cities, the rate of robberies and burglaries are related with use of drugs. Research has shown that fighting against drugs has lead to decline of crime.
But urban space is more than just masculine or feminine space, dangerous or safe areas. Urban space is a constantly developing room what is affected by politic, capital, trends, social activities, architecture, culture ect. Socio-spatial approach is analyzing and investigating different factors what have been and are effecting urban development.

Movements

Different 'movements' have shaped, still shape and will shape the face and nature of urban and rural areas. In the case of a movement of people within national boundaries it means that urban areas suck dry rural areas. Capitalist industrialization started vast relocations of rural inhabitants. Altough the guilty part is known it does not change the extreme and sad sight in rural areas-abondoned cots and farms without a humansoul.

Migration can be accompanied by two other terms. The first one de-territorialization reffers to the large scale migration + migrants are people who suffer under war, famine, political oppression, religous intolerance or/and enduring poverty.

The second term, re-territorialization also comprehends large scale mass movements+ a fact that everyday life stays in the frames of culture of place of origin.

Movement of people across national boudaries has nowadays many varietals. Traditional immigrants apply for permanent entry into other nations. But very often they are dependant on their friends or relatives because they run short in resources. Migrants also often double up with their friends or reltives and that is a beginning of a different problem-'hidden homelessness'.

Another varietal of immigration is - professional and middle class economic immigrants. It started out in the 70s, when US and many European countries accepted immigrants with high level skills.Another difference compared to traditional immigrants is that very often they retain their citizenship and ties to the homeland. Any kind of migration either on a small or large scale creates a situation where immigrants arrive with a certain

'ethnic luggage'and that defines the further tendency of the process. The fact that in London are represented 300 different languages or the city of Miami has become hispanic shows it quite well.
On a smaller and different scale take place urban and suburban social movements which are citizen initiation and the cause is a need of structural changes in social organization. The bulls eye is government. Rapid development is one thing that (sub)urban social movements try to prevent, because it leds to a rapid growth. (Sub)urban inhabitants have a government dependant cure - 'Growth control'-it helps to preserve the quality of life.
Preservation on a larger scale (and not so self-interested) involves architecture with historical/cultural values. Single building or built environment preserves the past. UNESCO has exapanded the concept of preservation object. The objects are already whole cities. But it has a sideeffect - tourism and consumerism. Attempts to show the world rarities and extraordinaries means that fragile palces are temporarly or seasonably overpopulated and instead of preservation takes place 'wear&tear'.

Contrasts

City and suburb differ in many ways. Suburbs are car-dependant, while in the city it is your choice if you drive a car, take a buss or use your feet. Pedestrian culture is a primary quality in the city. William H.Whyte and Jane Jacobs described the importance of pedestrian life in the city as critically important. Whyte declared that sidewalks are a kind of public space and in some parts of the city more than just predescription of the primary function.
Sidewalks are perfect for meeting someone= acquintances/friends/family and then for a little chit-chat or as Whyte called it `schmoozing`. Jacobs on the other hand claimed that active city life excludes active `crime life`. Her dead certainity came from her own Manhattan, Greenwich Village experience, where lively street life ment commercial businesses open late into the night & coming and going inhabitants. Jacobs was convinced that mixture of urban land uses generates more activity for day and night.
Another contrast between the city and suburb is housing. Suburbs are filled wiht single family homes + (1+n)garage. High rise buildings are probably not on the scene contarary to the city. In the cities the neighbourhoods are separated by (high)ways, while in the suburbs ´bushes´ have that role.
Contrasts in the city are caused by different `eras`. `Modernist urbanism` was triggered by capitalist industrialization and exemplified by architects and planners. Industrialization caused considerable relocation of rural inhabitants. They changed the free life of a countryman for a working class life. It was believed that modern life is guaranteed by living in a `cultural capital` like Paris.
International Style (LeCorbusier, Cropius, van der Rohe) was victorious. `Ornament was a crime` and clean geometrical forms were `must do`. Planning was conducted by modernist principles: transportation corridors, skyskrapers and zoning. Le Corbusier practiced ´clean sweep´ philosophy – which was ment for the whole city. Monolithic blocks of houses and fast motorways were a hit. Le Corbusiers two main principles show very well were he was aheaded: ´The plan must rule´ & ´Dissapearance of the street´!
Quite opposite to modernist thinking is Christopher Alexander - he had a belief that natural cities are more interesting and successful than those modern sterilized ´artificial cities´.
After modernists had done their deeds, a lot of criticism and dissapointment was burst open against this ´urban nightmare´.`Get us out of this hell` is more picturesque, than any other form of criticism.
In the 60s & 70s a lot of urban planning theories were conceived – planning theory was shattered into many different theories. Some of them more diversial than others. After Le Corbusiers ´crimes´ in the city planning everyone had an opinion and it was shouted out or writed on the banner.
Also emerged an understanding that planning is an ongoing – continuous process, hence the rejection of blueprint planning. Another important step was made by Paul Davidoff who suggsested that public should have the opportunity to participate in the planning. Sherry Arnstein composed even a ladder of citizen participation, which was quite extreme, because on the bottom of this ladder was nonparticipation and on top the ladder was citizen control.
In the 70s begun a new era of postmodernism. Ornamentation of the exterior and cultural traits were revived again. Pedestrian friendly and full service districts were prefferred instead of car-adoring & pedestrian discouraging modernism. Legacy of both eras is visible to us with its dissimilarities and the contrast is quite strong. ´Sustainable development´ is also a keyword of 70s. Industrialization changed the world in many ways. Negative impacts on the environment are becoming more visible. Altough principles of sustainable development comprises reducing negative impacts of technology production and managment, control of global population growth, protection of natural resources, ensuring employment, food, energy, safe water and sanitary services for all population and changes in planning and policy making, there is something that everyone can do. Everything that is concerning recycling, transportation and household is befitting for everyone.

Connections

City consists of different connections and everything has some kind of affection on something. Some connections are more visible to the eye and closer to us than others.
In many countries are related the crises of public education and the urban crisis. In US the better schools are located in the wealthier areas and in the suburbs. White parents send their children to private or parochial schools. So in the public schools study immigrants or children whos parents have immigrated, but in the US the official language is obviously English and that is one root of the problem. Immigrants and their children have to communicate and study in the second language. These two problems come down to a result where the pupils who study in the city public school are mostly with low educational results and from a poor minority group.
Schools and housing are also connected. In the UK living areas which are near a school are wanted, even real estate agents advertise houses emanating from the distance of a local school.
It is not very uncommon that living areas are seggregated by dwellers income, altough extremes co-exist. Dual housing market is one step further from seggregation by dwellers income, it also includes seggregation by skin color. This kind of discrimination leads to a situation where housing is a privilege. And that in turn predisposes existence of substandard housing. Inhuman conditions like lack of water, electricity or heat make the situation x times worse. Altough in the US the Department of Housing and Urban Devolopment has right to ´chastize´ substandard rental housing providers, the sitiation stays bad. The biggest problem concerning housing is having no house (=home) at all – homlessness. The statsitics about homless people are deceptive – illusive, because migrants double up with relatives and friends. These statistics also do not include mentally ill people, battered women, runaway youths and dwellers of temporary accomodation. But the sad thing is that even these deceptive statistics refer to homlessness as to a global problem. That is one of many faces of uneven development. Who wants can blame capitalism, once again.
Certain housing is is always in a certain neighborhood. According to New Urbanists ´the vitality of a neighborhood requires a balanced mix of functions – housing, shopping, civic institutions and open space.´ But we must keep in mind that the biggest consumers of the neighborhood are the children. And when they have not got much to ´consume´ they spend most of their time at home, doing their everyday ´opusculums´. Another problem is generation of ´pattery children´ who are overprotected and not active+independent in their environment. Cause of the problem is reduction of ´palyground´.
Another group of people we should keep in mind is - ´people with limitation´. Constrictive factor can be disabilty, age or poverty. And all these circumstances should be taken into consideration when changes are made in the neighbourhood.
When the children and elderly people go to bed starts a lot different ´consumption´ of the city. Revolutionary electric lights have made it possible. ´Nightscapes´ and ´nightshifts´ have changed the cities nature. ´24 hour´city ´, 3shift factories´, ´Ministry of Sound´, ´night venues´................................
There are existing two different cities in one – day time city and night time city – ready to be consumed!

Thru history cities have born, developed and extended over long period of time. But development and extending was always related with region location and its agricultural wealth because city can be as big as surrounding areas are capable to feed. Today many things have changed. Turing the last (maybe even in half) century cities have grown faster and bigger than in last three centuries.
This rapid and frequently unorganized growth has lead, especially in developing countries, to overurbanizatsion and all negative effects of rapid growth are experienced very strongly, as a lack of jobs, education and healthcare. Those negative aspects are also experienced in developed counties but not so strongly because from the beginning there has been better planning and partition of resources.
Other distinctive feature for developing countries is primate city. All amenities are draw together in one center and with that people abandon agricultural areas to get their shear of wellbeing but the circumstance that there are too many people, imperfect planning and not enough resources leads to failing of living environment. While there is too many people in one area, lead to that all resources are only targeted to this area and other areas of country are suffering in poverty.
If in developing countries the living areas are extremely densely crowded and stretch out in height then in developed countries is the problem reversal – since the suburbanization became popular cities have started to sprawl. Huge areas filled with single family house blocks. Sprawl is still popular while it’s offering privacy. The paradox is that now when these areas have extended over enormous areas, local population has started to fight against oversuburbanizatsion. But at the same time people and local inhabitants still look for privacy and prefer to live in single family building.
Mass sprawling has lead (for example in US) to environmental problems. City from its nature has been invariably taker (taking from an area that surrounds it). Now sprawling city converts nearest areas into living areas and at the same time destroying good farming areas. And increasing need for cars has lead to growing air pollution, which in turn has helped spread respiratory system illnesses.
One problem is these both areas (developed and developing countries) that inside urban area there is always uneven development. Areas wellbeing does not only depend on an amount of investments but also from the wealth of its inhabitants. So when there is more money circulating there is more possibilities to invest in local social services. Wealthy inhabitants can afford luxury.
Community interests are usually recognized by local government. Historically the power belonged to one specific group of people who possessed areas wealth and all the investments and planning followed their interests (to earn more money). In time the power to govern went from blue-blood to middle-class.
Today it seems that somehow local authorities have lost their way or will to make grand modifications. Maybe it’s because political regimes must do the best they can to supply necessary services while dealing with their dwindling resources. And while urban and suburban areas are fragmented to small pieces there in no well-set cooperation between city districts. So in some ways urban and suburban development and extension depends on local inhabitant participation in planning who in resent years have shown their interest to give their part.

Diseases of the city

Cities are in a constant change. Centuries ago, industry was the iron heart of the town, for the industrialists and for the workers. Residential districts aggregated around industrial areas. City dwellers were sedentary.
Since the 20. century there have been some variations in the usage of the city. In the 1950s suburbanization became a mass phenomenon. This kind of haphazard growth has lead to very sketchy environments: duplication of public services (elementray education, policing, fire fighting), low density and extended regions. Lack of planning is not the only reason of sprawl. Federal government subsidies embolden this kind of growth quite strongly.
Urban and suburban places develop because of capital investment, but capitalism causes also uneven development and since the capital has become more mobile, it is easier to invest and then disinvest in the different places.
Transportation plays also a big role in sprawl. A car gives certain freedom to its user. Freedom to drive any time any where and not to live by a bus schedule. Mass production of cars using gasoline has led to emission of carbon dioxide. This kind of pollution jeopardises earth (global warming) and earthlings ( diseases, like asthma). There are also other social problems related to sprawl: social isolation and obesity, because people are using a car even for a small distance instead of using their feet; erosion and flooding - the precipitation can not penetrate blacktopping and pavements easily and quickly enough; the demise of small farms; extinction of wildlife and unbalancing of nature - cities expand and invade in the wild life area.
Diversity of regions has led to a situation where there are simultaneously existing environments where duplication of public services is very common (haphazard growth) and environments where is quite common lack of education and healthcare facilities, jobs and necessary resources which are the basis of urban progress (overurbanization).
Overurbanization never happend to the advanced industrial societies, because urbanization took place over an extended period of time. So the agricultural areas remained relatively stable. Another important thing is that city development occured with a measured pace. The result is a ´balanced growth´, while the opposite of that - overurbanization refers to a ´primate city´.
There are power elites, like real estate elites and very often power means control over someone or something. In order to have a little bit of balance there is also ´citizen power´ and that means involvment, partnership and even control. According to Arnstein there is also ´non-participation´ and it is the lowest level of participation, where people are simply manipulated. The second level is ´tokenism´ where people are allowed to take part of information meetings. Citizen participation means active involvment in the town planning through discussions and that is necessary, because then both sides interests are represented and hopfully taken under consideration.

In my earlier studies we almost never read texts or had discussions about urbanization. We only look different architectural styles and historical development but we examined very superficially the reasons. Starting to read the books I see that almost every page gives me something new and it gives answers to questions that I have from former. Hence most of this is new perspective for me and from now on my studies I don’t focus on single building but the whole city and by virtue of that I start to see connections between things that on general survey may seem to be very different and unconnected.
Thru history cities have been serving larger areas around – it has been marketplace. The beginning of urbanism term we may read industrial progress, witch contributed fast growth of cities, first manly in England, in the beginning of 19 century. It also brought along impaired living condition for under classes. And from this, group of people from various areas, who were worried about city life (The Chicago School) started to explore the reasons why and how one or another variable affects city and its development. So urbanization tries to understand the rise and fall on cities.
Firs thing that I understand was that under the name of urbanism we can include people from very wide areas on life. It’s not only the domain of architects or real estate companies but it also includes sociology, ecology, economy, politics, common people, environment, communities and technology. And what’s main that the meaning on urbanism term is chaining with every decade. New aspects are added, old theories are forsaken and later overview.
Today’s world we can view urbanization very differently. It can be viewed from local point or from global point. And how the cities and surrounding areas are developing is also related with location and people’s background that are developing and living on the area. Cities (or metropolitans) are growing together with smaller cities that are surrounding them. Central city skyline can be the trademark to attract other countries and their companies to spread their businesses there and with the technological advantage it is possible. We possess fast communication means – fast transportation and internet. Since the first technological intension people have started to spread all around the world to find cheaper ways to produce goods. Nowadays city still is the marketplace but changed have the goods, the area that it’s serving and also the means. What haven’t changed is that city offers quality, quantity and accessibility. As at first the rapidly developing city had devastating influence to its habitants, urbanization now is having ravaging influence to nature such as water, air, noise pollution, toxic waste and also poor or none planning. There are as well nature forces and urban studies are constantly working to find solutions for these problems.

Digest of readings

This report's aim is to describe some of the theoretical links between globalization and urban areas, more precisely their economical potential and the city dweller's role in it.

Globalization has been referred to as a thorough change not only in international economic and financial mechanisms, but as all embracing societal process. Free flow of capital and better means of communication and logistics have introduced new spatial order of socio-economical agents, also creating new ones. The most apparent dimension of this process has been the internationalization of capital flows, the rise of international financial corporations and relocation of manufacturing processes from Western countries to areas less demanding in labor and environmental issues. As a result, a number of urban areas – in Sassen's terms world cities - have become as managerial centres that control the flow of international capital. These urban areas are also seen as leading sites for innovation of technology.

By Writh's definition, the more a place has population, its density and heterogenity or diversity, the more urban it is. Florida connects the aspect of diversity to innovation and through it to economical prosperity. In his researches he sees the mixture of different social and ethnical backgrounds to foster new technological and social solutions and by that to have a positive effect on the competitivness of the area – in this case, urban locus. Here the diversity can also be understood as wider range of possibilities for highly educated or creative (with high social capital) persons to find suitable working positions and spend their leisure time. Earlier thinker Mumford is optimistic about the nature of the urban places as sites of innovation, because urban life is creative, theatrical; stage, that catalyses social interaction among its dwellers. On the other hand, the strength of social relations and interactions has a strong impact on the competitivness of the region, notes Putnam.

Viewpoints mentioned above are somewhat opposing. Writh is pessimistic about urban areas because of their larger denser populations, feeling them to be anonymous, maintaining mostly formal relationships. This amplifies gesellschaft or impersonal or secondary relations, which is considered to have negative consequences for local communities. Weakening of non-formal social links has also been noted by Putnam.

In a sense, the debate is based on antipodal understandings of key terms used. For example, diversity is understood on the one hand to create interesting and innovative social settings, but on the other to result an encapsulation of different social groups because of the differences between them. At the same time it can be said, that heterogenity creates tolerance.

Concepts mentioned above have received sceptic comments. Important critique stems from the technological development, that has brought new possibilities of communicating via cellular phones or Internet. Decreased amount of face-to-face conversation doesn't necessarily mean the lack of primary relations, but it might, as the nature of personal communication is somewhat transformed. Introduction of new technological apparatus for social networking has also blurred spatiality, creating new spaces and communities into cyberspace. This also is a challenge for concepts of new economy, that rely partly on interpreting individual's cultural and social practices.

Ways of Thinking

´Key Concepts in Urban Studies´ is easy to read and the author obviously likes to make generalizations. Some concepts were intresting (Green Belt Policy) and allowed me to draw parallels. Some concepts were bold (Environmental Racism) and some were unconventional and allogeneous (Roland Barthes, City center as a kind of eroticism).

Muuga Aedlinn has its own so called ´Green Belt´, but in a twisted, ironc way. There are naphtha tanks besieging this small suburb. So, this ´Black Gold Belt´ limits the outward growth of the suburb area and most defenitely prevents regional sprawl. Lucky suburbanites!

Environmental Racism is also present in this suburb of Maardu. Naphtha smell fills the streets and houses on daily bases. During the day time it is not so recognizable but when the darkness falls the smell gets stronger. This air pollution is the most obvious, but not the only one. In order to bridle and control the inhabitants of Muuga there is a consolation phonenumber - 1313 - where you can report about the disturbing conditions. And that is the ´cure´ for this problem?!

In general i agree with authors writings about ´Environmental Racism´ but there is something that is confusing. He claims that rich and powerful people are guilty of polluting the earth. So being powerful is a premis to this kind of activity??
There is an old tunnel (probably a bomb shelter) on the very beginning of Laagna Tee in Lasnamäe . It is a place where people (probably not powerful and rich, but the very same people who live near-by in these massive, monotonous panel houses) occasionally storage their houshold waste. Or in Maardu where is a summerhouse district, people have ´garnished´ the road sides with household waste, especially massive loads of baby dipers?!. Dipers dry-rot approximately 75 years and that means – this kind of waste will outlive the user. Is that a legacy that someone really would like to leave to their child or even to their grand-child?
It is not comparable to the pollution of hazardous waste in New York, where people suffered of cancer and birth defects, but the way of thinking of the people who dumped household waste or hazardous waste is similar. They just do not care. The difference is in the scale of pollution, possibilites and in the consequences!
In order to prevent this kind of fatal/mortal errors there has to be a change in thinking.
´The Anarchist Roots of the Planning Movement´ made me think, maybe we should in a way return to these roots. The purpouse is not rebellion but a burning need of change, change in the way of thinking and obviously the action should be in correlation with thinking.

Diary of Reading

Key Concepts in Urban Studies - weekly reports

Reports and discussions to be posted here by students of Urban Studies MA.

Delirious No More

WANING SPACE: I __ NY

By Rem Koolhaas

read the article in Wired magazine here

What happened after New York lost its Deliriousness? Rem Koolhaas has written a short article a few years ago that complements his work Delirious New York.

DIARY OF READING BLOG

People's descriptions and impressions about the books they have read in urban studies field. There could also be suggestions on articles, magazines or whatever readable format sources. Whenever you find yourself touched or untouched by a book, please let us also know about it. And do not forget to add your own analysis or feelings about the content.