Jennifer's review of The Death and Life of Great American Cities
The Death and Life of Great American Cities (Modern Library Series) by Jane Jacobs
Jennifer's review
rating:
bookshelves:
conservation
recommended for:
People interested in the preservation of walkable communities
status:
Read in January, 2006
I recommended the Modern Library Series printing because it has a really nice forward that gives an uninitiated Jacobs reader some background as to why she's so amazing.
Back in 1961 when Jacobs first wrote this book, she was already a wipsmart critic of architecture in big bad NYC. She was a pioneer of urban diversity and humanistic management of cities. Even though Death and Life is over 30 years old, it is still so relevant to our rapidly expanding urban communities. I think it's especially vindicating (in an unfortunate way) to see that the cities who applied her basic model of urban planning (Vancouver BC for example) have thriving downtown communities, whereas cities that haven't are failing miserably (Seattle, WA) in the sense of having a truly viable, livable urban center.
I gave this book only 4 stars because it's at times difficult to push through some of the more mundane (but necessary) data.
Back in 1961 when Jacobs first wrote this book, she was already a wipsmart critic of architecture in big bad NYC. She was a pioneer of urban diversity and humanistic management of cities. Even though Death and Life is over 30 years old, it is still so relevant to our rapidly expanding urban communities. I think it's especially vindicating (in an unfortunate way) to see that the cities who applied her basic model of urban planning (Vancouver BC for example) have thriving downtown communities, whereas cities that haven't are failing miserably (Seattle, WA) in the sense of having a truly viable, livable urban center.
I gave this book only 4 stars because it's at times difficult to push through some of the more mundane (but necessary) data.
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