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The Great Inversion and the Future of the American City
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In The Great Inversion and the Future of the American City we travel the nation with Alan Ehrenhalt, one of our leading urbanists, as he explains how America’s cities are changing, what makes them succeed or fail, and what this means for our future.
Just a couple of decades ago, we took it for granted that inner cities were the preserve of immigrants and the poor, and that ...more
Just a couple of decades ago, we took it for granted that inner cities were the preserve of immigrants and the poor, and that ...more
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Hardcover, 288 pages
Published
April 24th 2012
by Knopf
(first published January 1st 2012)
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Laced with racist dogwhistling and factual errors, the book was not worth my time, especially when there are very rich and rooted histories of cities to choose from. FTS.
I seem to enjoy books on Urban Planning - it is like chaos theory - you instantly can see if urban planning was effective, but no idea which variables matter for success. There are so many spectacular failures in urban planning and so few successes that it should be easy to figure out. But the professionals, real estate developers, have always known it is "all local" and what works in one area is a miserable failure in the next.
Ehrenhalt's book is based on simple observation - central cities ar ...more
Ehrenhalt's book is based on simple observation - central cities ar ...more
I agree with this book's premise. While urban planning books can be dry, if not tedious, reads, The Great Inversion is much more enjoyable. The author literally takes things to the street level to illustrate his primary argument. So why the two stars? It may be simple and petty, but there was a glaring error early in the book that completely frustrated me page after page. That error is literally the size of a lake. A Great Lake, in fact: Lake Huron.
The author goes into a comparison between Chic ...more
The author goes into a comparison between Chic ...more
In a nutshell, the demographics of American cities are reversing: Young, affluent white people are moving to the inner city, and minorities & immigrants are being pushed to the outer neighborhoods and suburbs. As someone who lives in a moderately gentrified, sometimes dicey neighborhood in a large city, this is interesting, and it raises some moral questions.
For instance, gentrification is often seen as a good thing. It's hard to argue against lower crime rates, new restaurants, and people walki ...more
For instance, gentrification is often seen as a good thing. It's hard to argue against lower crime rates, new restaurants, and people walki ...more
Ever since my brother and I played "SimCity" in the late-1980s, I've been a closet city planner, so every now and then, I pick up a general book on the subject. The last was a manifesto on the "New Urbanism" by Andres Duany, Elizabeth Plater-Zybek and Jeff Speck, so it's been a few years.
Ehrenhalt pulled me in immediately with his idea, namely, that in American cities are beginning to see a reversal of the trend toward the suburbs, especially among the young upper middle class. I was hooked afte ...more
Ehrenhalt pulled me in immediately with his idea, namely, that in American cities are beginning to see a reversal of the trend toward the suburbs, especially among the young upper middle class. I was hooked afte ...more
A book to make the Mike Davises of the world wretch, which I happened to enjoy very much. As much as I appreciate the strain of urban scholar who ruminates on doom; ecological, cultural, etc., it's nice to read something written from a semi-excited amoral perspective where urban change is concerned. Having grown up in the Los Angeles area, which Davis covers with great aplomb, post apocalyptic reality is fairly workaday, especially when the forest fires are burning. So, Ehrenhalt's book with all
...more
This book starts out as a typical treatise on urbanism, seeking to explain the causes and consequences of millions of Americans moving back to formerly deserted inner city neighborhoods. However, after the first chapter, the author moves in to some new territory. He looks at the present position and future prospects of suburbs, as well as ways to redesign suburbs to make them more urban. He also discusses the role of immigration in revitalizing both cities and suburban districts.
The author compa ...more
The author compa ...more
TL;DR: People who can live where they choose, especially the young/educated/affluent, are more frequently choosing to live in cities. (Why? Erm…) Some cities have successfully harnessed this trend (New York, Chicago), but others have not (Cleveland, Philadelphia). Why? Erm…
I learned so much reading this book and there is a fascinating chapter on Philly.
Interesting book and concept. Early examples we're good, but the latter chapters we're stretches to fit the concept.
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This month, I came across "The Great Inversion and the Future of the American City," by Alan Ehrenhalt, while perusing through the library. The book examines a shifting demographic pattern in major cities. In the past, a city's downtown has generally been a place of poverty, ghettos, and the like. The American Dream lay in the suburbs, far away from the less affluent residents of the city. This is completely unique to American cities. Nearly everywhere else in the world, a city is wealthier, saf
...more
Alan Ehrenhalt does great work of bringing in a number of case studies to demonstrate the trend of demographic inversion, an alternate, or maybe supplemental, perspective to gentrification. He successfully compares a number of American cities (and their suburbs) to the European cities of a century ago that we so romanticize. I appreciate how he sets the context for each new area we visit to explain different facets of demographic inversion.
My only real criticism is that this was published almos ...more
My only real criticism is that this was published almos ...more
A shallow mind which has a hard time comprehending the present prophesizing about the future.
Chapter one opens with
> IN THE LAST QUARTER of the twentieth century, as poverty, violence, and abandonment settled over most of the big cities in America […]
Right. Compared with the late 19th century when people in the American cities had two cars, heaters and air conditioning, back in the 18th century when obesity and diabetes were common among teens, 99% of which survived into their teens. Right.
Chapter one opens with
> IN THE LAST QUARTER of the twentieth century, as poverty, violence, and abandonment settled over most of the big cities in America […]
Right. Compared with the late 19th century when people in the American cities had two cars, heaters and air conditioning, back in the 18th century when obesity and diabetes were common among teens, 99% of which survived into their teens. Right.
One of my all time favorites. Easy to read but not a simple book. Great introduction to urban development theories. Very matter-of-fact story telling. Not weighted down by fluff. Incredibly interesting.
Insightful
Very readable and quite thorough as far as covering the variety of urban/ suburban situations. I was able to add some coherence to a number of things I already knew and/or believed in sociological terms beyond the scope of this book.
Very readable and quite thorough as far as covering the variety of urban/ suburban situations. I was able to add some coherence to a number of things I already knew and/or believed in sociological terms beyond the scope of this book.
Great book for urbanists who want to explore how US cities have been changed. One prominent takeaway from this book is that the future of cities is the future of our world. This book is a must read to anyone who pursues urban studies.
Very well written and researched book - wish I had read it earlier!
I probably read this a few years too late, but some of the predictions seem to be coming through.
Engaging read that is pretty interesting, taking a fair look at the suburbanisation of cities and what has happened to inner cities.
Great read for anyone interested in the forces behind gentrification
Alan Ehrenhalt has written a fascinating account what he calls a recent "demographic inversion" - not, thank you, "gentrification" - in which immigrants now tend to enter American society via the suburbs rather than the core city, the poor abandon or are driven from the core city into the suburbs via loss of livelihood, taxes, and buyouts, and those who can afford it take up residence in the urban core for entertainment, social amenities, and quicker commutes. Ehrenhalt provides a variety of dif
...more
Excellent book of writing advice. I love Writer’s style. Highly recommend for other.
well written look at changing cities & suburbs with examples from Houston, Charlotte, Chicago & others
Having read The Death and Life of American Cities years ago, this was really interesting. I find the premise intriguing and possibly quite true.
One fault I find with the book is that he spends so much time explaining his example cities and not enough explaining his actual thesis. In jumping from example to example I don't know whether he's saying the specifics of a given case are in line with his theory or that they're an exception that proves the rule or what. It's a bit like listening to a p ...more
One fault I find with the book is that he spends so much time explaining his example cities and not enough explaining his actual thesis. In jumping from example to example I don't know whether he's saying the specifics of a given case are in line with his theory or that they're an exception that proves the rule or what. It's a bit like listening to a p ...more
Pro-gentrification. Let market forces work things out. Whenever Alan Ehrenhalt describes demographics, he uses racists dog whistling language ( true CNN and The New York Times uses the same language all time, but somehow I expect more from books)
So when he's writing about Center City ( in Philiadlehia ) Ehermhalt goes on and on about how great the affluent white class is how they make city life great. When every he writes about African American neighborhoods or Hispanic neighborhoods , he uses ...more
So when he's writing about Center City ( in Philiadlehia ) Ehermhalt goes on and on about how great the affluent white class is how they make city life great. When every he writes about African American neighborhoods or Hispanic neighborhoods , he uses ...more
In 1994 my husband and I bought a house in a charming little town we ironically called Mayberry (see, if you called the local police station after 5 pm there wasn't anyone in. You could either leave a message or call 911 for assistance.) Quaint. Soon after, my long interest in architecture expanded to include urban planning and I read a number of books on the subject and became an admirer of the New Urbanists. Since then I've paid attention to local mixed use developments, and less to what was h
...more
I read this book by Alan Ehrenhalt immediately after reading The Lost City, and while this book leaves behind the moral and historical perspective of that earlier book, and very explicitly focuses on current demographic and urban trends, I nonetheless see a connection. In The Great Inversion, Ehrenhalt points to data (both systematic and anecdotal) that shows a change in American life, with a greater sense of urbanity, and a greater desire for density and the kind of "civic" interactions usually
...more
This book is full of zesty and easy-to-read essays about the improvement of some (but not all) urban neighborhoods and the diverstification of suburbia. Unfortunately, it is not fact-checked as well as one might like.
His first error was in page 4, where he writes that my home town of Atlanta "came within a few hundred votes of electing a white Republican mayor." White, yes- Republican, no. (Mary Norwood's opponents accused her of being a Republican, but she says she is an independent). He writes ...more
His first error was in page 4, where he writes that my home town of Atlanta "came within a few hundred votes of electing a white Republican mayor." White, yes- Republican, no. (Mary Norwood's opponents accused her of being a Republican, but she says she is an independent). He writes ...more
I bought this book on the cheap from Amazon, for I am, for some odd reason that I cannot exactly explain, fascinated by the planning of cities; possibly it was the years of my youth that I spent playing SimCity and Civilation and all of the sequels for these games. That being said, I was very much intrigued by what Alan Ehrenhalt, obviously an expert in the area of city-planning, had to say about modern American cities. Ehrenhalt displays a keen understanding of the challenges that large (and no
...more
"The 1800 census shows that the four lower Manhattan wards housed 22,871 people, which was more than a third of New York's total population. The 1970 census managed to find 833 residents in the same territory, many of them living in poverty in single-room occupancy hotels. ... By the turn of the twenty-first century, the lower Manhattan population had recovered its 1800 numbers. Then, to the surprise of much of the city's real estate industry, it began to explode. A decade later, the skyscraper
...more
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ALAN EHRENHALT was the executive editor of Governing magazine from 1990 to 2009. He is the author of The United States of Ambition, The Lost City, and Democracy in the Mirror. In 2000, he was the recipient of the American Political Science Association's Carey McWilliams Award for distinguished contributions to the field of political science by a journalist. He is currently Information Director at
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