Elements of Urbanism: Akron
(http://photos.metrojacksonville.com/photos/592007367_sCZkY-M.jpg)
Metro Jacksonville looks at the downtown of a rust belt city that has successfully diversified its manufacturing based economy into one built on research, financial and high tech sectors: Akron, OH.
Full Article
http://www.metrojacksonville.com/article/2009-dec-elements-of-urbanism-akron
Nice looking city, very clean and polished. I like the Convention Center architecture too. The quaker Mill reuse is pretty inventive too.
The Akron Zips is a top 10 college mascot name.
"The quaker Mill reuse is pretty inventive too."
Inventive yes, but can't seem to make it as a hotel. Two seperate hotels and now owned by the college. But they are going to run it as a hotel until the city replaces the hotel beds. Would have been an interesting clean up project.
Cities of USA are so depressing except NYC.Empty streets,no people,looks like cheesy version of Armagedon.
You cant win against car culture.
What about cities like San Francisco, Seattle, Chicago, Boston, New Orleans, DC, Philadelphia, etc.?
San Francisco
(http://photos.metrojacksonville.com/photos/624968487_3eT7M-M.jpg)
Maybe SF and Chicago,only place Ive seen people 24/7 is NYC.But all those cities are expensive like hell.
Rest of US is car culture,no way anything will ever change.
That doesn't mean that all other US cities are depressing with nothing to offer. The US wouldn't be as powerful and prosperous as it is if that were the case.
(http://inlinethumb14.webshots.com/1037/2461602870104969885S600x600Q85.jpg)
What was in the Art Museum? But of course darling, a 1963 Avanti Motorcar.
OCKLAWAHA
Quote from: Bostech on December 19, 2009, 02:02:08 PM
Maybe SF and Chicago,only place Ive seen people 24/7 is NYC.But all those cities are expensive like hell.
Rest of US is car culture,no way anything will ever change.
Guess you haven't been in New Orleans or St. Augustine or Santa Fe, or Taos, or Reno, or Vegas, or Tahoe, or even Helen Georgia either?http://www.helenga.org/OCKLAWAHA
Quote from: krazeeboi on December 23, 2009, 12:36:11 PM
That doesn't mean that all other US cities are depressing with nothing to offer. The US wouldn't be as powerful and prosperous as it is if that were the case.
Well,people instead of being on street having good time they are at work..working.
I guess that makes you more prosperous but you dont have any fun in life.People in other countries have less but they have more fun and they are happier (based on polling).
So it comes down what you like more,having money and materialistic things or having fun and interacting with people.Somehow you can't have both.Its rule of living life.You either get one or another.Its like women,you either get dumb and pretty or ugly and smart.
Urban life just doesnt seem to work in US,except NYC which has history.
Sure,you can build urban areas,clean it up but unless people start living urban life nothing will change.
I guess its easier just to go and visit NYC or Europe,get some taste of urban life then come back.90% of US will always live suburban lifestyle.
I think you are way off base...there are plenty of cities (small and large) in the U.S. that have vibrant urban street activity....in addition to the ones mentioned above, how about Portland, Greenville SC, Baltimore (Inner Harbor area), Philly, and Boston....and the only one that might qualify as crazy expensive (housing costs only) is Boston!
Quote from: tufsu1 on December 27, 2009, 08:27:54 AM
I think you are way off base...there are plenty of cities (small and large) in the U.S. that have vibrant urban street activity....in addition to the ones mentioned above, how about Portland, Greenville SC, Baltimore (Inner Harbor area), Philly, and Boston....and the only one that might qualify as crazy expensive (housing costs only) is Boston!
I generally agree with Bostech on this issue, there is a HUGE difference in city life that only immigrants and expatriots have really experienced. For example on any given day, even in the upscale shopping districts of Medellin, there are streets/walks so crowded you have to squeeze through the crowds (Jax Landing Style).
The Colombians joke about it:
"The frantic American businessman got in the taxi and to his horror the driver pulls off down a dirt road to a creek and proceeds to start fishing. Waving his hands the American is going crazy, he has a hotel room waiting, big meeting tomorrow and, and, and... The little Colombian Taxista looks up from the Rock he's now sitting on and asks "What is it you Americans do?" By now red in the face the businessman half yells, "I get up at 5am every day, not like YOU, I work from 7am until 8-9 pm everyday, I'm busy damn it, someday I'll take it easy and when I go fishing I'll have a cabin by the creek, but for now, let's get the hell back on the road." The Colombian leans back on his rock and rolls his eyes as he replies, "Oh si, now I understand, you see, that's what I'm doing NOW!"OCKLAWAHA
Quote from: tufsu1 on December 27, 2009, 08:27:54 AM
I think you are way off base...there are plenty of cities (small and large) in the U.S. that have vibrant urban street activity....in addition to the ones mentioned above, how about Portland, Greenville SC, Baltimore (Inner Harbor area), Philly, and Boston....and the only one that might qualify as crazy expensive (housing costs only) is Boston!
Add Ashville, NC to that list. 3AM and people are still on the street.
The difference is the crowd, not that there is life, it's actually a mob, herd, or crowd all of the time in these foreign cities. When we speak of sustainable and "live" downtowns, we are talking St. Augustine style, St. George Street, King Street, type street activities. The closest thing I have seen in the USA is the typical mob on "Main Street USA" in Disney or at special City wide bashes at The Jacksonville Landing." If we took that landing crowd and packed not just the landing but all of Laura and Hogan, up to Monroe, then and only then would we see something like Bosnia or Colombian "Life".
BTW, Boston is crazy expensive and so is San Francisco, New York City, and Portland. The Northeast and Pacific tend to be high dollar playgrounds. The midwest, South, southwest, plains states, all tend to be much better priced and in my opinion
OCKLAWAHA
Perhaps age and technology have something to do with it. The places you offer as comparisons have been established urban centers for centuries. On the other hand, most of this country's major urban centers are not even or barely 200 years old and a chunk of their development has occurred after the explosion of the automobile. These two elements make it hard to compare apples to apples.
Could be Lake, the Colombian towns go back to colonial Spain, and most are laid out in a European style, and it's easy to see when Autos came into the picture. Hit suburbia, and you wouldn't know if you were in Bogota or Birmingham. On the other hand there is scarcely a village or city in Europe that isn't brand new - ancient. That is it was rebuilt in the last 60 years from DUST, on the same bones as the ancient city before it. There are a number of cities in Europe that simply vanished in WWII.
EXAMPLE:
SS Obergruppenführer Reinhard Heydrich was a supremely arrogant young man who liked to travel between his country home and headquarters in Prague in an open top green Mercedes without an armed escort as a show of confidence in his intimidation of the resistance and successful pacification of the population.
In 1942 Heydrich was assassinated in Prague, and so the Czechs saved their nation, but thousands of innocent Czech lives had been lost in executions.
Nazi Germany destroyed an innocent Czech village - Lidice - to avenge the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich. The village itself was completely destroyed. The village was burned, the remains dynamited, and then bulldozed so that no structure was left standing. Lidice became a symbol of Nazi barbarism.
Strange that Europe was able to turn the Nazi/Fascist policy's into an opportunity to rebuild a new and different society and urban life.
OCKLAWAHA
Any examples of cities that have been largely built after the worldwide acceptance of the automobile (something that Akron helped facilitate....to keep thread on topic ;)) that are just as walkable and vibrant as the established pre-automobile cities?
HIROSHIMA AND NAGASAKI :)
(http://www.annefrankguide.com/en-GB/content/hiroshima-2f.jpg)
(http://www.globalsecurity.org/wmd/ops/images/hiroshima-120.jpg)
BOTH PHOTOS HIROSHIMA
(http://aboutjapan.japansociety.org/resources/category/1/6/8/1/images/BE042931.jpg)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v385/stsebald/Nagasaki/Nagasaki.jpg)
BOTH PHOTOS NAGASAKI
OCKLAWAHA
Any photos at street level? Are these places just as vibrant as a Tokyo, London or Paris at street level or are they like Miami (dense but in an auto oriented way)?
(http://i419.photobucket.com/albums/pp275/kirina_landipa/memories/AKI150.jpg)
(http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj39/KOOL-KINI/h-n-7.jpg)
(http://i68.photobucket.com/albums/i16/fantasyakemi/HDR/DSC_8076_tonemapped-final.jpg)
(http://i214.photobucket.com/albums/cc250/davingtonsmythe/Kyoto%20and%20Hiroshima/IMG_0125.jpg)
(http://i903.photobucket.com/albums/ac240/intrepidjapan/Tibor%20pics/772.jpg)
(http://i400.photobucket.com/albums/pp83/kpattermann/hiroshima/DSC00714.jpg)
(http://i28.photobucket.com/albums/c231/d_japan/100_0763.jpg)
(http://i196.photobucket.com/albums/aa143/bajangrrl/DSCF1744.jpg)
HIROSHIMA including Peace Park and City Council building bomb ruins.
(http://i263.photobucket.com/albums/ii157/Manningtree/68StreetsceneNagasaki.jpg)
(http://i596.photobucket.com/albums/tt43/b00ksrgr8/IMG_1376.jpg)
(http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e67/andreaemn/Nagasaki/IMG_1853.jpg)
(http://i244.photobucket.com/albums/gg30/ryusei08/P1000372.jpg)
(http://i824.photobucket.com/albums/zz165/jpdnoelg/Nagasaki/f0c2c926.jpg)
(http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a50/jocyinjapan/Nagasaki/Picture073.jpg)
(http://i703.photobucket.com/albums/ww39/abigail_rose_photo/Nagasaki14.jpg)
(http://i703.photobucket.com/albums/ww39/abigail_rose_photo/Nagasaki9.jpg)
(http://i230.photobucket.com/albums/ee116/tkak7/Kyushu/CIMG3530.jpg)
NAGASAKI including Nagasaki Peace Park and downtown shopping district.
I think this speaks to HOW they did it, and WHAT they did that is completely different then the American model. Ya know Lake, asking me for photos is dangerous!
OCKLAWAHA
Great pics, however Hiroshima wasn't completely erased. It had nearly 420,000 residents before the bomb and never dropped below 137,197 in the period after. By 1955, the population had returned to pre-war levels. This suggests that they did not have to completely start over and that a significant amount of reconstruction had already taken place before America (I know we've jumped to Japan) really started to embrace low density sprawl. American zoning practices aside, its also helmed in by mountains and water, which helps with density. The same goes for Nagasaki, which dates back to the 16th century.
Btw, I think we all know the American model is different. Going back to what I stated earlier, a part of the reason the American model is different deals with the age of this country, its urban areas and technology. Sprinkle in land availability and culture and right or wrong, you end up with a different product.
The historic center of Nagasaki was not destroyed by the bomb. It fell on the other side of that hill you see which shielded the old city from most of the damage. The old city is pedestrian, charming and has many European influenced buildings since it was the only port where Westerners were allowed until 1849. It would remind you of San Francisco since it overlooks a bay with islands in it.
The bomb was aimed at the Mitsubishi ship building yard that you can see in Ocks picture of the bay. It missed.
Peace park is where the center of the blast was and is a beautiful and moving place.
Lake, the fact that many survived the bomb as Dog Walker has pointed out did not lessen the TOTAL and COMPLETE destruction of these cities. Even the ancient temples, and shrines had to be rebuilt, hell EVERYTHING had to be rebuilt. As Dogwalker said one side of the hill caught the bomb, the other side caught the FIRE BOMBS (which were far more deadly and destructive). They really had nothing to work with.
The difference in our culture and styles is really where it stands out. We elect a president and Japan elects a cabinet which stands under the Emperor who descends from the Ujigami (Gods) sometime before 660 BC! By the way the Ujigami spirits usually live in the woods, and meadows, thus the gardens Japan is famous for.
OCKLAWAHA
Part of the difference in our cities is caused by the fact that only a tiny portion of Japan's land can be built on. I think it is something like 5% so population density in the towns and cities is much higher than ours. Japan is mostly mountains; rugged, volcanic mountains.
Yes. This is what I meant in this previous post. To compare these places with the American experience is pretty useless to do based on many of the environmental factors expressed in past post.
QuoteAmerican zoning practices aside, its also helmed in by mountains and water, which helps with density. The same goes for Nagasaki, which dates back to the 16th century.
Btw, I think we all know the American model is different. Going back to what I stated earlier, a part of the reason the American model is different deals with the age of this country, its urban areas and technology. Sprinkle in land availability and culture and right or wrong, you end up with a different product.