tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28262055781880987582024-03-04T21:11:46.654-08:00...The More They Stay The SameA Historian's Take on the Relationship between the Urban Grid and the Automobile, Past, Present and FutureAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05564317383192729347noreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2826205578188098758.post-26393153007057618512014-07-10T13:06:00.001-07:002014-07-10T13:06:43.770-07:00You May Have Already Noticed, But...I have not posted recently, because my other blog, "The More Things Change..." has taken on a life of its own, and because I am deeply into preparing the publication of my next book, due out this winter.<br />
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Thanks for visiting, and I invite you to read my posts on this blog, if you have not already done so.<br />
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I would in particular invite you to visit "The More Things Change..." It is a very different blog, with both a specific regional and a subject focus, but with wide applicability. I post there on a weekly basis.<br />
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Here's the link: <a href="http://themorethingschange.michaeltolle.com/">http://themorethingschange.michaeltolle.com/</a><br />
<br />
Thank You!<br />
<br />
Michael E. TolleAnonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05564317383192729347noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2826205578188098758.post-8443334337997149002014-03-17T13:17:00.001-07:002014-03-17T13:17:39.929-07:00Where Will The Techies Live and Recreate? (Malta, Part II)<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> My previous post about the attempt to
establish a “Silicon Valley East” in upstate New York made it clear that if an
increasing number of young professionals do come to Malta, the concrete curbs
off the asphalt roads already in place demonstrate that their places of
employment in Malta will be laid out as an industrial park, with space for
parking lots already built into the park’s subdivisions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The work half of any “integrated community”
seems planned to be dependent on roads; the size of the parking lots suggests
that it will be automobiles that take them to work.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But what about where they will live?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Is there any chance of an after-hours
community of residences, services and entertainment that might reflect the
supposedly revolutionary future its inhabitants are bringing about?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Should the Malta area actually grow into a size resembling a “Valley,” the
land it will need to expand the footprint of its Industrial Park sites already
exists, divided and laid out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No so
with nearby potential residential and leisure locations, at least beyond the
one apartment complex that exists currently.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Such rawness invites speculation about the area’s future.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What might this new, still to-be-created
community look like?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Given the existing
evidence of industrial park spread, my speculation largely ignores the
workplace aspect and tends to wander about the questions of the lifestyle to be
enjoyed by the legion of future residents that the combination of money and
political influence hopes to lure to this largely “virgin” area.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Where will the employees live and where will
they recreate?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What will the local
supporting infrastructure—residences, cafes, restaurants, service businesses,
etc.—look like? Can an integrated grouping of residences/services develop in
Malta?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If so, what form might it take?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>There is an almost total lack of such infrastructure in Malta
itself.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A very few employees wishing to
live near their work have found local pre-existing houses, and proposals for
housing developments are appearing, but arrivals in the near future earning
less than a very high salary appear to have only one local destination: an
apartment complex still under construction.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The site may actually become a complex, with floors of apartments above
what is planned to be commercial space.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Only the renting agency occupies any such space at this point.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The site is not far from the Luther Forest
Technology Campus, and a shuttle bus operates between the two, so its residents
do no not need an automobile to get to work, just for everything else.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As far as thought to multi-modal
transportation goes, a shuttle bus may be it.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That is largely because there are three factors that argue persuasively
against any attempt to plan an integrated work/residence/recreation city of the
future in Malta, N.Y. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The first is the
area itself.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Malta’s primary selling
point—an abundant amount of land—renders any attempt to plan an integrated
work/residence/recreation community at least questionable from the very
beginning.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Add to that the already
substantial investment in road and intersection upgrading in the general area
(see my previous post for more on this), some already in place and some under
contract; together they suggest that sprawl is expected to be more profitable to
the area’s developers than integrated planning.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Second is the little problem that Malta’s location in upstate New York
brings with it. </span>It’s called winter. In Silicon Valley, winter is a chronological
abstraction. In Malta, N.Y., it’s real,
and it hangs around for a while. A bike
path connects the Technology Campus and the apartment building, but this past
winter should at least have poured cold water, if not actual snow, on any
dreams of the bicycle as a viable daily transportation alternative. Speaking of water, I must point to my readers
in the San Francisco area that it actually <b><i>rains</i></b> in New York, and I am not
referring to those persistent showers that go by the name in the Bay area. Real rain can be an impediment to commuting
that is too little appreciated out here.
In fairness, however, the area around Malta is gorgeous, and bicycle
trips through the countryside during the warmer months would certain beckon
those so inclined. So, bicycles for recreation most definitely, but day-to-day
transportation? No.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>While any integrated work/residence planning would seem to violate the
basic ethos underlying the project, a third factor may actually be the relevant
component to the evident resistance to such planning.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s that annoying variable that comes when
you don’t just proclaim free choice, but enable it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Those greatly improved roads that lead to
Malta also lead away from it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In other
words, will the techies that come to work in Malta want to reside and recreate
there when other locations beckon?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If
they are anything like the techies currently pouring into Silicon Valley, the
answer may very well be no.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I, as a San Francisco resident, can testify that while the latest wave
of techies are quite willing to work in Silicon Valley, they don’t want to live
there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They want the urban experience,
not the corporate blandness that surrounds their work sites.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Of course, when it comes to urban
experiences, San Francisco pretty much heads any list of American cities in
offering a variety of them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For those it
doesn’t, there is always Oakland.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The result is commuter traffic between home and work, which allows me to
bring up what is currently the hottest issue in San Francisco: “Google
Buses”(Google it and see).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Actually,
it’s an array of buses chartered by several companies (with comfortable seats,
air-conditioning and wi-fi, of course) that pick up the techies at specified
times along fixed routes in the city, whisk them to work, then back home again
in time for those evening pleasures that urban areas do best.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This makes them the perfect metaphor for
class conflict, which is dear to the soul of every true San Franciscan.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The image of the very well paid and
technologically savvy few who board their luxury coaches at public bus stops
while those who clean their offices and maintain their new apartment complexes
are waiting nearby for crowded, uncomfortable municipal buses is quite potent. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These two very different groups are also increasingly
making their respective journeys in the opposite direction.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The influx of the well-heeled is driving up
rents at such a rate that fewer and fewer of those people who clean and
maintain for the techies can afford to live in the city at all; their numbers
are dropping steadily.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The new techies
have thus found themselves the somewhat bewildered (if not altogether innocent)
objects of class warfare.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Could the anticipated wave of techies into upstate New York emulate
their western predecessors, spurn the local campus area and develop
work-residence relationships akin to Silicon Valley-San Francisco?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> Might</span> they in turn be accused of committing gentrification if not class warfare?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> If they do, t</span>hree cities beckon, each with a different answer to that question.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> The closest city is also the smallest, Saratoga. </span></span>Two—Albany and Troy—lie to the south, directly accessible from Interstate 87. Schenectady to the southwest is actually closer than Albany or Troy,
but lacks the direct Interstate connection to Malta.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The city most likely to see an influx of techies as unwelcome is
Albany.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is the largest nearby city,
of long standing and with built-out neighborhoods.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Many thrive, but the state government itself
occupies a substantial area, rendering it a classic governmental
dead-in-the-evenings sector.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The city’s
residents are virtually cut off from the Hudson riverfront by elevated
Interstate highways, and that is definitely a black mark.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In Albany, the reception of techies and their
buses would likely vary with the local street community.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Troy is the most likely destination for the new techies, and for good
reason.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Troy, which pretty much wrote
the script for “once proud river town fallen on hard times,” has steadily
rebuilt itself.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My visits there, which
span the previous decade, have provided me with visual evidence of how real
this is.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Troy offers new techies the
most, including housing that is both available and affordable, within a
stimulating environment of urban riverfront revival that seems to keep
producing new restaurants and cafes on a regular basis.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s a work in progress, but that may be its
chief attraction.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Residence in Troy
offers the opportunity to <i>get in early on a happening thing</i><b>,</b> a
siren call I expect many of the new techies will heed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I also suspect that if the Malta techies were
to somehow foreswear driving to and from work, the private buses that would
traverse the streets of Troy to pick up and drop off large numbers of new, free-spending
residents would be considerably more welcome there than they are in San
Francisco.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And then there is Saratoga, the closest of them all.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Saratoga is not just a horse of a different
color but an actual, living horse.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Several
of them, in truth, at least in the summer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Saratoga is one of the few American cities east of the Mississippi that
can, in the 21<sup>st</sup> century, lay claim to possessing a horse-based
economy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They are no longer a ubiquitous
presence on the city streets, of course (for which all can be grateful,
particularly in the summer), but they still are on the famous old
racetrack.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Saratoga has a vibrant urban
scene, particularly in the summer, when the local population is inundated by
visitors arriving to breathe in (often quite literally) the atmosphere of a
bygone age.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Visitors used to arrive by
railroad, and stay in hotels; the old station still exists, now converted, of
course, but the hotels are pretty much gone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Now they arrive by car, and occupy the cardboard hotels that line the
highways close to town.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Saratoga has
trendy restaurants, nightspots and the most expensive apartments for many miles
around.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Could Saratoga become to Malta
what San Francisco is to Silicon Valley, the place they would rather live,
while they commute to work?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Might enough
of Malta’s new techies be attracted to Saratoga to justify company buses to
transport them?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Would an influx of
techies further drive up Saratoga’s already pricey rental market, creating a
mini San Francisco?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Could we see an
anti-techie reaction among the residents of Saratoga, and if so, could anyone
actually call it class-based?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> It's pretty much potential at this point (okay, that GlobalFoundries "fab" can hardly be called potential), but Malta, New York has the infrastructure in place to accommodate the hoped-for reality: an industrial park, with an emphasis on the park part (as in cars), a nascent apartment complex for the less well paid or the just temporary, and three nearby urban areas that stand ready--more or less--to accommodate the anticipated wave of techies everyone involved hopes will flock there. All enabled by the automobile, to which due homage is being paid. In such a context, even buses to transport the privileged few could be pitched as environmental awareness. That's a shame for a location with no past, little present and is supposedly all about the future.</span></div>
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05564317383192729347noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2826205578188098758.post-11831215174874458212014-01-15T11:15:00.000-08:002014-01-15T11:15:19.348-08:00Quo Vadis Malta? (Part One of Two)<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>So far, there is only one Silicon Valley, and it’s in California. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are several locations jockeying for the
title of “Silicon Valley East,” however, and they present an interesting
contrast of approaches toward achieving the desired title.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is easiest to envision contenders for the
Valley East title arising adjacent to existing urban areas, as several studies
indicate they are.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These sites trumpet
their connection to a well-known and respected academic core, and thus their
nearness to a well-known urban center.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Cambridge, Massachusetts is the example with the most prestigious claims
(it’s hard to beat the combination of MIT and Harvard).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There is also a self-designated “Silicon
Alley” in the New York City area, but, as both sites are newcomers to already
built up urban areas, neither is an actual site so much as a collection of
firms and institutions in general proximity to one another.</span><br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One contender for the title,
however, is taking a different approach, in a decidedly different
location.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In utter contrast to the
several urban locations, New York State’s money and political influence have converged
around the tiny village of Malta, amid the bucolic countryside northeast of
Albany, where a massive computer chip fabrication plant is currently under
construction.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is the best contender
that money—almost 2.5 billion dollars to date—and political influence (harder
to quantify, but considerable) can create, more or less out of nothing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Building a Silicon Valley East in an undeveloped area presents an
opportunity to design, pretty much from scratch, an integrated physical
plant—workplaces, residences, services and transportation infrastructure—for a
modern, energy-efficient community.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This
would be extraordinarily difficult (not to mention expensive) to achieve in an
already long established urban or semi-urban location, but what about when you
can plan everything from the start?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Would not such an overall design testify to the future the products of
the complex will help to bring about, and become itself an advertisement for
and boost to the location’s future?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If
the employment predictions of those associated with this project are to be
believed, then Malta presents an opportunity to design just such a
forward-thinking, integrated community, one truly worthy of the name.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The chances of achieving such a goal depend
on a great many things, and one’s definition of “community” should be at the
top of the list. So far, in Malta, such thinking does not seem very prevalent.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>First, some background behind the development.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While Albany’s Capital Region cannot match the academic credentials of Boston or New York City, it is home to the State University of New York at
Albany’s College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering, a widely recognized
center of academic semiconductor research funded by large sums of both
government and private money.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Although
this new College sports the trendy name, the much-longer existence of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in nearby Troy probably adds more cachet to the
underlying requirement for an academic core.</span><br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span>
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The main attraction
in Malta itself is land, “undeveloped” land, and lots of it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This would appear to be a significant card in
the game, if the nature of the area’s first major business is any indication. That
business is GlobalFoundries, a company formed from the spinoff of Advanced Micro
Devices (AMD) chip fabrication facilities in Dresden, Germany, merged with
Chartered Semiconductor's operations in Singapore. The company is
actually owned by the Advanced Technology Investment Company (ATIC), a wholly
owned subsidiary of the Government of Abu Dhabi. The Malta site is known
as "Fab 8”.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Fab” stands for
“fabrication,” as GF actually produces physical products here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These products are microchips, in sizes I can
grasp only conceptually.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Still, in what
must be one of the more ironic results of the digital revolution, the
production of microchips seems to require macro fabs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I believe that if you stood at one end of
this fab and peered to its opposite end, you could see the curve of the earth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Even if I exaggerate (and that is possible),
the GF grounds are already immense, and are simultaneously a construction site
for even more expansion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span><br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>GF is both the pioneer and a sizable attraction for those seeking to
either locate or relocate.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Luther
Forest Technology Campus has been laid out for these expected businesses.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is mostly empty (GlobalFoundries is the
sole tenant), with roads periodically split by curb curves and a foot or so of
asphalt dead-ending into raw land.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
products may be cutting edge, but the layout is depressingly familiar.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Despite its trendy title it’s an industrial
park, pure and simple.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2v2mrtWaQy2hSd1vH6LQjqRV39dU0T-I6KpjzQxo9vL5hZpZJivE8B-zrnIYMrq_7DnmJgeHSgUTZF9-C4beyT6uWxtJlZXX9lt6aTr_rsB2J6n0bOkTk7etFGB9uEajhh8q5qxfx5IwT/s1600/PastedGraphic-1.tiff" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="405" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2v2mrtWaQy2hSd1vH6LQjqRV39dU0T-I6KpjzQxo9vL5hZpZJivE8B-zrnIYMrq_7DnmJgeHSgUTZF9-C4beyT6uWxtJlZXX9lt6aTr_rsB2J6n0bOkTk7etFGB9uEajhh8q5qxfx5IwT/s640/PastedGraphic-1.tiff" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"> Luther Forest Technology Campus </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Judging just on what is visible, Malta’s future as a tech center seems
inevitably dependent on the automobile.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Plans for the area announced periodically in <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Business Review</i> seem depressingly similar in concept, with the
operative word to describe that concept being “sprawl.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The assumptions in place about future
worksites and direct access are clear.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>So is the thinking behind getting to the area in the first place.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>As you drive to Malta from the Albany area (there is no alternative) the
planned dependency on the automobile is clear from the significant--and
expensive--improvements to the local road infrastructure.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It has obviously been planned and built with
greater traffic in mind than that which now occupies it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Much of the expenditures for the expected
development of the Malta area have gone into the construction of roads and
bridges to expedite the journey of these anticipated greater numbers to and
from it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The new intersection #6 off
I-87, for example, is a single-point urban interchange (SPUI), designed, as
Wikipedia puts it, “to help move large volumes of traffic through limited
amounts of space safely and efficiently.” <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Those traversing it for the first time can
find it well, disconcerting.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3WGmX3CnqXRtVYxhogIVT7xrFBjQ3QfpRYBddqXLm4GRgaZhGKxGqJwO9W332y7YJlmERCsHMQFVKeBhIcv6UtZJTkjD23pEMZnNMxEtfgrn4gEauyxjCwXG7zDEVjq-MDf6msTCyPcb_/s1600/Spooey+photo.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="359" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3WGmX3CnqXRtVYxhogIVT7xrFBjQ3QfpRYBddqXLm4GRgaZhGKxGqJwO9W332y7YJlmERCsHMQFVKeBhIcv6UtZJTkjD23pEMZnNMxEtfgrn4gEauyxjCwXG7zDEVjq-MDf6msTCyPcb_/s400/Spooey+photo.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">SPUI Intersection off I-87</td></tr>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> There is also an agreement in place requiring GlobalFoundries, if it
decides to build a second fab, to pay for the construction of an additional
exit off I87 between the current exit #11 and #12.</span><br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The network around Malta itself has gained
some notoriety for the seemingly unanimous agreement among those concerned with
vehicle traffic that streetlights are to be avoided at all cost.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The powers that be over the area have instead
built traffic circles, known locally as “roundabouts.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They are well marked on the pavement to
quickly instruct drivers as to New York State law governing the right-of-way on
them, but nevertheless provide moments of anxiety to those not quite familiar
with the required etiquette (including your humble correspondent).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Malta area also marked the first time I
have encountered roundabouts built into the classic cloverleaf design of a
limited-access highway.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After you take
the Malta exit off Interstate 87 and reach the intersecting road (State Rt.
67), there are no traffic lights, stop signs or even yield signs, just a
roundabout to send you in the proper direction.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>This is initially disconcerting, but does an offer an easier way to
correct initial mistakes.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinUO4EA6Fi0sRqmFvEUYnmpTzHe_yiJmstv1W0NlGVSpM9OtpFnPDL2TbPXXmaf-0tCv8SLfnlVAEOWTK-phyprV_JbpHqqwJo6DIFZQHLqiXsh5MZs9Sfi2Dpiqv_1HZYeDGZSRB2YbZB/s1600/Malta+intersection+roundabouts.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinUO4EA6Fi0sRqmFvEUYnmpTzHe_yiJmstv1W0NlGVSpM9OtpFnPDL2TbPXXmaf-0tCv8SLfnlVAEOWTK-phyprV_JbpHqqwJo6DIFZQHLqiXsh5MZs9Sfi2Dpiqv_1HZYeDGZSRB2YbZB/s1600/Malta+intersection+roundabouts.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">I-87, Malta Exit roundabouts</td></tr>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Once you have completed your journey, the best way to describe the
village of Malta is to say that when you get there, there is no there
there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I exaggerate, but only
slightly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There is a village here, and
there has been for some time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Prior to
the Big Change, Malta was not a destination, merely the intersection of U.S.
Rt. 9 and N.Y. Rt. 67.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In saying this, I
am being unfair to the residents who were (and still are) there, but in view of
what they have had to put up with (not to mention what is coming), I do not
believe I am adding any great burden. </span><br />
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjObucgHQXJznZG7DOGc5McAzwqgYFAjn7HxYdjR7o2uQXNPnWd_litTkJgr3zblAKmKeacA8bfd0gPXOocODXfOm-X1u-C77YrksDmlYOPWcO1u_B-ldQDDK6fFInWgFwinkg-uLZnCOEB/s1600/GF+protest+sign+two+-+cropped+to+sign+only.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjObucgHQXJznZG7DOGc5McAzwqgYFAjn7HxYdjR7o2uQXNPnWd_litTkJgr3zblAKmKeacA8bfd0gPXOocODXfOm-X1u-C77YrksDmlYOPWcO1u_B-ldQDDK6fFInWgFwinkg-uLZnCOEB/s320/GF+protest+sign+two+-+cropped+to+sign+only.jpg" width="294" /></a></span></div>
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The residents of Malta are also not taking things lying down by any
means (see photo), but their ability to affect the enormous financial and
political process taking place about them is most likely negligible.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A hand-painted sign on a backhoe
sitting opposite the first residential apartment project built to accommodate
new residents provides the necessary symbolism for this unequal struggle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They try, nonetheless, as a visit to a blog
site<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(<a href="http://blog.timesunion.com/malta">http://blog.timesunion.com/malta</a></span><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">)
will attest.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span><br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The reliance on the automobile that underlies all the planning visible
so far may very prove to have been the right decision (from the point of view
of the area’s developers, of course), but it places Malta’s future as a
community in considerable jeopardy. The
workplaces seem destined to emulate the current industrial park style, but what
of the residences, service business and the like that must be added? Where will the new techies live and recreate,
and how will they get to and from work?
That future, and what alternatives exist, will be the subject of my
follow up post.<br />
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Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05564317383192729347noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2826205578188098758.post-86914270005193413952013-09-04T16:23:00.001-07:002014-01-15T11:14:33.091-08:00A Surreal Experience<div class="MsoNormal">
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Since its publication late last year, I
have given talks about my book, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">What
Killed Downtown? Norristown, Pennsylvania, From Main Street to the Malls</i> at
a variety of locations, from a circa 1700s mansion to a meeting room in a
modern banquet facility, with auditoriums and public halls in between. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My talk and signing in June of this year at
the Towne Book Centre and Café in the Providence Town Center near Collegeville,
Pennsylvania, however, will always stand out, for its surreal blend of both the
medium and the message.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It is only mildly ironic that I would
speak of the death of a classic American downtown amidst a modern shopping
mall.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I strongly favor independent
bookstores, and if a mall location is necessary for one to survive, then so be
it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thus my complete willingness to
appear at the Towne Book Centre and Café.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Besides, I bear shopping malls no professional ill will.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The King of Prussia Mall was the prime
suspect during my investigation into <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">What
Killed Downtown?</i>, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>but my book does
not identify it as the cause of downtown Norristown’s death.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It identifies a culprit of even greater
dimensions than America’s largest retail shopping center.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">My interest in the Providence Town
Center actually begins with its causal factor, the Southeastern Pennsylvania
section of U.S. Rt. 422, known locally as “the Pottstown Expressway.” <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The highway is itself a subject worthy of a
historical case study, but it is the shopping center at its intersection with
Pa. Rt. 29 that interests me more.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The Expressway connects prosperous,
bustling King of Prussia with Pottstown Borough to its northwest.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The construction of Rt. 422 was sold to the
public for its benefit to the long-distressed borough of Pottstown, with Rt.
422 cast in the role of lifeline.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Of
course, connecting anyone or anything to Pottstown was not the road’s true
purpose, although that would have been an appreciated side benefit.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This substantial stretch of highway was
actually constructed to foster development in what was then still largely rural
land west of the then-existing Rt. 422.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
Expressway is a bypass around the traditional route, the westernmost portion of
Germantown Pike, which originates in Philadelphia.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>By the way, the Expressway does not actually connect
to Pottstown itself, but to another limited access highway, the “Pottstown
Bypass,” thus allowing Rt. 422 users to ignore Pottstown completely if they
wish.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">There is always a web of influence,
both financial and political, around selecting the exact path of a road, and
there always has been.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Pottstown
Expressway was no exception.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Close to
the road’s southern end, for example, it takes a very roundabout—and thus
expensive—path to avoid some very old properties, including an estate known as
“Fatland” that has been around since colonial times.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Whether this was due to concern for historic
preservation or because its owner was Peter J. Camiel, who was chairman of both
the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission and the Philadelphia Democratic Party at
the time, is officially uncertain.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">While how much benefit the new Rt. 422
has been to Pottstown is debatable, there is no question as to its effect on
all that undeveloped land along its path.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>In the final analysis the new road did what it was intended to do: earn
a great deal of money for those businessmen whose good political connections
allowed them to purchase land in the right place at the right time, along with
those politicians with good business connections.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The actual process was not nearly as simple
or its profits as predestined as this short summary would indicate, however.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There was never any question that the quadrants
formed by the intersection of Rt. 422 with the existing roads would be prime
areas for development.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The devil was in
the timing.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The two ends of the road were built
first.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They were the bypass around
Pottstown itself and a connection with U.S. Rt. 202 that included a high bridge
over the Schuylkill River.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Both were
completed in 1967.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The 13-mile gap
between the two was subject to numerous delays, for a multitude of
reasons.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>An intermediate section opened
in 1978, but the Pottstown Expressway did not open from end to end until
1985.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The total cost of the highway by
that time had reached<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>$102 million.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span>
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Some investors had speculated early,
but after the exact route of the road was known (not to be confused with
“publicly known”) the jockeying for property and financing really began.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The 20-year delay, with intermittent starts
and stops, played hell with several of the speculators.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thus, while the eventual profit from
development along the new route was basically guaranteed, the vagaries of the
financial and real estate sectors served to enrich some but not others, often
according to their timing.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span>
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Consider the case of the Providence
Town Center.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It occupies the northeast
quadrant of Rt. 422’s cloverleaf intersection with Pennsylvania Rt. 29.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The state road is of ancient vintage, and was
guaranteed an intersection (upgraded, of course, as a condition of project
approval by the local authorities).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The property,
however, went through three owners before construction finally began (this is
an enormous oversimplification, by the way).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The current owner, Brandolini Properties, began construction in 2008,
only to be reminded that while location, location and location is important, timing
is, in fact, everything. <o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">A more or less standard mix of national-chain
restaurants and retailers aligned along the periphery were the first
constructed, and their accessibility and high name recognition helped to
counter the economic bad times.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was a
Wegman’s, however, that probably sustained the site.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The company’s blend of supermarket, ethnic
buffets and sit-down restaurant proved to be an immediate and consistent hit
with people from far and wide.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It
occupies the local point of highest visibility along Rt. 422 as you approach
from either direction.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The interior of
the center languished for some time, however, and it is that interior that drew
my attention during my earlier visits (yes, to Wegman’s; I love their cheddar
cheese).<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">What rendered my talk and signing
surreal during my most recent visit, however, was that as I stood and spoke,
visible to me through the store windows and above the heads of my audience was
the now largely open and functioning core of the Providence Town Center.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That core is laid out to evoke the very
downtown Main Street shopping experience that shopping malls did so much to
destroy. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span>
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">When you first turn onto Town Center
Boulevard off Rt. 29, there is little to indicate that the site is anything
other than a variation of the by-now familiar layout of large box stores, restaurants,
fitness centers, etc., all surrounded by large parking lots.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Once past these into the center’s interior,
things change.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After crossing Broad
Street, Town Center Boulevard itself assumes the form of an old downtown
street, passing by brick sidewalks, small shops with (diagonal) street parking
in front and antiquey street lamps.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Town
Center Boulevard terminates as the base of a “T” intersection with Market
Street, the thematic climax of this deliberately-designed “downtown” core of an
otherwise conventional shopping center.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Dominating
the intersection is a MovieTavern, complete with an old-time-evoking marquee
alight with movie titles.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
MovieTavern is altogether modern inside, however, taking “dinner and a movie”
to a new level.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Patrons can watch a
movie while eating their dinner at tables.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Much of its marketing is aimed directly at families.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The remainder of this nostalgia layout
rendered in modern colors and materials features small shops fronted by parking
spaces along the “downtown” streets.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>There is music in the air, but not from street musicians, or even any
local music store; it is piped in from hidden speakers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>On a hot summer’s day there was activity out
front of the MovieTavern, but not elsewhere on the streets.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>People were able to park near to their
destination, and spent little time passing between store and car.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As these small locations fill up, the
diagonal parking spaces in the core will be insufficient to allow such
convenience for all but the fortunate few with the right timing, but not to
worry.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Larger, very conventional lots
lie all around the site’s core, merging with the much larger stores (and their own
sizeable parking lots) along the perimeter.<o:p></o:p></span><br />
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Providence Town Center is by no means
the first such nostalgia-evoking shopping mall, simply the first in an area
whose population once traveled to two real downtowns, in Pottstown and
Norristown, for its retail and entertainment needs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The marketing thrust of Providence Town
Center is also, in its way, a minuscule version of the oft-recurring American
impulse of nostalgia/guilt.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Often that
nostalgia is advanced most by those who, while unburdened with guilt over their
actions, had a lot to do with creating the conditions for nostalgia in the
first place.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The finest example of that
impulse is Greenfield Village in Dearborn, Michigan.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That unsurpassed ode to a vanished American
lifestyle was brought into being by the man who may have had more to do with ending
that lifestyle than anyone else, Henry Ford.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>On a more impersonal level, with an enormously lower budget and a great
deal less concern for historical accuracy, shopping malls such as Providence
Town Center now attempt to recreate—or at least to evoke—the very shopping
experience whose death their predecessors had greatly hastened.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Henry Ford possessed both the money and the
longevity to artificially recreate the real thing (period items rather
seriously rearranged), and Greenfield Village survives to this day, albeit
subsumed into a larger theme park.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One
suspects, however, that these new old towns, whose authenticity is no more than
plaster deep (and the plaster may actually be plastic) will experience a shorter
historical trajectory than did the real old towns.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Families may enjoy both dinner and a movie on
a summer’s evening, but will they want to stroll down an ersatz Market Street
afterward?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
</div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05564317383192729347noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2826205578188098758.post-17436153252714541542013-07-26T13:25:00.000-07:002013-07-26T13:25:01.529-07:00The Return of the “Pigeon-Hole Garage”?<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">By the late 1950s, merchants in the
struggling downtown of Norristown, Pennsylvania, had been confronted for over a
decade by a problem that still dominates urban centers today: the lack of
“conveniently located” space to accommodate the increasing number of automobiles
delivering shoppers to their stores.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then
technology seemed to offer a way out of their dilemma, promising to accommodate a large
number of cars on a small footprint. An alliance of merchants and local banks,
seduced by this near-miraculous solution to what had seemed a physical impossibility,
produced the “Pigeon-Hole Garage” (that’s it in the photo to the left, at its
1962 opening).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The technology failed, dealing downtown Norristown both a financial and psychological
blow.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Today a new technology has
appeared that again promises to “solve” the problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It also promises to add fuel to the already
white-hot dispute over urban parking garages, and provides me the opportunity
to again demonstrate why I choose the title for my blog.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">As I recount in my book <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">What Killed Downtown? Norristown,
Pennsylvania from Main Street to the Malls,</i> long ago (in the minds of
planners, if not historians) and across the continent, the Borough of
Norristown was attempting to deal with the two-sided problem brought upon urban
grids by the automobile: traffic congestion and parking.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Most attention focused on the parking
aspect.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Street parking and a few
too-small surface lots were already both clogged and controversial.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The only location with a potentially
sufficient footprint for a conventional parking garage of the necessary size
lay at the already decaying west end of downtown Main Street.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>An extreme form of parochialism among both
Norristown’s merchants and its elected representatives ensured that such a
solution never really entered the public discourse. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thus, when a proposal for a parking garage requiring
only a footprint that could be accommodated on a small lot in the center of
downtown appeared, it seized the imagination of virtually everyone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The new technology required the driver to
only park on a lift; after all occupants had exited, the mechanism would raise
the automobile and insert it into a space just large enough for the vehicle
itself (hence the term “pigeon-hole”), then extract and lower it upon the
driver’s return.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">While questions exist about the firms
engaged to build and operate the machinery, it is clear that the banks and
businessmen of Norristown placed their bet on a technological dead end. The
“Pigeon-Hole Garage” was not just a failure; it was a debacle for Norristown.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The technology did not exactly take America’s
urban centers by storm, either.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
concept did not die, of course, and has been reborn in the form of “stacked
parking,” which invests a great deal less in the structure itself, and can be
found today adding marginally to some parking lots in large cities.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">History does <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">not</i> repeat itself, but broad patterns of behavior certainly do, and
the new technology at issue promises another replay of an oft-repeated
sequence.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The overall technology is
generally referred to as the “driverless car,” and has become a frequent
subject in a variety of articles, columns and blogs. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A first step—moving vehicles “communicating”
with each other to prevent rear-end collisions—is on the horizon.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A potential early step in the direction of
the “driverless car” could be the adoption of “autonomous parking,” one of the
many examples of ongoing research into aspects of the broader concept.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Letting our cars park themselves could, as a
recent article in <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Economist</i>
suggests, ease our acceptance of letting them drive themselves.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Be that as it may, the technology of
autonomous parking alone suggests myriad possibilities for the next generation
of disputes over automobiles and the urban grid.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It could also result in the reappearance of
the “pigeon-hole” concept on a much larger scale. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Experiments
currently under way by the Volvo company promise to give a car the ability to
park itself, not just in the partial way already available on some, but from
the garage’s entrance up the (still necessary) ramps, into a <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">very</i> tight space, then out again and back
down to the driver, all made possible by the interactive wireless transmission
of huge amounts of data.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The enticement
is obvious: absent the need to open the car doors for people, each parking
space can be smaller, and smaller parking spaces means more spaces per square
foot of garage.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Parking garages would
still need ramps, but they could be narrowed and tightened, thus adding to
space available to shoehorn more cars in (theoretically) complete safety to both
panel and finish.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Given the top-level corporate interest,
the amount of money already invested and the determination of these
and future players to fulfill the promise (and reap the profits) of this new
technology, the debacle of the original attempt to “pigeon-hole” parked cars is
not likely to be repeated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This
almost-certain future has enormous ramifications, not just for the automobile
industry, but also for parking operators, urban planners and entire cities.</span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">As the technology becomes prevalent, we
can expect familiar historical patterns to recur.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Some advocates will see in autonomous parking
the “solution” to downtown parking woes, and thus promote it loudly, to
sympathetic (and deep-pocketed) interest groups.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At the other end of the spectrum, some will
oppose it as only exacerbating the other side of the urban grid/automobile
conundrum—traffic congestion, or just for extending the historical dominance of
the automobile in the U.S.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Some in “the
middle” may embrace it as a compromise, shrinking the footprint of parking in
urban areas, perhaps without even reducing the total number of spaces available
(a true siren song, that magical solution that would “benefit” everyone).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The variations on these basic, oft-repeating
responses will be both wide spread and numerous.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They will be offered by those ostensibly
well-qualified to offer an opinion (which I certainly am not), but even if you
become involved in the details of any of these possibilities, this historian
urges you all to, somewhere in a corner of your mind, remember that “the more
things change…”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05564317383192729347noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2826205578188098758.post-71291728435973371122013-06-01T10:32:00.000-07:002013-06-01T10:32:30.229-07:00Polk Street: On Corridors and Community<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary
offers several definitions for<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“corridor.”
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While some are metaphorical (“the corridors
of power”), the physical emphasis is on a travelled path, such as <span style="background: white; color: black;">“a usually narrow passageway or route.” <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The implication of the physical definition is
that a “corridor” is something you employ to get from here to there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Consequently, you give little attention to or
thought about what you are passing while you are using a corridor.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And when you are not, such thought as you
give to it is limited to issues that might affect your use of it to get from
here to there.</span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It is with some trepidation that I
describe Polk Street as a significant north-south corridor, as it lies one
block east of and parallels Van Ness Avenue (U.S. 101), which <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">is</i> San Francisco’s principal north-south
corridor.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While Polk Street is definitely
the road less traveled by, it remains a corridor, for several forms of
transportation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The volume and mixture
of its traffic require close attention from those navigating it; even brief
glimpses of the scenery to either side carry great risk.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And that is a shame really, for a journey
along Polk Street can be much more than just the act of getting somewhere else;
it is a trip through the highs and lows of San Francisco, both in geography and
community.<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><o:p></o:p></i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I believe that now, during a temporary
pause while MUNI collates the information from its “open houses,” is a time to
reflect on Polk Street not just in the context of gain or loss for one’s
particular cause, but on the more significant issue of how an improved Polk
Street might make for an improved community through which it passes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The key to that, in turn, lies in not
thinking of Polk Street solely as a “corridor.” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The overwhelming focus of attention so
far in the continuing saga of Polk Street has been on the narrow section, above
Post Street.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is by far the longer
stretch, the players are more numerous and the stakes are certainly
higher.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Small businesses line the narrow
section for block after block.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Those
using Polk Street to reach them, from semis to bicycles, must “share” a common
lane in each direction along this stretch, a condition that pleases no one.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The fundamental struggle between expediting
traffic and providing parking is most starkly displayed here, with bicycles an
additional—and welcome--component in the mix.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The community that deserves attention,
however, lies at the lower section of Polk Street.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It begins at Post Street, precisely the point
that Polk Street widens.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is a shorter
stretch, extending south just to Turk Street; below that are the large, new
Civic Center buildings that house only elements of city government, and then
only during the day. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Polk’s wider width on this lower
stretch cushions it from the sharpest edges of the disputes that rage about the
stretch above, although not the disputes themselves.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are also fewer businesses here. The
representatives of Save Polk Street that I spoke with knew of no businesses
south of Post that were members, despite the fact that lower Polk contains
virtually the only automobile-oriented businesses south of Union Street; stores
for auto parts, shops for auto repair and motor courts, each with its own small
parking lot.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Save Polk Street has
nonetheless taken a position in favor of the “safety changes only” option for
this section, as it has for the narrow section to the north.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is to be expected, and expected equally
is its continued focus on Polk’s narrower, longer and thus “more important”
segment to the north.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The bicycle
coalition will also focus its efforts above Post Street, for equally good
reasons.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The combination of a wider street and
far fewer merchants has made the lower section almost an afterthought to those
with a particular cause to support.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This
is unfortunate, for the intersection of Polk and Post Streets is a border in rather
more ways than just that of street width.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>If your travel is southbound on Polk Street, the up and downs you have
traversed from Union Street to this point are substantial, but they are only
geographic.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The adjoining community
differentiates largely in the level of affluence.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As you descend from the western ridge of Nob
Hill, however, you are entering “Polk Gulch,” a name now considered very
politically incorrect among the neighborhood boosters, who prefer “Polk
Village.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Gulch does have a purely
geographic origin, but it remains reflective of the descent in income and class
a southward journey quickly demonstrates.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The border between affluence and want
is an abrupt one, but no more so than is common in any large city.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The first clue comes between Sutter and Post:
an awning that proclaims “Check Cashing, ” with a smaller sign below
advertising “Payday Loans.” Another such establishment appears just below Post.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are no such signs on the higher
elevations.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But now you have entered the
Tenderloin District, technically its western boundary. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you had any doubts, the street people
hanging out at the corner convenience store quickly eliminate them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The structures that abut the sidewalk begin
to signal the change later, as the small shops that characterize upper and
middle Polk Street begin to disappear, further accenting the difference from
the heights of Russian and Nob Hills.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But much more than the buildings and their inhabitants have changed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The difference between Good Vibrations up the
hill and Frenchy’s Adult Superstore below Post is as much one of attitude as
altitude.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Even what remains the same is
different.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>People sitting along the
sidewalk enjoying the sun and conversation are a common sight all along Polk
Street.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>On upper Polk, they are sitting
in chairs next to little tables while eating dainty creations and sipping
coffee.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Below Post Street, they are
sitting in wheel chairs or just front stoops, and sipping from bags and bottles.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Those in the cafes above may have arrived by
car or bike as well as by properly-shod foot, but down here they are the urban
poor, mostly elderly, and the only wheels involved in getting them here are the
ones on their chairs. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">A similar theme is seen in the food
outlets.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Food along Polk is ethnically
diverse, with a great many locations that are tasty and healthful, plus a few
that are famous (see Oyster Depot, Swan).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>There are no national brand fast food franchises on Upper Polk.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The first—Subway—makes its appearance at
Sutter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then, at Eddy there are two, KFC
and Taco Bell.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Actually they are one:
one building, one entrance, one counter, but two menus.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Neither has any provision for parking, nor
any apparent need.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Their customers (with
the exception of truck drivers on lunch break) all walk, most from the
Tenderloin District to the east.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
chicken is lousy, even for KFC.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Even the buses avoid lower Polk.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The southbound Route 19 bus turns east on
Eddy, to turn south again on Hyde, while the northbound 19 does not even turn
onto Polk Street until Geary, having come up Larkin.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are more customers on those streets
than on lower Polk.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Muni’s options for this lower stretch derive
from the wider width available, but they also suggest that while Polk Street
may be a corridor, very few vehicles of any sort travel its full length,
particularly to or from its southern edge.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>One of Muni’s options put to the public was to divert northbound traffic
off of Polk Street entirely for the first few blocks.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This hardly suggests high vehicle usage.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It does not require statistics to conclude
that most of those who travel Polk Street turn onto and off of it at some
point, headed in other directions.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Thus, while Polk Street is a
transportation corridor, it tends to be a partial one, allowing it to nourish
its neighbors along the way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Except, it
seems, those unfortunate enough to live in the Tenderloin; they can’t even
benefit from the scrutiny that controversy would bring.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Upon the conclusion of whatever work
the final project actually undertakes, Polk Street will continue to be a
transportation corridor, and a safer one.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>While we will all likely applaud the result (some more than others
perhaps), those who focus solely on the street and its traffic will miss a much
more important point:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the true
significance of streets, roads, or any other form of transportation corridor
derives from what they do for the people and communities they touch.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Some understand this more than others, in
their own way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The merchants behind Save
Polk Street fear that making Polk Street easier to travel will make it harder
to stop, particularly in front of their stores.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>As I stated in my previous post, this fear should not be airily
dismissed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At a very personal level,
these merchants realize the importance of people using the street as not just a
means of getting somewhere else, but as a means of getting to the people—and
thus enriching the community—along the way. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There has been much talk within the bicyclist
community about how they should stop and buy at the stores along Polk, to
convince merchants that safer cycling will mean more business.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is to be encouraged, but will a safer
corridor encourage its users, pedestrians as well as bicyclists, to stop and
buy at the stores on lower Polk also?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>While I don’t expect bicyclists to greatly increase the business at
KFC/Taco Bell, there are several other stores and shops that do deserve a
boost.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This can only benefit a community
that could use the help. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">When all is said and done, it is the community,
not the corridor, that should matter the most.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Regardless of how you get there.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05564317383192729347noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2826205578188098758.post-38461070637206189822013-05-01T21:26:00.001-07:002014-03-26T22:10:19.570-07:00Parking vs. Bicyclists on Polk Street<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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The San Francisco Municipal Transit
Authority (SFMTA, or “Muni”) unveiled its latest thinking on the contentious
issue of traffic vs. parking on Polk Street in two “Open Houses,” April 27and
30, at the First Congregational Church of Christ at the corner of Polk and Bush
Streets. Neither event was a meeting, and
thus lacked drama that greeted Muni’s previous version of its plans. Discussions took place in small groups or just
face to face. Rhetoric was in abundance,
but little true dialogue. I attended
both meetings, my goal being more to comprehend the subject at its different
levels, than to examine the technical details.
In the interest of full disclosure, I should state that I frequently
shop along Polk Street, and I walk to get there, as I live just a few blocks
away. I also own neither a car nor a bicycle.<o:p></o:p></div>
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The section of Polk Street to be
rebuilt spans the 20 blocks between its intersection with Union Street to the
north and McAllister Street to the south.
Muni’s most recent offering divides this into two sections, the
“narrower width” from Union to Post, and the “wider width” portion from Post to
McAllister. This is in accord with the
existing situation, as Polk Street widens from Post Street south. The current traffic configuration on Polk Street
changes at this point also. South of
Post Street bicycles have a dedicated lane for both north and southbound
traffic; north of Post they must share the lanes with motor vehicles.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Muni’s latest outreach to the Polk
Street community took the form of graphic and textual outlines of three proposals
for each of the two sections into which Polk Street has been divided. Next to each graphic was a large piece of
blank paper, and both red and blue magic markers with which visitors were
invited to register their comments in a San Francisco-appropriate bold and
colorful manner. They filled up rapidly
and had to be replaced often. A survey
asking which alternatives the individual preferred was distributed and
collected. Other displays included a
transportation survey which updated some statistics, claiming that 50% of Polk
Street shoppers arrive on foot, as compared to 19% on public transit, 16% by
car and 6% on bicycles (“other” and “no response” made up the remainder). These figures differ a little from those
previously distributed about the project.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The most recent MUNI proposals follow
the standard three-option format of engineer presentations to the unschooled:
An option for little (or no) change, one for much change and a compromise
middle ground. Only the sequence of the
three options differs between the wider/narrow option presentations. Greatly oversimplified, the three options for
the upper portion are (A) safety improvements only, (B) a designated bike lane
only in the northbound direction, and (C) two designated and marked bike lanes,
one in each direction. On the
wider (southern) portion of Polk Street, the road width and considerably less
traffic has resulted in somewhat different options. Option (A) would provide a complicated
combination of a single bike lane northbound, separated from a parking lane on
the center of the roadway, with a bike lane southbound and <i>only one vehicle lane, in the southbound direction.</i> Northbound
vehicle traffic (considered very low in in this section) would be rerouted,
perhaps to Larkin Street one block to the east, which is one-way
northbound. Option (B) features two “buffered”
bike lanes, one in each direction, while option (C) outlines safety
improvements only.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There appears to be little controversy
over the “wider width” options on southern Polk Street, although rather more
over the specific details. This is
largely because the lower section of Polk differs considerably from that above,
with fewer retail merchants in stores along the street (I will deal with this
difference in a later post).<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Along the upper section, however,
controversy reigns. The dispute over
this section is—on the surface—yet another replay of the “do you expedite street
travel or provide street parking?” dilemma that has plagued urban commercial
streets since the advent of the automobile.
The antagonists are even arrayed in the conventional manner: those who
travel the street seeking a swifter journey versus local merchants who want to
preserve street parking. Yet there are
two fundamental differences here, both of which actually suggest that progress
has been made in the priorities of both the public and municipal government. First, the basic motive for the project is
not to either expedite traffic or safeguard parking, but to produce greater
personal safety for those using the street, regardless of how. This shift of safety from a side issue to the
driving issue should be welcomed by all, whether walkers, riders or
drivers. Second, and of personal
interest to me as a historian, is the fact that the traffic to be expedited at
the expense of parking is not that of automobiles, but of bicycles. Drivers are likely to be inconvenienced
regardless of the options selected; curbside parking will probably be reduced
and some motor vehicle traffic may even be rerouted off Polk Street
itself. The true “winners” of this
dispute will likely be bicyclists. Assuming
that MUNI will not select the “safety improvements only” options on both
sections, the question is by how much. Street
parking has thus slid to third place on the priority list. I consider this a step forward.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Not everyone thinks so. The proposal spurred the formation of “Save
Polk Street,” which claims to represent the local merchants. The group bitterly opposes the cutting of
parking spaces, while verbally supporting the need for increased safety
measures. They were present at both open
houses, wearing and selling black T-shirts emblazoned with “Save Polk Street.” The organized opposition, the “Folks for
Polk,” while more diverse, draws its primary support from bicyclists, who lined
up their bikes and literature outside the church building.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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The merchants’ very verbal opposition
to MUNI’s offered options is based solely on the perceived threat to Polk
Street businesses that a loss of even some parking spaces would entail. The current MUNI proposals make their
position somewhat more difficult. For
the upper portion of Polk Street, while Option (C) would eliminate 18% of
parking spaces “within one block of Polk Street,” both<i> </i>option (A) and Option (B) would eliminate <i>the same</i> <i>number of spaces</i>,
now identified as no more than 5%. Nevertheless, “Save Polk Street” has formally endorsed
Option (A) for the “narrow width” section and opposes both (B) and (C), despite
the fact that the loss of parking spaces are the same for both options (A) and
(B). Needless to say, they also dispute
MUNI’s figures about how people arrive at Polk Street via automobiles as well
as the cost in parking spaces of all the options.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A frequently made point among those who
oppose vehicle parking in urban areas basically on principle (and I count
myself among this group) is that the opposition of local merchants is
“irrational,” i.e., not based on actual experience. They offer several examples to prove their
contention. It is at this point that my
bias as a historian comes in, and causes me to distance myself from such
arguments. The point about
“irrationality” is valid (although I would prefer “non-rational”), but, if
there is one thing that my research in urban history has caused me to give
greater weight to—and tolerance for—it is the innate conservatism of small
business owners. The fact that its
expression in the admittedly hyperbolic “Save Polk Street” cause is based on
emotion rather than data should come as no surprise to anyone. Even the data can be understood as
threatening if viewed through a reasonably sympathetic eye. Small retail businesses are the urban market
economy’s equivalent of peasants, operating so close to the survival margin
that even a slight change for the worse might destroy their efforts. No small business owner on Polk Street would
view the possible loss of even 5% of his/her income, let alone 18%, with
anything but dread. Even the logical
understanding (by the rest of us, at least) that many of those who currently
drive cars are going to come to Polk Street anyway is hardly comforting. What would be an “acceptable” drop in revenue
for a Polk Street business? And who among
us is qualified to make such a judgment?
My final observation on this point is that judging from the business turnover
on Polk Street just since I began to walk it, and the current number of empty
storefronts, owning a small business on Polk Street is not exactly a license to
print money.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In addition to store owners who believe
instinctively that they stand to lose and bicyclists who see clearly that they
stand to gain, a third group (while I am oversimplifying I might as well go all
the way) was also present in some number. These were local residents, the majority of
them well into maturity, and quite a few in the fullness of their years. They are the pedestrians who frequent Polk
Street most often, and the experience has made many of them quite vocal.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The “open houses” are not a referendum; no vote totals will be taken,
and the final decision will be MUNI’s.
It is nonetheless tempting to view the process as a struggle between merchants
and bicyclists and speculate on whose side the “undecided,” the local
residents, will line up. From my
personal (and highly unscientific) survey, this third group may be largely
indifferent to the loss of vehicle parking, but is by no means inclined to
support much—if any—gain by bicyclists.
While neither of the two direct antagonists can count on anything more
than qualified support from this group, I suspect that most of the neighborhood
residents may actually side with the merchants.
The fault for that unfortunate possibility can be laid squarely on the
bicyclists themselves, or rather a small minority of them. At the two open houses at least, the local
residents, the voices of experience, tended to express a substantial animus
against bicyclists in general, each with personal examples not limited to Polk Street. The reason is well known: the tendency of some
bicyclists to avoid all rules of the street that they possibly can. Virtually every local resident has stories
about how bicyclists behave, and how they respond when reminded that they also
should obey the traffic rules. And yes,
I count myself among them. Before anyone
gets upset, please let me add that I have no idea how many act in this way, or
what percentage they constitute. I
believe that bicyclists (like gun owners) are overwhelmingly honest, law-abiding
citizens.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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Bicyclists have also hurt their cause
in public statements and online comments.
It is disturbing to hear or read the statements by (again, a <i>minority</i> of) self-identified bicyclists
that dismiss the concerns of the local merchants, or blithely predict that some
businesses will be have to be replaced by those more friendly to bicyclists
(read upscale), such as cafes. At the
very least they tend to confirm the impression of bicyclists as elitist snobs,
contemptuous of those whose role in life is to serve them, preferably with
trendy coffees.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Anti-bicyclist anecdotes were by no
means the only opinion expressed by local residents.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A familiar theme appeared in their
comments about the search for safety: “instead of passing new laws, why don’t
we just enforce the ones we have?” If
the goal is safety they say, the answer is simple: more police on the street to tightly enforce
the traffic laws; against drivers, but against bicyclists even more. This local version of the classic argument used
against any and all proposals for change is indisputably correct;
unfortunately, it is also moot. Too many
laws and too few personnel have been the reality for a very, very long time;
law enforcement has always had to select which laws to actually enforce, and which
to turn a blind eye to. In today’s world
of increasing health costs for public employees, no city has the option of
flooding the streets with additional officers.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
MUNI claims that after the comments are
tabulated and processed, it will offer its “final” plan (although in San
Francisco, few plans are ever final).
That plan will be composed of one of the previewed options for each
section, albeit with modifications in many details. This has not prevented charges by both sides
of official favoritism toward the other.
Given that this is after all, San Francisco, the local merchants have
more valid reasons to believe this than do bicyclists. It is unlikely that MUNI will recommend the
“safety improvements only” option for either section, and almost certainly not
for both. Bicyclists are favored to win,
but “Save Polk Street” will continue its struggle. The timetable of how this issue will play out
is uncertain, but be sure of one thing: the
war has not ended; other battles lie ahead.<o:p></o:p></div>
<!--EndFragment-->Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05564317383192729347noreply@blogger.com16tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2826205578188098758.post-90775241182642866692013-04-23T13:57:00.000-07:002013-04-23T13:57:29.424-07:00Why this Blog…and What is It?<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 12pt;">I
am sure you know the first half of the title quote, and a multitude of
urban-oriented websites emphasize the “change” component. </span><span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 12pt;">This blog takes a longer view, inspired by
another old (if less well known) saying: “history never repeats itself; people,
however, usually do.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I am the author of <i>What Killed Downtown?</i> which chronicles the fate of a classic
American downtown along Main Street in the mid-sized Borough of Norristown,
Pennsylvania. In 1950, crowds thronged
its streets and shopped in its stores.
It did however, have two issues: (1) traffic congestion, and (2) a
parking problem. I now reside in the
great city of San Francisco, a substantial journey along the space/time
continuum from the subject of my book.
Yet, while crowds throng its (hugely larger) downtown and shop in its
stores, it does have two issues…well, you know the rest.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Norristown experience is at the
core of my blog “The More Things Change…” which has a geographic focus on the
Delaware Valley. This blog, “The More
They Stay the Same,” takes a broader look—both geographically and thematically—at
the same continuing issues. The posts
will also be longer. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My research experience has been greatly
influenced by the close proximity in the Delaware Valley of both older small to
mid-sized urban areas and superhighway-spawned conglomerations, particularly
King of Prussia, that prototypical “Edge City.”
The historical trajectories of both types of “cities” are based on the
nature of their relationship to successive modes of transportation, so the
means of getting about—then and now—are my primary interest. This is ultimately a blog about
transportation.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My blogs cross-fertilize, and my current
residence in San Francisco regularly provides a variety of fascinating twists
on historical themes as the city plays out its cutting-edge attempts to improve
the quality of urban life, in transportation as in so many other areas.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
My approach may be one of skepticism,
but by no means pessimism. Skepticism may
be produced by the accumulation of knowledge; but pessimism is produced by the
accumulation of myths. Besides,
skepticism cushions the inevitable angst when the eventual results do not
measure up to the initial predictions, as is so often the case in this land of
Hype and Glory.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Here is a specific—and relevant—example
of what I mean: <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I view urban planners as akin to those trying
to design a safer football helmet. They
are to be encouraged, but their accomplishments measured against the fact that
they are attempting to bridge the fundamental contradiction between the
structure of the human body and the laws of physics. Urban planners should likewise be encouraged,
although they are attempting to bridge the fundamental contradiction between
the structure of the urban grid and the physics of the automobile. Both efforts are necessary, but we should never
lose sight of the limits their respective contradictions place upon them.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The above reveals the fundamental
belief that underlies this blog: there is a fundamental contradiction between
the urban grid and the automobile. The
physical basis for this is known to all, and is indisputable: there is close to
universal agreement that the least efficient method of bringing people into
downtown is by automobile. Of course, that
does not universally translate into accepting what I identify as a fundamental
contradiction, and therein lies much of the discussion and all of the plans for
our current visions of the “livable city.”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
While I believe my position to be an
acceptable starting point, that does not translate into doctrinaire opposition
to the automobile as ever more new proposals pop up to deal with traffic and
parking. As with those toiling to
produce a safer football helmet, the proposals and the plans must keep coming,
and I might even support them. In this,
and in much of life, we should all be in emulation of Emerson; willing to
encompass contradictions.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
In the final analysis then, my
observations as regard the automobile and attempts to deal with it are driven
by what I will somewhat pompously term “the lessons of history,” not the latest
calculations of this engineer or the proposal of that planner. This is what you readers of this blog are in
for: frequent references to history, but a minimum of technical jargon.<o:p></o:p></div>
<!--EndFragment-->Anonymoushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05564317383192729347noreply@blogger.com0