The life and death of great american city_ jane jacob
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Jane Jacobs wrote influential books on cities, emphasizing the importance of safety, diversity, and mixed-use neighborhoods for urban vitality. She argued that successful urban areas need short blocks, aged buildings, and a variety of primary functions to thrive, while also critiquing conventional urban planning practices that lead to slums and lack of community engagement. Jacobs highlighted the complex interrelationship between city structure and the lives of its inhabitants, suggesting that planning should prioritize people's needs over bureaucratic tendencies.
![GRADUAL MONEY AND
CATACLYSMIC MONEY
“this money shapes cataclysmic changes in
cities. Relatively little of it shapes gradual
change. Cataclysmic money pours into an
area in concentrated form, producing drastic
changes. As an obverse of this behavior,
cataclysmic money sends relatively few
trickles of money into localities not treated
to cataclysm. Putting it figuratively, insofar
as their effects on most city streets and
districts are concerned, these three kinds of
money [state, private and ‘shadow world’]
behave not like irrigation systems, bringing
life-giving streams to feed steady, continual
growth. Instead, they behave like
manifestations of malevolent climates
beyond the control of man – affording either
searing droughts or torrential, eroding
floods…”](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/thelifeanddeathofgreatamericancityjanejacob-200820111145/85/The-life-and-death-of-great-american-city_-jane-jacob-30-320.jpg)
The life and death of great american city_ jane jacob
- 2. Jane Jacob: the author Jane Jacobs wrote 12 wideranging, brilliant books. In them she wove together ideas about cities, city life, politics, economics, and social and cultural issues, so it’s hard to briefly summarize her contributions to affordable housing in New YorkCity. The most directly relevant writing was in her first book, The Death and Life of Great American Cities, which came from her experience of living in Greenwich Village. President Obama agreesthat was “the most important book ever writtenon cities.”
- 3. “Canadian cities looked the way American cities did on television.” ― William Gibson, Spook Country
- 4. SIDEWALKS • SAFETY • CONTACT • ASSIMILATING CHILDREN “If a city's streets Are safe from Barbarism and fear, the city is thereby tolerably Safe from Barbarism and fear. When people say that a city, or a part of it, is dangerous Or is a jungle what they mean primarily is that they do not feel Safe on the sidewalks.”
- 5. SAFETY • To not rely on constant police surveillance to keep it safe. • Creates an intricate network of voluntary controls among the people. • A well used street is relatively safe from crime. • The more busy the streets the more interesting to see and walk along, which helps in self surveillance amongst the people. • A substantial quantity of stores, bars, restaurants, and other public places adds more interesting qualities and another source of surveillance.
- 6. CONTACT • It makes open interaction with a differing potentials of people. • For illustration, inquiring for bearings and getting exhortation from a grocer. • Creates a web of open regard and trust.
- 7. ASSIMILATING CHILDREN The children playing on the sidewalks beneath parents’ inspection and other proprietor's of the street. Sidewalks are where children learn the "primary essential of fruitful city life : Individuals must take a smidgen of open obligation for each other indeed in case they have no ties to each other
- 8. NEIBOURHOOD PARKS Non matriarchy environment for children to play and gathering place for people . Parks usually possess four common characteristic : intricacy , centering , sun shade and enclosure . City open space with a rim that consistently reflects the supposed magnetism or stabilizing influence residing the parks. Known as center as well as buildings to enclose park . The first necessity in understanding hoe cities and parks influence each other is to jettison confusion between real uses and mythical uses – for example the science fiction nonsense that Parks are “the lungs of the city”.
- 10. CITY NEIGHBOURHOODS 1.INTERSETING STREETS 2.CONTINOUS NETWORK AS POSSIBLE 3.USE PARK AND SQUARE AND PUBLIC BUILDING 4.TO EMPHASIZE THE FUNCTION IDENTITY SUCCESSFUL NEIGHBORHOOD: PHILLY OLD DHAKA
- 12. THE GENERATORS OF DIVERSITYCities seem to be natural generators of diversity, but not universally so. Some places are lively and bustling while others remain inert. Jacobs attempted to diagnose this by identifying four key items she believed needed to be in place to actively generate diversity in an urban district: 1.The district must serve more than one primary use, and preferably more than two. 2.Most blocks must be short. 3.Buildings must be mingled in their age, condition, and required economic yield. 4.A dense concentration of people. "Diversity, of whatever kind, that is generated by cities rests on the fact that in cities so many people are so close together and among them contain so many different tastes, skills, needs, supplies, and bees in their bonnets."
- 14. THE NEED FOR PRIMARY MIXED USE • Primary uses are the reasons that people go to a district, like a thriving entertainment hub. • Secondary diversity accounts for all of the enterprises that move into an area to support the primary uses, like restaurants and coffee shops. • The secret to a successful mix of uses is keeping the streets busy at all times of day with all kinds of people. • A single-use business district without secondary diversity is doomed, since the area will be deserted after 5pm. • After the district becomes vacant, businesses move away to be nearer to clients and draw more desirable talent. • However, a business district that is also host to residential units, restaurants, shops, and theaters can expect to thrive and evolve. “The district, and indeed as many of its internal parts as possible, must serve more than one primary function; preferably more than two. These must ensure that presence of people who go outdoors on different schedules and are in the place for different purposes, but who are able to use many facilities in common.”
- 16. THE NEED FOR SMALL BLOCKS “Most blocks must be short, that is, streets and opportunities to turn corners must be frequent.” 1.Short blocks ensure that pedestrians 2.opportunities to turn the corner and explore a new path can enrich the social life of a district and help businesses in all locations 3.independent grocer or new bookstore a fighting chance of attracting customers, strengthening the economy overall. • Long block • Shorter block
- 17. • Shorter block • Long block OLD DHAKA BASHUNDHARA RA
- 18. THE NEED FOR AGED BUILDINGS • The economic value of new buildings is replaceable in cities. It is replaceable by the spending of more construction money. But the economic value of old buildings is irreplaceable at will. It is created by time. All we need is lively Activities not new buildings
- 19. SOME MYTHS ABOUT CITY DIVERSITY • Diversity is ugly. • Diversity causes traffic congestion. • Diversity invites ruinous.
- 20. Facts • Users are not absolute. • Anything done badly can be ugly Homogeneity (sameness)seems orderly but betrays a deep disorder, as it doesn’t allow for change or expression. • City diversity is not innately ugly. • Traffic causes congestion, not diversity . ”Lack if wide ranges of concentrat ed diversity can put people into auto mobiles for almost all their needs.”
- 21. THE SELF- DESTRUCTION OF DIVERSITY • The self-destruction of diversity can happen in streets, at small nodes of vitality, in grouping of streets, or in whole districts. • At some point the diversity growth has proceeded so far that the addition of new diversity is mainly in competition with already existing diversity. • The self-destruction of diversity is so successful in streets that people might know/visit that street only for that cause. • The people register both the fact and effect of selfdestruction of diversity. • “The selfdestruction of diversity can be seen at outstanding successful little nodes of activity, as well as along street stretches”
- 22. Gulshan 2 Circle Doyel Chottor Old Dhaka New Market
- 23. THE CURSE OF BORDER VACUUMS MASSIVE SINGLE ELEMENTS ARE INFLUENCING IN CITIES • Railroad Tracks • Neighborhoods Universities, Civic center, Parks. • These neighborhoods creates vacuums in areas immediately next to their borders. • Border Vacuum creates a dead edge to the space. • Creates a dead border on its surroundings so that it can’t be accessible from any side. Has one control point. The Highway to Nowhere is Baltimore's most notorious border vacuum
- 24. RAILROAD TRACK AND PARK OF NEW YORK CITY DHAKA TRACK AND PARK OF NEW YORK CITY
- 26. SLUMMING • Slums operates as vicious circles embroil the whole city operations. • Present urban laws are an attempt to break the particular linkage in the vicious circles, wiping way slums and their populations, lure back easier populations with less expensive public requirements but this method got failed. • The key link in a perpetual slum is that too many people move out of it to fast and it has no economical profit and social improvement. • The first sign of an impact slum is stagnation and dullness. • • Lack of Disposal system, Fire safety. SLUM IN NEW YORK CITY
- 27. FIRE SAFETY ISSUES WATER DISTRIBUTIONS SYSTEM SLUM IN MIRPUR,DHAKASLUM IN KORAIL,DHAKA
- 28. UNSLUMMING • A decline in overcrowding among certain low rent buildings. • Have to bring a diversity in unslumming, such as business growth, variety of economic class, variety of economic class profession, families and children who are interested in school, park. • Key to city growth instead of a scene of urban blight. • Sidewalks become safe and interesting. EAST HARLEM IN NEW YORK CITY AND WEST-END IN BOSTON
- 29. • City planners tore down slums, include landmark buildings. • They built housing projects that made problem worse. • Planners need to think about a congenial area where people will want to stay, not to be forced. • Unslumming depend on the fact that a metropolitan economy, if it is working well, is constantly transforming many poor people into middle- class people, many illiterates into skilled (or even educated) people, many greenhorns into competent citizens
- 30. GRADUAL MONEY AND CATACLYSMIC MONEY “this money shapes cataclysmic changes in cities. Relatively little of it shapes gradual change. Cataclysmic money pours into an area in concentrated form, producing drastic changes. As an obverse of this behavior, cataclysmic money sends relatively few trickles of money into localities not treated to cataclysm. Putting it figuratively, insofar as their effects on most city streets and districts are concerned, these three kinds of money [state, private and ‘shadow world’] behave not like irrigation systems, bringing life-giving streams to feed steady, continual growth. Instead, they behave like manifestations of malevolent climates beyond the control of man – affording either searing droughts or torrential, eroding floods…”
- 31. JACOB DIVIDED MONEY INTO THREE PART • The credit extended by conventional, nongovernmental lending institutions. • Government, either out of tax receipts or through governmental borrowing power. • A shadow world of investment, an underworldof cash and credit.
- 33. SUBSIDIZING DWELLINGS • Stimulate new construction in currently blacklisted localities. • Increases net numbers of dwelling units in neighborhoods where it is needed. • Fill in gaps that occur in new front ages created where new streets are cut through blocks that were previously too long. • Add to an area's basic stock of diversity in building ages and types. Newyork City
- 34. EROSION OF CITIES OR ATTITION OF AUTOMOBILES • Too much dependence of private automobiles and city concentration of use are incompatible. • Depending on the pressure, one of the two processes occurs: Erosion of cities by automobiles or Attrition of automobiles by cities. • Trade demands transportation and communication. • There can never be enough parking for automobiles. • Vehicle roads and pedestrians needs to be separate, being together is a problem. • Street venders also cause traffic and congestion.
- 35. “The interval of the automobile’s development as everyday transportation has corresponded precisely with the interval during which the ideal of the suburbanized anti-city was developed architecturally, sociologically, legislatively and financially.”
- 36. EROSION OF CITIES: • For vehicle congestion, roads are widened and more roads added. Different vehicles have different horse powers, which have requirements in/of different roads. • Loss of green spaces. Roads taking up more activity spaces. • The more territory, planned or unplanned, greater becomes the pressure of traffic. • The bigger cities get, more the vehicle congestion, more the erosion of cities. Manhattan Chicago
- 37. ATTRITION OF AUTOMOBILES: • Attrition is seldom deliberately planned by anybody, and it is neither recognized nor practiced as policy. • Attrition operates by making conditions less convenient for cars, which requires changes in habit and adjustments in usage. “Good transportation and good communication are not only amongst the most difficult things to achieve, they are also basic necessities.”
- 38. Random parkingKuril Flyover Street vendorMohakhali Flyover
- 39. Visual order: its limitations and possibilities • Jacobs rejects the sort of repetitive, crafted visual monotony that looks so tidy on blueprints and road maps. • Designing cities means dealing with peoples lives. Streets represent our visual views of cities. • When people used intensely they need some sort of visual interruption or they look like endless. • This is due to the grid like nature of city streets. If they are not grid like too many people get lost in the neighbourhood. • There are ways to put interruptions to straight streets so they don’t have to appearance of being endless.
- 41. SALVAING PROJECTS: • The project should represent something that is worked back into the frame work of the city. • Cities offer multiple choices. However, one cannot take advantage of this fact without being able to get around easily. • The low income housing projects are where work is needed • They must be made livable and become assets to the people living there and to the city • Jacobs view is to begin the ground level and developed new streets that have uses. • The new streets should untie both sides of the project border and must fit in with the city .Jacobs argues that visual cohesiveness should not be regarded as a goal. She stresses the importance of the visual announcement that a high number of streets would make by picturing an intense life. • On the down side, if such streets go on and on to the distance, the intricacy and intensity of the “foreground” appears to be repeated infinitely. • Therefore the endless repetition and continuation should be hampered, by introducing visual irregularities and interruptions into the city scene, such as irregular street patterns with bends, special buildings, etc.
- 42. GOVERNING AND PLANNING DISTRICTS • City planning must begin to aim to plan for city vitality. City vitality must: - stimulate quantity of diversity - promote continuous networks of local street neighborhoods. - promote people’s identification. - aim at unslumming the slums. - convert self-destruction of diversity into constructive forces. - aim to clarify visual order of cities. • Self governed cities need a political power. • City planning requires consideration of people’s choice which provide variety of ideas of planning. They are unable to consider all ideas to become rules. • Different smaller divisions make a big a bigger division which make a district, governed by different representatives at respective levels. “A city instituting district administration should attempt to convert every service to which district knowledge is relevant into this new kind of structural organization.”
- 43. THE KIND OF PROBLEM A CITY IS: • Therefore, horizontal structures in city planning would work better than vertical structures, which aim at oversimplifying problems of such complexity. • Finally Jacobs argues that cities are a problem of organized complexity. • Running through the book is a consistent misapprehension, that cities exist to serve the needs of the people who actually live in them, as opposed to the needs of the urban planners, most of whom (judging by the outcome of their policies) live in quiet villages far from their interesting little experiments.
- 44. “THE WAY YOU DESIGN A CITY IS NOT TAKING A CLEAN SHEET OF PAPER AND DRAWING ARROWS AND AVENUES. THE WAY YOU DESIGN A CITY IS TO GO ON THE STREET AND LOOK HOW PEOPLE LIVE.”